“I did not speak in secret, in a land of darkness; I did not say to the offspring of Jacob, ‘Seek me in vain.’ I the Lord speak the truth; I declare what is right.” ~ Isaiah 45:19 Lately, I’ve been feeling listless, restless, uneasy, empty, aimless and out-of-sorts. I’ve felt this way at other times in life, usually in relation to fleeting or unfortunate circumstances; a temporary downturn. We all have them. But as I look more closely at this moody word list, it begins to resemble a quiver of arrows, all pointing toward one, encompassing, emotional theme: purposelessness. Or so it seems. I know I was not created without purpose, and neither were you, but honestly it is how I’ve been feeling for longer than I care to. Pondering this thought a little further, I sadly determine I’ve hit on something significant. I’ve battled depression most of my adult life, probably longer, with subtle signs evident as early as high school. I see this only now, looking back. I wish I’d known then what I know now (don’t we all), as I could have interpreted the world around me, and those in it, differently. I would have understood that my terrifying fear of abandonment was a perfectly expected reaction to the periodic silent treatment I endured in my youth, and the on again-off again absence of affirmation, conversation, and relationship that was utilized as a form of discipline. Silence effectively told me I’d been a disappointment, although I didn’t always know why. But emotional abandonment isn’t discipline. It is wrong, plain and simple. Routinely cutting the lines of communication in a valued relationship, especially with a young child, is traumatizing. In my case, it laid the groundwork for developing a mindset that emotional control over my life belonged to others, not me; toying with my emotions became permissible and ripe for the taking. Further, it set the stage for my people-pleasing propensity and this became my mission, because I would do almost anything to make the pain of silence and rejection end. Every human being comes into this world with a need for love, affection and acceptance, and being ignored by a significant other isn’t conducive to any of that. By school age the silent treatment was a well-established form of “communication” that grew more frequent as I entered my teen years. I learned early that communication can happen with a voice…or with no voice at all. (Something occurred to me just this very minute: I have loved the written word since my youth. I prefer it over verbal communication a thousand fold. I find that ironic; isn’t it amazing how, even late in life, the lightbulb can suddenly come on?) Anyway, growing up, there were other instances of implied abandonment, or the outright-stated-threat of leaving that I won’t go into at this time, but never-the-less they escalated my fears. As time marched into adulthood and I left home, this nearly-all-consuming fear of losing loved ones kept me chained to a controlling spouse, who did his homework and learned well how to keep me tethered. He studied the people-pleasing aspects of my personality and took full advantage. Ironically, it was the laying open of my heart and soul that taught him where I was vulnerable. He learned well the lessons that I unwittingly divulged as I shared stories of my youth. I thought in confiding in him that I was running to safety, a harbor in the storm. I naively believed my purpose was to take care of him and love all his demons away. If I could somehow make up for everything he lacked or lost in boyhood, then he would be happy, and by extension, I could be happy. But once he learned this about me, he began to expect that his happiness was my purpose. Just as in childhood, my job, my purpose, was to appease certain others, and in this case, him. I was to be present and accounted for, even if he wasn’t (and he often wasn’t). If I failed to be pleasing in any way (perish the thought), then his sadness or anger or other myriad emotions became my fault. I shouldered the blame and the punishment: silence, shouting, shoving and leaving. And that, my friends, isn’t simply an unkind person; it is the essence of betrayal by a master manipulator impersonating a “husband”. It’s an insidious malignancy of torture that eats away a person’s soul until they feel so small and empty the only thing alive is a heart, faintly beating in the chest, and lungs that weakly breathe in and out. Consequently, I would often recite to him this old Mother Goose rhyme: Peter, Peter, pumpkin eater, Had a wife and couldn’t keep her, Put her in a pumpkin shell, And there he kept her very well. It was a favorite nursery rhyme of mine as a child because I loved pumpkins, but in truth, I had no idea what it meant. Later I came to realize I was once again held captive under a heavy hand, this time by a controlling, alcoholic, narcissistic abuser who reeled in the catch of his life, gutted me and put my carcass on the mantle above the fire; the trophy wife he could display like a prized, hunted, and very dead animal. And from the outside no one could see that I, indeed, was hollow. Bottom-line, I’ve made some poor decisions in my life. Not all of them, but when I did, they were significant. For instance, why did I marry this man in the first place? The answer is important (and I hope this saves even one person from misery!) The reason was to flee a perceived lack of control over my life as a young, single woman. The root that took hold so long ago from the punishing silence was now bearing fruit. I was living at home in my early twenty’s, and still under (perceived) authority even at that age.
