Story to Young Women

Story

I respectfully ask permission to tell this circle of women my story. I ask the Grandmothers and the young ones to allow me to share what I have learned about being a woman, the good things and the not-so-good things. Perhaps the young women amongst us can learn something that will help them in the future, but I suspect that each of them will have to live their stories through their own mistakes and their particular descents, sacrifices, and returns. Ah well, so it usually is. To begin:
I believe that the lifespan of my marriage was one long cycle of descent, sacrifice, and return with individual events that created their own cycles. The marriage itself was a cycle that took most of a lifetime to run its course and outlive its usefulness and to teach me what I needed to know to return home to myself. Truly, marriage is like the interlocking spirals of our DNA; it has a life all its own.
I married very young, too young. I entered into this most serious and holy union a virgin in the sense that my ideals, hopes, and dreams were still new and untarnished. I had not yet tasted the bitterness of descent of any kind. Like all very young women, girl really, I had a vision of a perfect life: the white picket fence, the dog in the yard, and beautiful, well-behaved children. My young husband was so handsome and all his words were just right and exactly what I needed and wanted to hear (and take heed of men like this….often there is little substance behind such perfection).
The first vague sense of uneasiness began to manifest itself into my consciousness about five years into the marriage. I had begun suspecting that many of the beautiful words my young husband had told me were lies; I could not, at that time, put my finger on why I felt this way. Such thoughts seemed a betrayal and so I pushed them deep down where I could pretend they did not exist. I decided to throw myself into being a good wife and mother to my two small sons. This seemed to me a good solution. I believed if I just became…more… everything would be alright. If I just completely “bought” into the local mores and dictates of what a “good and proper” wife looked like, acted like, things would improve and I would be happy. (A caution here young women: take a good, hard look at what you are “owning” and make sure it is yours to hold and not someone else’s.)
Living this way, not being true to my nature, and ignoring my need for mental stimulation, activities that challenged, and not allowing myself my more esoteric interests created a soul-deep and painful descent within the larger framework of the cycle of descent, sacrifice, and return of my married life, which caused me to lose myself for a very long time. The wise writer, Penelope Washburn, suggests that women need to retain a sense of uniqueness and autonomy to experience marriage with any sort of grace (p. 84); I did not have such inner-resources. My own culture did not teach such things nor would have likely condoned it. Women’s jobs were to be “helpmates” to their husbands and to raise children. My descent into depression of the truly dark, debilitating kind was a long one, and it was horribly compounded by the knowledge that I had followed my cultures dictates into a life I was eminently unsuited for. Depression and guilt were my constant companions; I went nowhere without them. Unlike Persephone, I did not have a mother who would descend to the depths and lead me back to the light and teach me balance. My poor, much-loved mother lives in her own Hades of unhappiness and depression. Who will rescue her?
Living in such a blind and dishonest way, I lost my soul for a time and had no path to follow. I looked miserable and felt hopeless. I lacked the courage to take my dissatisfaction and unhappiness out and look at them; I refused to accept my culpability in my unhappiness. (If you take nothing else from my story, think on the importance of courage!) By refusing to examine my inner-self, I began sacrificing my most essential being on the altar of “fitting in.” I believed, on some unenlightened level, that by forcing myself into a mold that hurt me, I was doing the “right thing” for my children. My dearest friend and amazing wise woman, Kelly, asked me at the time, “But, what are you teaching them about living life and about relationships by not becoming who you really are?” I was not ready to begin the ascent at the time; I stayed in the dark place of self-pitying sacrifice for a very long time.
Those years were dark and unhappy indeed. However, slowly, slowly I began the ascent to the light of self-knowledge and the beginnings of self-acceptance. Returning to school was the largest act of courage I had ever enacted and saved my life because at the same time, my life with the handsome husband was becoming increasingly difficult and soul-deadening. My suspicions about the pretty words and deeds were indeed correct: my handsome young husband was a pathological liar and classic narcissist. I learned that he was indeed young and would always remain so, at least in his psyche and mind; I realized that I was parenting him and not well.
It is an excellent thing (for me) that I was well into the middle of my ascent back to the light of my most authentic self during the last years of this long learning cycle because I was to be dropped into a new descent, sacrifice, and return cycle—one of those interlocking spiral events I mentioned earlier. The handsome young husband began acting strangely. He stayed out all night more and more often, something he had never done before. I would get angry and demand to know where he was and what he was doing; these confrontations resulted in his holding me down twice and forcibly raping me. He broke my arm. It was a bad time. I was suddenly and without warning evicted from my home and the business we had was lost. The husband was finally arrested and his drug addiction to Methamphetimes came to light.
I was angry for a long time about the losses suffered—too angry to see the lessons the universe was teaching me. Finally though, I came to a place of acceptance (I began ascending from the darkness—yet again) and began looking at the event without the emotional storm that had previously surrounded it. I discovered that I needed to base my self-worth on whom I was, not what I had. I had become rather arrogant in my material belongings; I preened. I was self-congratulatory about my large house, handsome husband (liar though he was); I had been taking much of my identity from things outside myself rather than nurturing the seed of my most authentic self and becoming that woman, that spirit.
I made much progress (but alas, not enough!) during those introspection days. I stayed with the handsome husband because I reasoned that everyone has flaws and things to heal and mend my own self especially. I realize in retrospect that I had not truly returned to myself by making the decision to stay with him; it was a fear-based decision and thus a poor one: I still did not believe in my own efficacy and power. Ascent and return takes a very long time, indeed, I think it never really ends.
The marriage was never the same; of course not, how could it be? I tried very hard to be more of what he said he wanted (see, young ones, how easy it is to fall back into descent and sacrifice—courage, diligence, and self-awareness need be always foremost in your lives!). I knew, in my most honest inner-self that I was telling myself lies this time; I could not remain in this cycle and survive intact. However, old conditioning urged me to continue to try. Finally, the handsome husband’s very young, Jamaican girlfriend called and released me from my self-created prison, and I was free to rise up and reclaim my light! I learned courage and the need to strive for wholeness. I began to wonder what a healthy relationship might look like (I have not experienced that one yet). I started to reclaim my long-forgotten gifts. I learned to value being alone and being more than ok with it and all this is only the beginning!
I see some of the grandmothers nodding their heads in recognition; my story is not original; it has been enacted many times, with many women, in many times. But, this is MY story and thus important to me. It is my wish that by sharing it with other women there can be some descents avoided and if not, and I suspect not—there is hope for wholeness and there is proof that there is a return. There is, I swear it.