Lancing Boils (Part two)
October 14, 2007
I think most of the people who read this blog know me, and I thank you for your patience, kindness and support. You can see by the dates how long I have been working on this post. I'm sure you know this is not an easy door to crack open or go through. I know this has been a long time in coming and I know it's not well written or edited. It's the best I can do at present and I'm not even sure why it has to be done, I just know it does. So please bear with the errors, the stream of consciousness writing etc. So that said. . .here's the rest of the story.
So September came around and I started 2nd grade. Miss Woods was my teacher and she terrified me. She was a large, powerfully built woman and she yelled alot. I don't think she really yelled at me as I think I was her favorite girl, but when she yelled at the other kids it seemed to hurt me too. Several of the boys in the class developed crushes on me (believe me when I say I can't imagine why)and I had no idea how to deal with it. They would try to gather around me at recess and after school and I would run, so of course they would give chase. I know I was really scared sometimes and annoyed at other times, but I couldn't understand why no adults stopped it. So there I was running like a hare from the hounds during recess and lunch and cringing in my seat during class. Not much fun!! I remember walking to school and my stomach hurting so bad I would start crying and go back home where I would have a sudden recovery. The other thing I remember was math races. Two people would go to the blackboard and Miss Woods would give us a math problem to solve, the first one to get the right answer won. Joe Bob and I were the fastest in the class and I'm sure I actually won occasionally, but my memory was that he always won, most of the time by a fraction of a second.
SO. . . Lessons I took from second grade were something like this, "I'm good, but never the best" "No one is going to protect me, ergo, I had better watch out for myself"
Anyway, life became "normal" and I continued to grow and learn. I had enough, clothes, friends, love, stability, family to keep me on a pretty middle of the road journey. I wasn't the best, smartest or prettiest, but I was "good enough". There really wasn't anything to complain about much. I was pretty careful, with a few exceptions, to not get myself into any situations that I couldn't handle, as I still believed I had to look out for myself. I lacked a layer of protection that my other friends seemed to have.
I grew into a young woman and married a good man Jim (as an aside, there are a lot of Jims and Bills in my family). We had a family of our own. Moved around a few times with his career. Usual ups and downs of life. I was always curious about people and how they thought and what made them choose the actions they would take. Trying to see the world through their eyes. (I'm trying to summarize here to get to the "rest of the story".)
I had a son Brian, daughter Tiff, son Chris and son Travis. Life was full and busy. As the kids grew up I noticed that Chris was compared to my father by family members. There were many incidents that I could relate here but they would just make a long story longer. The up shot is that Chris is my father reincarnated!!! Remember that, it's important later. If ya got questions about that story I'll address it in another post.
Okay, moving on quickly, my children are grown and I become an Oma to Jimmy (see what I mean, another Jim) who lives in Virginia. My emotional pain around this was puzzling. I couldn't be the Oma I wanted to be with him so far away. I made every effort to see him every couple of months but it was never enough and just left me sadder. I knew that if it was what I really wanted, I could move there, but I was unwilling to do that. Hmmmm. I was puzzled. It all came to a turning point this January. My body was so wracked by physical pain that I began getting massages to help me stay mobile. I knew I had been going downhill emotionally since November and hit bottom the first of January. I had been close to tears many times a day and really not well. I asked Claudia about grief massage and she knew exactly what I was talking about and began to work on that level. There were often tears of emotion during the massages. We were moving the boil closer to the surface.
In February, Jim sent me to Dallas to visit my best friend Jane. We do amazing work together and he knew I needed to see her. I told her the whole story, one of the few times I had really told the whole thing. Very difficult but very helpful also.
Then in May Jim's brother called to say his roof was leaking and the ceiling was falling down in the sunroom????? Okay, this means a quick trip to AZ to deal with the problem. Jim is buying tickets to AZ and asks me if I'm going too. I hesitate, not sure if I could get more emotional work done home alone or if going to the grave site (which is in AZ) would be best when he says "I think you should go". So I say alright buy me a ticket. Then Jim gets kidney stones which put him in the hospital for a few days and immediately he says "if I can't go to AZ I need you to go for me". Chris (who lives in Cal) is between jobs and Jim has asked him to come to AZ and help with the house. So the outcome is this, Chris (my reincarnated father) and I will be in AZ at the grave sites on the 51st anniversary of my father's death. AND IT WILL BE FATHER'S DAY AGAIN.
The universe will move whatever it needs to to assist you when you are ready to do the work. I needed to tell Chris my memories of that day and when I finished he asked me if I felt guilty because I went to the store instead of staying home. I answered him as I always have "No, I don't think I felt guilty, I don't think I felt I had enough power to influence adult decisions. I think I took the lesson that even small decisions could have huge consequences, but I don't think I felt guilty".
We put flowers on the graves and touched the stones and I read a few words I had written about shifting energy. That was all, no thunderbolts, no great difference. Later in the week I did bring up the subject with my sister for the first time ever. We didn't really go into great detail, but at least the subject was opened.
Return home and the days go by, still processing, still weepy, when one day while driving I get this thought in a very small voice "I didn't stay home and save my Daddy"!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was like a gut punch. I do carry guilt after all!! Oh C--p, is there anything else we can add into this boil?
So the next couple of months I try and let the guilt come up. I try and talk to the 7 year old girl I was and reassure her that it was not her fault and she really could not have "saved" her Daddy. It's not easy and is very slow going. Even the adult Linda can't quite be totally sure that is the whole truth. I flit from emotion to logic like a ping pong ball. September comes again and Jim and I are going to Arizona again. We spend the whole month, Jim working on John's house and I stay at the ranch alot. This means lots of alone time in the quietest place you can imagine. I very carefully avoid writing anything and do very little processing. A few tears each day while listening to music was about it. Then on the last Friday before we leave I go into town alone with the intention of putting flowers on the graves. On the way into town I drive past the house I grew up in, and they are having a huge yard sale!!!! (the universe at work again) I drove around the block and stopped at the edge of the property, not sure if I wanted to go in or not. I had driven by the house earlier in the month and was surprised by how much is still the same. Same shingles, same trim, same fence my father built, same porch, same front door. (When I had dreams about this house it was always about the doors. Either the front door or the back door wouldn't close or lock properly and I couldn't make the door close and lock so I would be safe through the night) Anyway, I finally went in the yard and there was a woman sitting on the porch. She began talking to me about the sale and I said I wasn't buying anything but that I had grown up in this house. She immediately said I could come inside, but that things were a real mess. So I went into my old house, the house we moved to when I was maybe 4 and lived in until I got married. Over all impression is that it is just so much smaller than I remembered it. I was suprised how much is still the same. No major renovations have been done and even a couple of the cabinets my mother put up in the kitchen are still there. I observed myself go into automatic and remove myself from any emotions I might have been having at the moment. The lady kept talking the entire time and I had a hard time between her words and my thoughts.
She said she, her sister and her brother were moving into this house in order to help each other heal from their childhood of physical abuse and incest. They had grown up in the next block so they were moving back into the neighborhood they grew up in. She said her sister had tried to commit suicide just recently and her brother said if she had succeeded he would have followed her. She seemed like the older sister and she said she had raised her son and not passed this awful legacy onto the next generation and she seemed to be helping her siblings. She asked about my memories and I told her about my father, I cried a little and we hugged each other. Not sure why this is important here, I was just blown away by the coincidences.
I told everyone at dinner that night that I had gone into the house and the things I had observed, how much was the same. I didn't tell them about the lady's story though. Later in the weekend I tried asking my brother about the day our Father died and he clearly didn't want to talk about it. His whole body sort of crumpled into a kind of protective posture, so I dropped the subject. He is 70 years old and can not break the silence after 51 years. That's how much this awful act has impacted us all. I don't even like to think about how much of my life, my perceptions of the world and how I have interacted with others have roots in 1956.
I'm tired now. Jim and I are going to Virginia to welcome Tiff and Shaun's new baby into the family and I think I will take a break from this process for awhile. I don't want to bring this energy to this joyful event. I'm ready for some Jimmy energy and new baby energy for change. I don't know how much more work I have to do, but I would guess there is a lot. But for now it has begun. It's been almost a year and sometimes I get weary and think that's a long time, then I remember that I held it down for 51 years and it doesn't seem so long. I hope when this is done I will feel lighter.
I think most of the people who read this blog know me, and I thank you for your patience, kindness and support. You can see by the dates how long I have been working on this post. I'm sure you know this is not an easy door to crack open or go through. I know this has been a long time in coming and I know it's not well written or edited. It's the best I can do at present and I'm not even sure why it has to be done, I just know it does. So please bear with the errors, the stream of consciousness writing etc. So that said. . .here's the rest of the story.
So September came around and I started 2nd grade. Miss Woods was my teacher and she terrified me. She was a large, powerfully built woman and she yelled alot. I don't think she really yelled at me as I think I was her favorite girl, but when she yelled at the other kids it seemed to hurt me too. Several of the boys in the class developed crushes on me (believe me when I say I can't imagine why)and I had no idea how to deal with it. They would try to gather around me at recess and after school and I would run, so of course they would give chase. I know I was really scared sometimes and annoyed at other times, but I couldn't understand why no adults stopped it. So there I was running like a hare from the hounds during recess and lunch and cringing in my seat during class. Not much fun!! I remember walking to school and my stomach hurting so bad I would start crying and go back home where I would have a sudden recovery. The other thing I remember was math races. Two people would go to the blackboard and Miss Woods would give us a math problem to solve, the first one to get the right answer won. Joe Bob and I were the fastest in the class and I'm sure I actually won occasionally, but my memory was that he always won, most of the time by a fraction of a second.
SO. . . Lessons I took from second grade were something like this, "I'm good, but never the best" "No one is going to protect me, ergo, I had better watch out for myself"
Anyway, life became "normal" and I continued to grow and learn. I had enough, clothes, friends, love, stability, family to keep me on a pretty middle of the road journey. I wasn't the best, smartest or prettiest, but I was "good enough". There really wasn't anything to complain about much. I was pretty careful, with a few exceptions, to not get myself into any situations that I couldn't handle, as I still believed I had to look out for myself. I lacked a layer of protection that my other friends seemed to have.
I grew into a young woman and married a good man Jim (as an aside, there are a lot of Jims and Bills in my family). We had a family of our own. Moved around a few times with his career. Usual ups and downs of life. I was always curious about people and how they thought and what made them choose the actions they would take. Trying to see the world through their eyes. (I'm trying to summarize here to get to the "rest of the story".)
I had a son Brian, daughter Tiff, son Chris and son Travis. Life was full and busy. As the kids grew up I noticed that Chris was compared to my father by family members. There were many incidents that I could relate here but they would just make a long story longer. The up shot is that Chris is my father reincarnated!!! Remember that, it's important later. If ya got questions about that story I'll address it in another post.
Okay, moving on quickly, my children are grown and I become an Oma to Jimmy (see what I mean, another Jim) who lives in Virginia. My emotional pain around this was puzzling. I couldn't be the Oma I wanted to be with him so far away. I made every effort to see him every couple of months but it was never enough and just left me sadder. I knew that if it was what I really wanted, I could move there, but I was unwilling to do that. Hmmmm. I was puzzled. It all came to a turning point this January. My body was so wracked by physical pain that I began getting massages to help me stay mobile. I knew I had been going downhill emotionally since November and hit bottom the first of January. I had been close to tears many times a day and really not well. I asked Claudia about grief massage and she knew exactly what I was talking about and began to work on that level. There were often tears of emotion during the massages. We were moving the boil closer to the surface.
In February, Jim sent me to Dallas to visit my best friend Jane. We do amazing work together and he knew I needed to see her. I told her the whole story, one of the few times I had really told the whole thing. Very difficult but very helpful also.
Then in May Jim's brother called to say his roof was leaking and the ceiling was falling down in the sunroom????? Okay, this means a quick trip to AZ to deal with the problem. Jim is buying tickets to AZ and asks me if I'm going too. I hesitate, not sure if I could get more emotional work done home alone or if going to the grave site (which is in AZ) would be best when he says "I think you should go". So I say alright buy me a ticket. Then Jim gets kidney stones which put him in the hospital for a few days and immediately he says "if I can't go to AZ I need you to go for me". Chris (who lives in Cal) is between jobs and Jim has asked him to come to AZ and help with the house. So the outcome is this, Chris (my reincarnated father) and I will be in AZ at the grave sites on the 51st anniversary of my father's death. AND IT WILL BE FATHER'S DAY AGAIN.
The universe will move whatever it needs to to assist you when you are ready to do the work. I needed to tell Chris my memories of that day and when I finished he asked me if I felt guilty because I went to the store instead of staying home. I answered him as I always have "No, I don't think I felt guilty, I don't think I felt I had enough power to influence adult decisions. I think I took the lesson that even small decisions could have huge consequences, but I don't think I felt guilty".
We put flowers on the graves and touched the stones and I read a few words I had written about shifting energy. That was all, no thunderbolts, no great difference. Later in the week I did bring up the subject with my sister for the first time ever. We didn't really go into great detail, but at least the subject was opened.
Return home and the days go by, still processing, still weepy, when one day while driving I get this thought in a very small voice "I didn't stay home and save my Daddy"!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was like a gut punch. I do carry guilt after all!! Oh C--p, is there anything else we can add into this boil?
So the next couple of months I try and let the guilt come up. I try and talk to the 7 year old girl I was and reassure her that it was not her fault and she really could not have "saved" her Daddy. It's not easy and is very slow going. Even the adult Linda can't quite be totally sure that is the whole truth. I flit from emotion to logic like a ping pong ball. September comes again and Jim and I are going to Arizona again. We spend the whole month, Jim working on John's house and I stay at the ranch alot. This means lots of alone time in the quietest place you can imagine. I very carefully avoid writing anything and do very little processing. A few tears each day while listening to music was about it. Then on the last Friday before we leave I go into town alone with the intention of putting flowers on the graves. On the way into town I drive past the house I grew up in, and they are having a huge yard sale!!!! (the universe at work again) I drove around the block and stopped at the edge of the property, not sure if I wanted to go in or not. I had driven by the house earlier in the month and was surprised by how much is still the same. Same shingles, same trim, same fence my father built, same porch, same front door. (When I had dreams about this house it was always about the doors. Either the front door or the back door wouldn't close or lock properly and I couldn't make the door close and lock so I would be safe through the night) Anyway, I finally went in the yard and there was a woman sitting on the porch. She began talking to me about the sale and I said I wasn't buying anything but that I had grown up in this house. She immediately said I could come inside, but that things were a real mess. So I went into my old house, the house we moved to when I was maybe 4 and lived in until I got married. Over all impression is that it is just so much smaller than I remembered it. I was suprised how much is still the same. No major renovations have been done and even a couple of the cabinets my mother put up in the kitchen are still there. I observed myself go into automatic and remove myself from any emotions I might have been having at the moment. The lady kept talking the entire time and I had a hard time between her words and my thoughts.
She said she, her sister and her brother were moving into this house in order to help each other heal from their childhood of physical abuse and incest. They had grown up in the next block so they were moving back into the neighborhood they grew up in. She said her sister had tried to commit suicide just recently and her brother said if she had succeeded he would have followed her. She seemed like the older sister and she said she had raised her son and not passed this awful legacy onto the next generation and she seemed to be helping her siblings. She asked about my memories and I told her about my father, I cried a little and we hugged each other. Not sure why this is important here, I was just blown away by the coincidences.
I told everyone at dinner that night that I had gone into the house and the things I had observed, how much was the same. I didn't tell them about the lady's story though. Later in the weekend I tried asking my brother about the day our Father died and he clearly didn't want to talk about it. His whole body sort of crumpled into a kind of protective posture, so I dropped the subject. He is 70 years old and can not break the silence after 51 years. That's how much this awful act has impacted us all. I don't even like to think about how much of my life, my perceptions of the world and how I have interacted with others have roots in 1956.
I'm tired now. Jim and I are going to Virginia to welcome Tiff and Shaun's new baby into the family and I think I will take a break from this process for awhile. I don't want to bring this energy to this joyful event. I'm ready for some Jimmy energy and new baby energy for change. I don't know how much more work I have to do, but I would guess there is a lot. But for now it has begun. It's been almost a year and sometimes I get weary and think that's a long time, then I remember that I held it down for 51 years and it doesn't seem so long. I hope when this is done I will feel lighter.
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