Friday, July 8, 2022

 Friday, July 8, 2022  

 

    I had a 7:30 appointment with my PT. Yesterday, my hamstring started twitching. I texted Josh and Scott, warning them if I started screaming, the problem was with that muscle. Get me to the emergency room. I was afraid it was torn and would snap. My walking was more limited. Every step hurt the muscles around my knee. I didn’t think, hoped, the problem was inside the knee. That would be a whole set of problems. 

   Katie, my PT, worked on my hamstring muscles. She believed this problem resulted from muscles coming online that hadn’t done any work in years. From her lips to God’s ears. That would mean the limitations I was now experiencing were temporary.

   I made it home shortly before nine am when I had an appointment with Shelly. I felt pretty good today. I had been depressed and feeling downright desperate the two previous days. My lack of social stimulation was part of it. When I  meditated on it yesterday, releasing anything negative about my hatred of being isolated, etc., and then releasing and negative of my hatred for my love of being isolated, etc., I discovered that the latter was more significant. As usual, it was the one I don’t expect it to be, the one I hadn’t been focusing on. I craved isolation, aloneness. Being alone is a positive state; being lonely is the negative version. 

   This was a familiar dilemma for me. I have had many moments when I thought total retreat from other humans sounded great. My first moment was when I was in high school and read The Seven Story Mountain. Merton lived in a Trappist monastery in silence. Ah!! That sounded great, wonderful in fact. To have a place in a community and not have to interact verbally. The second incident was when I was in grad school. I read about an opera singer who needed to be silent for a year to cure her throat ailment. She moved into a rural house and didn’t speak for a year. Ah! A few years later, I had an opportunity to camp in an undeveloped piece of land in Maine for a week. I hitched there. I set up camp with a few tarps and a sleeping bag. I had a wonderful time, just wonderful. I did fine without others. Several years later, I found a book on Poutinias, a Russian tradition of spiritual hermitage.

     People of all standing spent a year living in a hut outside of town. The townspeople would provide food, basically bread and water, if I remember correctly.   I discovered in the Buddhism tradition that there are monastics who spend their lives in caves meditating. The meditations are thought to impact the world for the better. Then in my late fifties, I discovered a meditation practice that resonated with me, Vipassana. Before I headed off for my first silent retreat, someone said, “Betty, you’ll never make it. You can’t keep your mouth shut.”  I said, “Just watch. I’ve been dreaming about something like this since my teens.” I did twenty sits, most at the retreat site and someone my own with Mike’s cooperation.

   Being pulled between the two extremes, my extroverted personality and my need for total retreat has plagued me forever. The need to cut myself off from all human contact scared me. How do you come back from that?  

   Shelly said she had never heard of someone experiencing that dilemma, especially so young. I realized that was how my mother made me feel. The world was a hostile place with everyone out to put you down. She certainly treated me that way. It wasn’t until a few years before her death that I realized she saw herself defending herself from my putdowns. What were my putdowns? Any time I didn’t see things exactly as she did. I had limited wiggle room. I adored my mother as a child and as an adult. While she had serious problems, which everyone recognized- except her, she was also an amazing person, spectacular in many ways- and underneath it all, loving. She never showed affection, never gave praise. But every once in a while I would feel her gaze on me. I would turn to catch the love and pride pouring out of her eyes. She was one confused lady, leaving me with my confusion. 

   If you wonder how I could have invited her to spend the end of her life with me- good question. It wouldn’t have been possible if I hadn’t set a boundary. Shortly after Mike and I were together, I sent her a letter saying I had always been afraid of her. I had tried everything nothing worked. I was going to stop talking to her for a while. The letter also included a vision of her living in some community with me. She was sitting in a chair on a hillside with children running around her. She was happy.  

    I sent the letter in August. In mid-November, she called, “ I’m old,” she said. “I forgive you. come for Thanksgiving.”  Does anyone see a problem? For her, I could not have a point of view. I said, “Thanks, Mom. I’m not ready.” A year later, a cousin was hosting Thanksgiving and invited Mike and me.   I was ready, especially on neutral territory. My mother and I greeted each other as strangers -politely. It made me sad to think this would be the total of my adult relationship with her, but it would be better than her constant verbal assaults. 

   I started going to her home for Sunday dinners, but I had a limit in mind. She could only say something critical three times, and I would leave. I wouldn’t be angry, just go. “I have to go, mom.”  I would come back at another opportunity. Doing this, setting that boundary, relieved me of my fear of her. It wasn’t that everything was perfect between us while she lived with Mike and me, the last eighteen years of her life, but it was good enough. We found ways to deal with our differences. While she never thanked me, Dorothy told me how grateful she was for what I gave her. 

    I only recently thought, “What would have happened if Mike had died before she did?” OMG! It never occurred to me how much he was a barrier between me and her worst behavior. He never said anything to her. There was just the incident during our first visit together to her home. I needed to nap. Knowing she wouldn’t take kindly to my doing that, Mike sat at the head of my bed reading while I slept. His message was loud and clear. 

   I started the hamstring and Achilles Heel exercises Katie gave me. I was to do them once a day, holding each position for three minutes. After doing the hamstring stretch, I felt a difference in the pain by my knee. That made me hopeful this problem was temporary as my muscles adjusted to the new normal after the THR.

   The Hidden Life of Pets came up after Leave No Trace. Holy cow! Animals are not what we think they are.