Chapter 1: The Beauty of Heartache

written August 2016

This piece of writing had many working titles...

"The Precious Pin Cushion" was one. "The Art of Aging" and "The Only Way Is Through" were a few others. “The Beauty of Heartache” emerged. Beauty, wonder, pain, love and so much more swim in and around heartache. May these words from my full, aching, tender heart find their way to yours.

Long ago, when faced with heartache (that deep, brutal kind of grief), all I wanted was to be kind to myself and move through it. I believed I was open and vulnerable, but I was guarded against the depth of my pain. I put myself on an island, imagining my suffering was unlike anyone else's. I wore that belief like armor. I didn’t realize that I was frozen inside a sea of trauma. I didn't want to talk about things in a support group, and I didn't want to read books. I moved through my days (and years) powering through and taking care of everyone else. I was surviving but I was certainly not thriving. I began to learn everything I could about grief so that I could better navigate all that was happening in and around me.

Grief hurts. And the unpredictable, challenging thing about grief, it is not linear. It is not nice; it is not mean. It does not wait for a convenient time to show up. It is loud. It is quiet. It is up and down and all over the place. Yet grief is not the only thing I want to share here. I want to allow what is the foundation, the underpinning of what grief is truly about for me, and maybe for you too. Grace. By definition, grace is "to do honor to someone or something by one's presence." Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound. Grace and love. Love binds and connects and heals. I am so grateful I learned to soften and find my vulnerable places inside. Tapping into the dimension of my feelings, all of my feelings, I have found a well-spring of not just heartache, but amazing grace and true love.

Mothering My Mother

This is a story about my mother. The meaning of mother. Mothering my mother.

It started sometime in 2012, perhaps much earlier. I began noticing my mom couldn't keep track of a card game. Fast forward. We are one of those families, a family facing the diagnosis of Alzheimer's.

I am not one of those people who asks why awful things happen to good people. I am not one of those people who believes everything happens for a reason. I don't know what I believe in most of the time, and so I 'try things on' all the time. During visits to see my family, that oldie but goodie tune "I Want You Back" came on the radio. Poignant, perfect and pretty damn painful. Yet with great pain comes great compassion. I was standing in my parents’ kitchen, holding onto the counter to support myself while I felt like I was punched in the gut. I let my tears fall and with all that I was feeling, I turned towards my folks, invited them to move with me, and taught them a Nia move, "Catching Flies." We were howling with laughter as I allowed the words "I Want You Back" to continue to wash over me. A month later, I visited again. "I Want You Back" came on the radio. Coincidence? I think not. She is slipping away. And it would be so nice to have her back.

The precious pin cushion

My mom always had these little red pin cushions. Whenever I see them, I feel instantly connected to my mother, and to her mother before her. Mom has had these ancient pin cushions ever since the days of her sewing clothes for me and my two sisters when we were little girls. Recently, I took one of her many pin cushions. It sits on my desk as I write these words. She thinks she continues to sew, but alas, she does not. We pack up those sewing projects, my father and I, and together we offer things to the church or the Vietnam Vets. We find pockets of lightness and belly laughs as we work together. We share moments of connection and sanity, feeling together how insane this whole part of mom’s story is. Especially for dad. They celebrated 60 years together last May. He is losing his girl.

Oh, the exchanges I have had with my mother throughout this time ~ sweet, heart-wrenching, priceless. In her words (September, 2016), "Sometimes I forget names and faces. Sometimes I don't remember myself in stories when people tell me I was there. Sometimes I don't know this house. Sometimes I get frustrated. But I have to say, I'm not scared." Relief rushes through and washes over me. But then it changes. A month later, my mother shared, “This thing I have, what is it called again? Well, it feels scary sometimes." Imagining my mother feeling afraid is my worst nightmare. In those moments, even though we live hundreds of miles apart, I imagine rocking her and singing to her and calming her fears with my earnest wish to stay connected to her, to help her, to soothe her. Mothering my mother ~ something I resented my entire life. Now it is all I want to offer her.

I am sad more often than I would like to be these days. I have spent a good bit of this year feeling the sharp edges of sorrow. But I know tending to my heavy heart is the best gift I can give myself. And so I keep on tending...

Time

Time passes. That is what I will say about time. I happen to love the songs "Time is a Healer" and "Time Heals Everything" yet I'm not sure I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment. Time definitely helps. But heartache remains. It changes. It shape-shifts. It shows itself in different ways with the passing of time. I have strengthened my emotional muscles so that I can carry, feel, embrace and express the depth of my feelings. I have developed a beautiful relationship with loss and heartache, so that I can be with the pain...not sinking into it or staying stuck in a place of suffering...simply being with it so that the pain itself knows I’m listening. That part of me never needs to feel alone.

I am moved by the notion that loss and pain weaves in, among and between all of us. There is a universality of this human experience.
The friend who loses his daughter tragically.
The friend who is scared her body is betraying her.
The friend who is going through chemo and radiation.
The friend who is afraid she will have to someday go through chemo and radiation again.
The friend who left me for reasons I do not understand.
The friend who walked away for reasons I do understand.
The friend who has moved and is starting anew.
The friend who has buried more friends than he should have at his young age.
The friend who is rebuilding her marriage.
The friend who lost her husband too soon.

The list goes on. Heartache is part of being human. During some of my darkest hours and loneliest moments of grieving, I wish I hadn’t suffered in solitude. That armor did not keep me safe, it kept me alone. I wish I could have raised my eyes, turned my face to others, and remembered that I was part of the universal experience of being alive. Love and loss and yearning and disappointment are part of the human condition.
Part of being alive.
Being Alive.

How Deep Is Your Love?

It is a cold day in October of 2016 and I sit between my mother and my father at a New York Voices concert. The harmony of these beautiful voices pierces my heart, and the lyrics to "How Deep Is Your Love" bring tears from a deep reservoir of pain. I take my mother's hand, and I let the words move through me.

I have always had a complicated relationship with my mother. But at this stage in our lives, I feel such compassion, such tenderness as she does her best to navigate this scary, awful terrain of Alzheimer's. At this moment, she wiggles and hums and smiles and dances to the music in her seat. Oh, how my mother loves music. Later, she is telling me about her three children, not remembering I am one of them. As far as my father is concerned, I do what I can to help him as I share what I am learning about Alzheimer's. "Do your best not to argue with her" and “You might have to repeat things a zillion times” I say to my amazingly patient father. He is losing his patience these days.

One morning as I sit with my mother over coffee, she tells me, "I am going to fight this, and maybe someday soon the doctors will find a cure for what I have. In the meantime, I am not going to let it get in the way of my life!" she exclaims with the tenacity of the bullheaded-Taurus she is. I agree wholeheartedly with her on the surface, yet inside, my heart squeezes in my chest as I know full well this disease is taking her away a little bit at a time without her even realizing it. Or even worse, sometimes she does.

All of what is happening inside her is not for me to understand or make sense of. I feel so compelled to be with her, this person I have spent a lifetime trying to distance myself from. And yet when I have to say good-bye to head home, the hugs feel a little too short and the squeezes not quite tight enough. I want to linger longer and yet I cannot get away fast enough.

Back and forth...

I travel across New York State, soaking in the fall colors at their peak. There are moments where I let music wash over me as the tears fall. My sobs feel too loud inside my little car, too intense for my little body. There are other moments where I can catch my breath and manage to sing. Beautiful. Painful. Healing.

Maybe there's some exquisite justice in the Alzheimer's bubble my mother lives in at times. I pray that it is more painful for me than for her. I can cry and I can reach out and I can write passages like this one. I can grieve and I can talk and I can shake my fist to the sky and I can dance my dance to celebrate the life she has given me. This is the most meaningful way I know to truly honor her. Despite my intense fear and rage for this part of her story, it has softened me in relation to her. And it is softening me in the world. I am deeply, truthfully and astoundingly grateful to feel this kind of depth of experience, in my body, in my tears of grief and fear, in my relationships and in my life. The only way is through.

Life and death and love and loss are unpredictable, inevitable, even mysterious. I imagine I am not alone in my existential wondering. What are we all here for? How do we move from experiences of exquisite grief to divine experiences of possibilities, vibrancy, and vitality? What happens when we die? I am not sure what I believe in. All I truly want to believe is that someday my mother will be somewhere where her feet do not hurt, she can jitterbug up a storm, and she remembers everything. That is my idea of heaven.