I had a reasonable sleep last night though I woke at 1 am and had to take my lung herbs and some tumeric, I was obviously still digesting a lot about my sister’s visit.. I was then surprised to sleep through until 8.30 am. We are on daylight savings here so I keep reminding myself that is 7.30 am and the days are closing in here in the Southern Hemisphere as we move towards the Equinox on 21 March (time of equal light) I do not have window coverings in my bedroom as I like to wake to the dawn naturally
Jasper didn’t want to walk as I got a bit spun out earlier. It was an old friend’s birthday yesterday and I forgot. When I got a notification from Instagram a lovely photo of her came up so I sent her a message.. then I lost my book as I had split some water on it yesterday put it out in the sun to dry and forgot where I put it.. Jasper watched me wandering around a bit confused and lost, he then got on his chair in the garage and didnt want to move off of it.. So I gave him a hug and took myself off to the local markets to have a cup of coffee and get my veggies for the week.. I have been praying each day to God to be guided to the right actions and attitudes.. I then saw a family friend who knows my sister well so I rushed over to say hi. I told her about my sister’s visit the way she tried to undermine me by saying how I have a lot of ‘stuff’, Suzie just said to me “look Deb we all know how judgmental she is, do not allow her to get you down.” It was really good to get that reality check. It also made me remember how nasty my sister was to me growing up.. It was my older sister Judith who was loving but she left home when I was 3 and died in 2014… When I cried at my living sister’s wedding she was angry at me “for spoiling the day!”
I hate to say this on my blog but my living sister just strikes me as so bound up and miserable at times.. I felt on Friday night if I am happy or lively I am contravening some unwritten family law.. she isn’t even happy being there for her grandchildren at all and it reminded me of how Mum frowned on kids jumping around and making a mess at a local restaurant.. This all made me realize yet again how my Mum was NOT ALLOWED TO BE A WILD CHILD and that my own sister has a very very shut down and damaged/remote inner child.
On that note, I just read this post from Benny K
Like me, he is in recovery and his post reminded me of how at a psychic fair in the 1990s a woman who gave me a tarot reading read the card of The Moon when it came up in a spread, she said to me “you are a wild wolf, but your mother wanted to turn you into a domesticated dog” that really struck me as true when I finally came across Clarissa Pinkola Estes book Women Who Run With the Wolves in early sobriety.. In that book she speaks of ‘instinct injured’ women.. How we lose our way and then have no self esteem and no bark or bite that would helps us set good protective self boundaries… that book taught me alot about the ways I got wounded growing up in my family and culture..
I love to let myself be wild.. but my Mum always had me manicured.. I remember when she had all of my long golden hair cut when I was only 6.. I felt like I had been wounded, it all came back to me reading about a similar thing happening to a client of Tara Brach’s who came to her for help with emotional neglect issues in the book True Refuge. Anyway I got to grow my hair back later in sobriety though with all the stress of my sister’s illness since Mum died in 2018 it has shrunk on one side as I try to figure out how to be there for her and not be cut down again by both her and her family…
Being wild with my older brother would only get me in trouble.. He told me literally over my Mum’s dead body that I am a “loose cannon”, yeah mate you are fucking withholding money she left to us and not taking any steps to connect EVER on an emotional level… Sorry to even write this. I do love my brother now.. He is a product of his environment… and he does try his best.. I just really resent having been called a loose cannon when I stood up to him for not actively supporting my dead sister’s second oldest son and family when he came to him for help to move back here and be closer to his mother just a few years before her death.. Possibly it wasn’t meant to be anyway and my nephew never held it against my brother but my sister could have done with one family member being close to her in her final years.. My brother is surrounded by his own children and grandchildren.. its a classic Hero/Scapegoat scenario…
Past is past and I am not holding onto this stuff.. Today has been a good day….Slowly I am separating myself from my family’s narcissism… Gosh it has been major work.. They treated me so meanly on an emotional level so many times and made me bad or wrong for being emotional, honest and real!!!.. it bloody well hurt me.. I forgive to let it go, I just do not know how much time I really want to spend around them at times.. Kat, my therapist always encourages me to stay connected but separate psychologically.. I think I am getting there., I just don’t want to be ending my life as a miserable shut down instinct injured judgemental person and today I can thank God and my lucky stars, that There But For The Grace Of God Go I,without freedom from mood altering drugs and a recovery and therapy program I may be in a similar boat!!
Emerging From The Dark Night 