In therapy today, we wandered. I neglected to do my homework last week due to the usual, plus some days where I couldn't sleep until 3 am. (I am feeling somewhat better, which means I cannot get away without my homework next week.)
Instead of homework, we talked about other things. Last week, when I was making a comparison to illustrate how I felt at one point, I told her a story about something that happened when I was a child. It happened several times: I lost my parents in a department store. I would stop to look at something and when I was done I'd look around and they would be nowhere near me. I'd go from aisle to aisle looking, panic growing inside me. When I was too short to look over the top of the aisles, it was like I was caught in a maze; even when I went to the same aisle again (in case my parents were looking for me), it looked different. And I never asked another person for help.
I always found them. And every time they'd say "Oh? You were lost? We didn't know that." Way to go folks. Kind of lost parenting points there. Even to this day, I stay close to friends when I'm shopping with them because I feel that panic start to rise if I cannot find them immediately.
Since my mom's death, I've experienced a lot of that lost, panicky feeling. Today my therapist told me something she'd forgotten to say last week, which was that she sees me being in that place of being lost and unable to find my family — permanently. And now I have to find a way to become okay with myself and with being here. Without my parents, my brother. Just me.
The idea of being lost in the department store for the rest of my life punched me in the stomach I know she didn't mean it that literally, but I am a literal person in unexpected ways. And I kind of do feel as if I am lost in the department store. One of the darkly funny things about that is that some of the scariest movies I've ever seen — seen when I was a kid — took place in department stores.
Have you ever been lost? Did you look for your parents, or did they look for you? Who was panicking and who was calm? I've known kids who felt it was their parents who were lost, not themselves. No panic. Just hanging out doing what they wanted until their parents came running to find them. These kids didn't understand why their parents were so upset. I suppose I have to become that kid, because no one is going to run around looking for me.
What do you think are the qualities a person needs to adapt to the department store, to being alone? Yes, i know I have friends, good friends, but in the end, it is me and my aisle in the store and no one running around trying to find me. I've got to get home by myself this time. I'm not sure how.
I was definitely a panicker--I know that lost feeling. Your post makes me think of what Mary Stella wrote on the post about being an adult, I was just reading it:
ReplyDelete"When Dad died, I felt like a tightrope walker who looked down and realized that there was nothing between me and the hard ground except air. ... In one lesson, I learned that being an adult meant that I was my own first responder, first, second and last resort, ... It doesn’t mean that loved ones or other people in your life won’t support us ever again.... but as an adult, the bottom line rests with me. The Buck Stops Here. I’m okay with this."
(She also mentions that her mother was an alcoholic, and later died. And she's also still single.)
I don't know exactly how she made this adaptation. Maybe we could ask her to do a Lucy Guest Post about it. :-)
I also got lost and panicked. Partly cause I was scared of being lost, and partly cause I knew I'd get in trouble for wandering off.
ReplyDeleteYou have to give yourself credit for being able to see over the walls now. You are strong and capable. My therapist introduced me to the concept of self parenting - you take care of yourself the way you would take care of a scared, sad little kid. She says we can all learn to mother ourselves, and that eventually, that ability will help us find someone else who needs our love. I like the idea of that, of being my own parent, of learning to actually take care of myself. Not in the "I am responsible for myself" way, cause we all already do that, but in the "I am going to take good care, to show care, to treat myself with care" kind of way.
BFB I love that self-mothering concept. It's a good thing to remember, especially for me, since I sMother everyone, except my own wee self elf (to her, I am way harsh).
ReplyDeleteChangeling, I believe that you could start by looking at the department store more as a place of fun, instead of a place you are lost in. (I often thought that I WANTED to be left behind on some shopping trip, then I could LIVE in the store! But then, there is the whole "I'm in the bathroom" thing, so maybe not.)
Part of it is looking at yourself as a valuable and complete person, genetic family or not, you are the whole You. Not lost, not left behind, but all-encompassing (IN-compassing?) as an entire being. (I never know where I am going with these thoughts, crap just comes out of the keyboard, and then I don't know what to do with it. Perhaps my job is to be a prompt.)
Julie
(who can usually be found near the potty)
Interesting that two of the three of you panic. Makes me feel a bit less alone in this. Bona Fide - I'm so sorry you would get in trouble. That's just wrong. But then, some adults expect kids to know and be what adults are, from day one. <>
ReplyDeleteJulie, interesting idea. I'll work on that.
Bona Fide - yes, I have heard of reparenting. We'll see what Karent the therapist thinks. We are doing such different things than I have ever done. (And I HATE crying!)