With incredible awareness comes the penetrating exhaustion that happens when you realize the stories you have been telling yourself aren’t necessarily the stories that are true today. Infinite possibilities exist where there was once none. For so long, I was distinctively aware that the Simon and Garfunkel song, I Am A Rock, resonated with my life and my realities.
A winter’s day
In a deep and dark
December;
I am alone,
Gazing from my window to the streets below
On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
I’ve built walls,
A fortress deep and mighty,
That none may penetrate.
I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain.
It’s laughter and it’s loving I disdain.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
Don’t talk of love,
But I’ve heard the words before;
It’s sleeping in my memory.
I won’t disturb the slumber of feelings that have died.
If I never loved I never would have cried.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
I have my books
And my poetry to protect me;
I am shielded in my armor,
Hiding in my room, safe within my womb.
I touch no one and no one touches me.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
And a rock feels no pain;
And an island never cries.
There are parts of this song that will always resonate with my soul. It is the nature of the armor that has kept me safe for 45 years. The walls that I built have kept me sheilded from the darkness that has sometimes surrounded my life. Thankfully the darkness didn’t actually shape me into an unhappy individual, but it was a part of my life.
For me, the surreal nature of being a survivor of childhood trauma caused me to become an empowered human being. I learned to stand strong and stand-alone; there was no choice. All of my life, I felt this need to create and sustain a strong foundation that would not allow anyone to truly penetrate my world. I always felt the need to protect myself from the world around me. I am not certain that my loved ones realized what I was doing, but I was always cognizant of the nature of my relationship with others. Only my children have been allowed into my heart completely; they are the ones that helped me make room for more healthy interactions with others.
In the last year, my resolve to maintain my island facade has been chiseled away, bit-by-bit. I’ve slowly begun to notice that people have been there for me in the last 10 years. When Aryeh was sick; there was a band of volunteers and confidants that stood by us and would have been there and the drop of a hat. Unfortunately, there were a few people that should have been there that didn’t have the emotional wherewithal to be available. It is what it is. When I had surgery, my friends surrounded me with love and commitment; they found ways to take care of both my physical and spiritual needs; some of my friends even helped me through the disgusting recovery process and the temperamental outbursts of recovery. Friends offered to come and take care of me from both near and far. Two friends ended up being there to support me along with my family. Slowly the evidence has been mounting, I am no longer alone in this world; sometimes I choose to be alone.
The abandonment of my childhood does not serve me as a move into what I hope will be the middle of my life. While I still have parts of me that love to be alone that thrive on the aloneness that I have grown accustomed to living. A cocoon of love and warmth also surrounds me. In the last years, I have slowly found friends that love me for who I am; each and every one of them is there for me when I exhibit wisdom and more importantly when I stumble. My friends will both support me when I cry and laugh with me when I feel excitement. The judgments that surround me start with a basis of love and loyalty; no one is intentionally out to hurt me on a core level.
A few days ago, I celebrated my birthday. For, perhaps, the first time in my life, I have felt surrounded by love and warmth of friends and loved ones both near and far. The treats, the calls, the texts, the letters, and the love have all touched me deeply. Not only did I receive loving and thoughtful gifts, but also I realized that I have grown to trust in these connections.
Let me be clear, just because I couldn’t always see the love that surrounded me before now, doesn’t mean that it wasn’t there. Since my early twenties, I have had great friends; sometimes I saw it, but not clearly. I married a man who was kind to the core and loving; college was the beginning of when I knew that people could love me. It was my college sweetheart who came to my father’s hospital room when I called him sobbing because my father had just been given his death sentence. It was my high school and college friends that surrounded me in the six weeks that my father laid dying and in the weeks that followed.
Support and love has surrounded me at nearly each and every life journey; only today am I beginning to understand that the support means that I don’t have to be alone. I can still love to be by myself, but that doesn’t mean that I have to be a rock or an island.
Today I don’t have to live in the shadow of my childhood; I both love and feel loved. No one in my life will purposely hurt me in any way. People want to hear my thoughts; my thoughts don’t have to be kept inside. Others trust my wisdom; my thoughts are worthy of hearing. I am not invisible and no one wants to violate my soul or my body. My childhood definitely scarred me, but it has also empowered me to become a healthier human being.
Only now am I coming to understand that I don’t have to live in solitude; I can surround myself with friends whether they live close by or not. I believe that my children opened the doors for this next stage of my life. Regardless of all the internal garbage, I have always loved motherhood and trusted the love of my children. The love grows at every step and the love has helped me to understand the true nature of what love is.
This year’s birthday has birthed a new reality, the vision that I am loved; I don’t have to be alone any longer.
Fascinating. Humbling. Touching.
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