I like the idea that we choose our parents before we are born, it makes me I feel free, trust opens up and I see how beautifully connected we all can be.
It offers an unexpected angle of gratitude. If I believe I have chosen my parents, and maybe even all the major players in my circle, then it becomes difficult to harbor resentments. We can see the impeccable purpose of each soul surrounding us. as lights guiding our journey. I chose this, because this is what will serve me best. Nothing is showing up on my plate that I did not order.
My father is not handy, he can not fix a leaky faucet, change the oil in my car or build a bookshelf for my first apartment, even with instructions from ikea. I don't think he has a toolbox? or a tool? He is not the sort of father who is over protective, he never met my boyfriends with a shotgun, spit tobacco on a suiters shoe or intimidated anyone into treating me right or risk being buried in our backyard by the thugs and goons in his street gang. I once watched him dial 911 because there was a snake in his pond.
He is famous for his mishaps, the time he walked on a pool cover with an electric leaf blower and had to be rescued before electrocuting himself, the time we heard '' I have made an error '' bellow thru the hall and found him, with his foot stuck in the toilet, arms above his head holding onto a picture that had scraped a dark groove several feet down pristine drywall, one foot stuck in the actual toilet bowl, and the other on what was left of the toilet now broken in pieces intermingling with the priceless vase, now shattered on the wet floor.
Why would I choose this man as my father?!!!,.....when Dwayne the Rock Johnson was available. Or Morgan Freeman! I could have chosen Morgan Freeman and enjoyed the real time narration of a velvety baritone. But I chose.... Dr. Decker I think I knew what I would need in this lifetime. A really good psychologist and an adequate sense of humor.
I think I knew from maybe a previous earthly encounter, that my mental health would suffer on this planet.
Despite several diagnoses, I don't think of myself as mentally ill. I think looming violence, climate change, divisiveness, war, famine, disease, inequity, injustice, poverty, and despair create a state of constant stress, to be able to function well in that mess feels like a mental illness to me. It feels more like an illness to be in cahoots with calamity , than it does to retreat into anxiety, addiction or the blankness that we call depression. But here I am sharing space in a world of incomplete definitions and insufficient words. I have a lot of trouble functioning. And I think it's super weird if you don't.
But to be honest, I have yet to meet someone who is not suffering...it just spills out of us all in different ways.
Maybe it is a gift that you can see what is wrong with me. I can not hide my pain, It won't stay stuffed in anywhere, its like a dough that keeps rising. I can be a neurotic, hypochondriacal, compulsive binge eater, with treatment resistant major depression, morbid obesity, chronic pain, disordered sleep, a hump back, a hoarding problem and a sharp shooting pain in my pelvis. Oh and sometimes I get brain zaps in my tongue and I still think I am just a regular person reacting to an insane world. But you can call me whatever you want.
My dad calls me whatsername. A joke at the hilarious stunt I pulled 25 years ago when I had my beautiful maiden name legally changed to capital ED Hose. which is admittedly a little strange and really doesn't support my brand of '' I'm not crazy, you're crazy '' that I am trying to peddle here.
So I am looking for a dad, I am
Looking for a great psychologist, who better than the son of a great psychologist. My grandfather who was injured in the war, went back to school at a late age and became a psychologist, transforming his life of pain and anger, into one of soft understanding. Seeing the profound effect that my grandfathers transformation had, my father was inspired to become a doctor as well. So inspired he fought thru 38 rejection letters before finally being accepted into Brigham Young University. I admired that resolute perseverance. And I don't know how it all works with souls and birth and beings and such. I don't know if I was looking thru some sort of metaphysical catalog of dads and he checked all the boxes
But I know my father could not be more perfect for me. Deep thinker check, content to stare off in space Double check... Wise and socratic Check Check...I couldn't yet see out the front windshield, when he passed along the idea that what you resist persists and what you let be disappears. My dad drove that point home as he drove me to school, teaching me that maybe my stomach aches that would appear just as we turned into the parking lot of school each day, might have more to do with elementary school anxiety, than the tumor, or reflux, or poisoning I was certain I had and he taught me to float on top of the stomach ache, to ride it like a surfer unafraid and eventually I would feel better..
What a gift to be introduced so early on to the rich ideas of Freud and Jung, analyzing my every move and teaching me to look at the world from different perspectives. I did not know how to throw a baseball , never played catch in the yard, but I was learning self awareness and the strange significant and powerful command that the mind has over the body! I learned that the ego will cling on to whatever it thinks is our identity and I learned that our thoughts are not who we are. I was a sponge for psycho babble, I loved the language of learning about myself.
But I was all the things a psychologist would not want for a daughter. Depressed and anxious, hyperventilating my way thru high school into a paper bag. I think my father felt a sense of helplessness. I think he thought even that my issues were ''my way'' of being angry with him. How awful for a DOCTOR. to have a child he can not cure.
He felt set up I think, and a chasm grew wide between us. Me becoming more and more entrenched in my illnesses and depression, For a long time, I sense he felt humiliated by it. Powerless maybe, I think my mental and physical health have burdened him, in that he thinks he must be responsible for my agony, that divorce at an early age had forever made me feel worthy of abandonment. These are the precious conversations I have with my dad now? can you even imagine? most people talk pot roast and playoffs.... but finding a father who could one day share his fears with me and be able to hear mine and see who I am. It is the most one can hope for in any relationship.
I hate to think he feels he let me down, when I am so certain that all is as it should be, I chose him to get me to exactly here. He gave me the invisible tools to navigate my inner world. No, My father doesn't have a toolbox in his garage, he has one that he carries around in his being, and it is filled to the brim with shift buttons and space bars...Little tools that make a huge difference in changing perspective and changing minds, the ''whats the worst that could happen '' tool, takes me down a path of so what if that horrible thing happens, what then, and then what and then what.... Life saving tools that push perspective and help me change the way I think. Like '' The, can you make it worse '' tool, which helps in so many instances, when you realize that by trying to make something worse, you are actually accepting it and no longer resisting it...Full circle to what you resist persists.
My father has taught me is to look curiously at my own thoughts as they come into being. the '' Observation deck'' where you view your own thinking from a far, and do not get pulled into the riptide of believing that thoughts are real. Think, how interesting this is and how interesting that is, without ever thinking they are real. hey are just thoughts after all. When I look at them curiously and separate from myself , I can survive them.
I think having chosen such a father has kept me alive, knowing my thoughts are not reality has afforded me hope. I am so grateful. I think a lot of people give up to soon on themselves, they have not been given the understanding of the connection in there own body, they listen to the voices in their head like they are facts. They have not been taught to look curiously upon themselves.
The other gift my father gave me, is the ability to play with words, to use humor to diffuse tense situations and stay lighthearted. I remember the first time I understood a joke, My dad was over and he said 'OH , don't you look sharp...don't cut yourself!'' he says he could see the look of dawning cross my face and my eyes lit up as I realized suddenly that words could have multiple meanings. Just this evening my dad and I were discussing my binge eating, I was telling him that I began seeing a new therapist, who, aware of my tendency to isolate, suggested I binge on my porch instead of my couch and he said without missing a beat that, porches seem harder to digest then couches but that he thinks it would be safest if I binged on food. There has been 45 years between the two moments of my sharp shirt and my undigestible couch, they have been filled with reminders that it is dangerous to hop in the shower and maybe I could just stand there. 1,000 directives to take the car, if I make the sad mistake of wanting to run to the store.
My dad also has routines, he loves routines so the routine routines really thrill him. He performs dad jokes for every waitress, complaining that his plate is dirty and pointing to garnish, if you ask for a tiny bite of something, he will give you a piece imperceptible to the naked eye, if you ask him to pass a roll, he will touch each one, hold it up and ask if this one is ok. I think he is funny, my youngest son thinks he is funny, everyone else thinks he needs a muzzle.
I have drawn the conclusion: my dad is an explorer, he is an adventurer of the mind, navigating the twists and turns , mapping what he finds, and he has taught me well to seek the cure to my own ailments, to be unafraid to look so deep inside. He has also taught me that it is all kind of funny. Just barely funny, but it is in there, and being able to uncover the funny parts, well it deserves an award.
.
🫶🫂
ReplyDelete