As the summer comes to a close, I just wanted to share some reflections and insights from the last couple months.The mountain air is starting to chill, the warm fire a counterpoint to the uncertaining I feel in the pit in my stomach as my daughter’s flight back to New York looms ever closer. As parents when our children are struggling there are so many different voices telling us what we should do, to keep our kids safe, to help guide them back on the “right” path, that it is hard to distinguish truth from conditioning and wisdom from fear. This summer, I carved out as much time as I could, to sit in silence, reflect, and listen to the voices and talk to the various teachers who have come into my life. (See resources here) Sometimes this truth I seek is so clear, and then when I notice my daughter sleeping just a few too many hours, or a certain franticness, the ground shifts under my feet, and my mind races to make plans, driven by the lie that I can fix this, that I can make her see through my eyes. So these are some of the truths, that I am working on internalizing and embodying.
The struggle to be present
No matter how strong my intention to live in the present, and be present, from the time I wake up in the morning my mind insidiously rushes to the lists and challenges of the day, of
what I have to accomplish and handle in order to feel that I have been productive, so I can feel ok. Often the challenges come with the anticipation of the dopamine hit that comes with figuring things out, or checking things off a list. And of course aspects of my daughter’s life also get put on this list, right at the tip-top, of things to figure out and resolve. As I observe my mind, all the fluttering and movement, the more I resist and judge, the more I sink into despair. One of the key tenets of the Course in Miracles is, “I am determined to see things differently”. I love this so much, as it so powerfully reminds us of the agency we have in how we are experiencing and responding to the world. So I can choose to recognize that having a mind that grapples with fear and often moves into doing and control is just part of being human. Like so much of what we resist about our and our children’s essential nature, we can choose to move away from constriction and judgment and into acceptance and expansion. From this recognition of the perfection of imperfection, I can rise above the fray and see and feel what is unfolding in the present, which is often more miraculous than anything I could have planned or envisioned.
Versions of truth
This summer there was more than one difficult exchange with my daughter where she threw in my face the many errors of my ways - from my early admonishments that she eat healthy food and exercise contributing to an eating disorder, to my inability to defend her from her father’s anger, to her multiple stints in residential programs. All of her experiences were real for her. I know I need to recognize this as her truth, at this point in time. And her truth may change, as experience and maturity allow her to see the world through different lenses, to see more gray and less right and wrong, good and bad. I also know that I have my experience, my truth, which is shared by many parents with struggling kids - that I can acknowledge contributing to her pain, and that I absolutely did the best I could with the tools I have. So we each have our own versions of the truth, and our work isn’t to change anyone’s mind, to argue for right or wrong, but to validate the underlying emotions. We have to be vigilant around what meaning we are making, around someone else’s feelings and words which often call into question our worthiness as mothers. When I am able to untangle my value as a human being from how my daughter is experiencing the world, I take that weight off our relationship and am able to come to her from a place of wisdom that only neutrality can bring.
Acceptance of the unknown
These last years have been about crisis management. Leveraging all my resources to put out one fire after the next. Sitting with a racing heart wondering how we got here and what can be done to eliminate the extreme discomfort and nearly permanent state of fight or flight. And my daughter is alive. She is tentatively taking a pencil in her hand to sketch a vision for her future. This Fall she has the independence and autonomy that she was fighting tooth and nail for. I don’t have my head in the sand. I know for a kid like her, around every other New York City corner lies a monster waiting to devour her. And it is her life. It is so hard to write this as figuring out her life has been my raison d'être for at least the last five years. Yet this nightmare has come wrapped up in a package with an assortment of gifts; life will give us what we need, at whatever cost. So now as the rails she has resisted with such fierceness come off, it’s up to me to take the inheritance of these last years and shape my own life.
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