More tales for the journey: Case Study (2) Letting go of the past

 
I came to a place where I had left an old leather suitcase, which I had once carried for my mother.  I saw it lying there, neglected in a corner and imagined that there was great sadness left in it that seemed to have something to do with me.

 I leaned down and inspected the tattered leather, which I had slashed with a knife.  I saw the damage I had done when I wrenched it open in my desire to find my baby bracelet.  I stroked the smooth leather surface, wondering what journeys that case had made, that I could never know about.  I was lost for a long time, pondering the mysteries of the case.

 Then I saw that the leather was a warm, brown colour and was soft and malleable.  I knew at once what to do.  I took up my scissors and cut carefully into the leather until I had several pieces lying about my feet. 

 I spent a long time carefully planning; placing the pieces this way and that, until I knew what I could make.  For many hours I worked until my fingers were sore and my eyes ached, until I had made a small rucksack and a pair of moccasins.

I saw the road stretching out ahead of me, inviting me to walk on.  I put the sack on my back, placed the moccasins on my feet, and set off, singing.

Tales for the journey: Case Study (1) carrying family pain

It was a dark brown, old-fashioned, leather suitcase of indeterminate age, and it was locked.  It was given to me by my mother, and I carried it about with me all my life.  It had labels all over it, of countries far away, trips made by previous generations, and far-flung countries with names we don’t use any more.

I took the suitcase everywhere I went.  When I went to school it was there, weighing me down and taking up space in the boot of the car: - space which may have been better used to store extra books and equipment.  It came with me when I moved house, and, rather than leave it behind, I threw away precious toys and brought the suitcase instead.  I was an adult before I dared to put it down, and think about it.

One day I decided to try and find the key.  I asked everyone in the family where the key was and they didn’t know. I wondered what might be inside.  I remembered my mother placing in it, when I was very young, a silver bracelet I had worn as a baby.  I wanted to see that, and hold it, and see the size of my tiny wrist at that age, but I couldn’t open the case and get at it.

Then I spoke to a wise woman who knew about these things and together we wondered and thought and speculated about what was in the suitcase.

 First of all we looked at the outside, and we examined the labels carefully and tried to work out which grandmother or grandfather had taken which trip, but it did not help me in my quest for I really wanted to know what was inside.  Together we wondered what was inside and speculated and cogitated about the contents of the case.

In my mind’s eye there were terrible things in there, and I was afraid to open it, lest they leap out at me and eat me up.  Gradually my fears calmed and I realised that the terrible things would be dead now and maybe they had lost their power over me.  Then I began to feel deprived and lost, excluded from the secrets of the case.  I wanted to hide the case away and stop being obsessed by it, so I angrily threw it away into the cupboard and tried not to think about it for a long time.

As the years passed I found that I badly needed to know what was in that case.  I thought about it every day, and did not feel able to live my life fully without the knowledge it contained.  So I took it out again and dragged it with me once more to the wise woman.  I raged against the case and the fact that it was locked.  The wise woman sat and waited for me to express my rage and I turned my rage upon her and said, “ Why are you so indifferent to what is in this case?  It is life and death to me, why are you so dismissive of what is so important to me?”

The wise woman said then, in a quiet, gentle voice, that the suitcase was never mine.  It still belonged to my mother.

I was shocked by this.  Of course the case was mine!  It was my gift, the only real gift my mother, in her inadequacy, ever gave me. I had made it my life’s work to carry it about for her and I had surely earned the right for it to be mine?  I stormed out of the room leaving the wise woman alone with the soft smile that enraged me, and I shed bitter tears.

Alone in my room I began to tear at the leather, wrench at the lock, but the case would not open.  I knew that if I could only open the case- if I tried hard enough- it would open and I would know the secrets of my heart and my mother’s heart.  I would know WHY.

I went to the wise woman and I left the case at home.  I felt alone without it, lost and vulnerable.  I wept for my loneliness; for my wasted years carrying the case, which would never open of itself and reveal my mother to me.  For in my mind’s eye in the case was my mother, carrying it for her mother.  I realised that she had carried it for her mother and maybe my grandmother had carried it in her turn.  Like Russian dolls, each mother within her mother carried the case: it got heavier with each succeeding generation.

Then one day, within my mind’s eye, I dared to open the case to see what was inside.  It was a terrible black hole that ate everything in its path, and I was afraid and closed the case hurriedly.

 I knew that I would never dare to truly unlock the case, but equally, I would never give it to my child to carry.  Surely I should take out the bracelet and give that to my child, and throw the rest away?

So I took the case to the wise woman, and with her help I cut the case open.  I sliced through the wonderful labels that spoke of past dreams and disillusionment.  I reached in with a trembling hand and felt inside the case.  It was filled with hurt and resentment and unrequited love.

Now it was overflowing with feelings and fears, and memories of past dreams; and there in the midst of it all lay my silver bracelet- not shining, as I had imagined it, but drab and tarnished.  The curling, faded photos; the little unspoken thoughts and un-given gifts; the unrealised dreams and terrible, terrible shame that I saw there I knew nothing of: they were not mine.

Clutching the bracelet  (the only thing that was truly mine), I turned and walked away.

Healing (23) Healing floating resentment

I am not insane. I am angry. This world has dumped on me for the final time. I am not spoiled or lazy for fighting is not weak or slow-witted. A real fight is gutsy and painful. I don’t care about the pain. I want to show the world I won’t be stamped on any more. People like me are mistreated every day. I fight for my rights to show society, "push us, and we will push back." I have suffered all my life. No one ever truly loved me. No one ever truly cared about me.

These words were written by a young man who had been charged with attempted murder following a street fight. Anyone who feels “dumped on” by society is clearly trying to find a place for free-floating resentment. For a start “society” doesn’t “dump on” or “push” people; the world does not “stamp” on anyone; also it is highly likely that at least one or two people in the whole world care if this young man lives or dies. In short, there is absolutely no truth in these allegations against “society” or “the world”. Resentment goes a long way back; far back into the Dream of the Womb.

Healing (22) Forgiveness and repentance

Repentance is a complex psychological and spiritual task, and history reveals with what difficulty people acheive it. It comes in a total surrender to the Way Things Are, yet there are ten difficult steps to be taken, before repentance can be complete.

• The first step is to realise the nature of  your invented shame.

• The second step is to achieve self acceptance through an honest personal evaluation of  invented shame.
• The third step is to face the truth of one's genuine morally shameful behaviour .
  

New Year resolutions for womb twin survivors?

What could they be?


To decide that this will be the year you begin, or make progress with, the womb twin work:

• Acknowledging that yes, you are a womb twin survivor and yes, it has been a problem all your life
• Deciding to do something about that
• Finding out about twins and twinning, the "vanishing twin phenomenon", dermoid cysts and all the other signs and indications that you once had a twin

(See the whole list here)

• Recognising how the way you feel about life, your whole world view in fact was formed before you were born and the loss of your womb twin was an important aspect of that
• Letting go of resentment and bitterness over past hurts - see how you hold on to that pain
• Clearing clutter from your mind, your heart , your life and your home
• Honouring your womb twin in some way

 Make a memorial, perhaps?


What will your resolution be? Leave a comment to let us know,  let's encourage each other!


( What is mine? To put up a post for every day of 2011 on this blog. Will I make it?  Follow this blog and see! )

Parents: do they damage their children?

One disturbing aspect of working with wombtwin survivors for me, has been the level of resentment against one or both parents, as if they were responsible for all one's pain and distress and indeed one's psychological problems. Sigmund Freud, not having access to wombtwin theory of course, as little was know about life before birth at that time, assumed that psychological problems were due to sexual abuse. Great, thanks.

However those who came later seem to have looked a little wider and the idea that psychological problems begin in childhood was quickly established and remains central to all psychotherapies, expect of course pre and perinatal psychotherapy, but that's a story for another time.

If one is full of resentment and looking for a place to put it, what better than Mum and Dad? Philip Larkin, ( a wombtwin survivor if ever there was one!) wrote plenty of dark, self-indulgent poetry and blamed his parents for his pain. He wrote the famous : "They F*** oyu up, your Mum and Dad. " see the rest here.

Well I have revised this poem and invite your comments;

Larkin about

They take the rap, your Mum and Dad-
They do not mean to, but they do.
They fill up with the faults you had
And take the blame for love of you.

But they were carried in their turn
By folks with quite a different brain,
And half the time tried to be firm
And half the time took on your pain.

Child hands on misery to Mum
And lets Dad carry all the shit.
Then he or she is innocent:
And that's about the size of it.

Constant, secret, seething resentment

Now this has come to light as "Resentment syndrome" : an interesting aspect of the Dream of the Womb and the need to keep that dream alive, for therein lies the lost twin. [ article here to maybe read later]

Resentment. That sense of some Great Wrong having been done to you.
Constant. That feeling that underlies every waking moment and some dreams as well.
Seething. Restless, always active, always moving, always seeking out a target.
Secret. Hidden, discrete, a little shameful but very real.

Anyone with resentment syndrome directs an incredible amount of energy towards the every day practice of feeling resentment:

• one can resent some past hurt or something taken away.
• one can resent the fact that something is unfair or unjust
• one can resent someone who just doesn't understand how you feel
• one can resent the fact that the world is made how it is, filled with pain and suffering

resentment feels powerful because it is angry and hurt and feels very much like self preservation.
resentment feels honourable because one must protect one's rights
resentment feels absolutely authentic because the feelings are so very real

what if:

What is something truly was taken; what if there was a life and death struggle? What if the weakest one did go to the wall? What if your life came at the cost of another life? What if survivor guilt is holding you back?

It seems to me that, for the survivor of an identical twin pair, resentment is probably the only way to express those feelings in born life.

Natural enough - but what a waste of good life energy. The healing is to let go of resentment and begin to live a fuller life. Forgiveness: that does it.

Today, a new idea: that children create for themselves the parents they need to keep alive their Dream of the Womb.

This is the idea: ( comments welcomed.)

A child is filled with angry resentment and directs it to one or both parents: “You made me this way!!” The child finds one or both parents inaccessible, rejecting and cold. The child withdraws into a secret, private world where the pain of isolation and emotional neglect is made bearable. Only by complete withdrawal from the parents can the child survive emotionally.

Meanwhile, the parents, faced with their child’s total withdrawal, find their child inaccessible, rejecting and cold. The parents withdraw into their own world and only when they are completely separate from the child is the emotional pain made bearable.

So on both sides of this family divide each party feels the same: rejected, unwanted and unloved. The parents see the child’s coldness towards them and they withdraw, feeling hurt and unloved. The child sees the parents' withdrawal and so the child withdraws still further, feeling hurt and neglected.

The pain that lies between them never leaves, never heals. The child lives in pain and the parents die in pain. The parents take their pain to the grave. For the surviving child, the death of the parents is a relief from this constant, unnamed, family pain.

This is a terrible tragedy. It is a travesty of what families are for: where is unconditional love, forgiveness and reconciliation in this situation?

But wait! Here is the same mother trying to reach her child, who will not meet her eyes, but is withdrawn and evidently in pain.

The child is saying: “What is there for me in this family?’
The mother is saying: "There is unconditional love forever, whatever you do and wherever you go.”

Here surely is healing! Here is the answer! Let us pour love on this situation and the family relationships can heal and grow!

But there is to be no healing in this family. Notice the child’s distainful silence and withdrawl. The love remains unacknowledged and the pain un-healed.

“YOU made me this way!’ cries the child, and the parents hold each other and weep.

We are told we must believe this child.

We are told that parents are vital to a child's emotional well-being. We are told that the quality of love between the parents and the child is to be unconditional if it is to enable the child to grow. The social policy of this country is built on a single idea: that family life fosters the growth of children and by fostering family life we help to make better citizens. We are told that emotional intelligence is about empathy and the ability to make good connections with people. We are told that children learn emotional intelligence from their parents.

This is wrong. Parents do not make their children. Parents deal in the best way they can with the children they are given.

Children are born, not made. In our desperate search for explanations for why so many families break down as love dies a silent and painful death, we have been grasping at straws. In a procrustean effort to fit our psychological theories to the facts, we still choose to believe, along with Freud, Winnicott and all the others, that the root of neurosis lies in the primary relationships made in the first vital weeks and months of life. This means what when children withdraw into silence and begin a painful path to self-destruction through eating disorders, addictions, self-harm, unplanned pregnancy, impossible relationships and all the rest, that we can blame the parents.

This is wrong, parents do not make their children. What moulds our children is their life in the womb.

For the surviving identical twin, the primal relationship was not with Mum and Dad, but with their inaccessible, cold and unresponsive other half: their twin. After a brief period of live interaction, one twin begins to die. The twin becomes withdrawn, goes cold and inaccessible and in time goes away completely. This tragedy is being re-enacted in familes all over the world.

Wombtwin survivors create the parents they need to keep their Dream alive.

I wonder: if this was generally understood, could this secret and mysterious pain be healed at last? I do hope so.