I think sometimes that people don’t even realize the guilt they hold onto. Sometimes you justify things so deeply that you don’t let yourself admit that you feel guilty about something and then you just bury it so deep inside you don’t realize you are carrying it.
Then…years later…when your mind is not as cluttered as it used to be…things like that will surface. You can either squash them down again…or face them and forgive yourself.
This is something I dealt with somewhat recently.
When I was in my very early 20’s, I got married to a man who was very insecure – which led to him being very controlling and jealous. Whether it was his true intention or not, he kept me away from my family quite a lot. Now I do give him the benefit of the doubt because our situation was a mess. We were young and stupid and made some very bad decisions. I say WE. Not just him. We got married too young and neither of us got the education we should have tried to get. Then we immediately got pregnant right after we got married and I already had a child. So fast forward to my being married with two kids by the time I turned 21. The husband wouldn’t keep a job…and all I could get was very entry level work because I had no education. Fortunately – at that time, the economy was not nearly as bad as it is now. I lucked into my first office job and at least kept us afloat. During this time…my mom discovered that she had breast cancer.
She had to have a needle biopsy…a lumpectomy…chemotherapy and radiation. I was never there for her during any of it. I was not at the hospital for any of her procedures and never accompanied her to any appointment. In my defense…I couldn’t take off work because I was supporting my family. Additionally, communication wasn’t as easy as it is now. We didn’t have cell phones and email. So it wasn’t that I could have easily done all these things and didn’t. However…I still suddenly realized one day that I felt horribly guilty for not trying harder to keep up with what was going on with my mom. I didn’t know what days her surgeries were. I didn’t know what days her chemo appointments were. I didn’t know anything. All I knew was work to home and take care of the kids and get up and start over again. I was so wrapped up in my life that I didn’t try harder to see what was happening with my own mother battling a life threatening disease.
Now just for the record…my mom was not alone in all this. She had a good support system. She has three sisters who constantly checked on her. She had my dad – such as he is – but at least he was able to drive her when she couldn’t drive. She had my aunt (my dad’s sister) who was there for her. She had friends at work and stuff like that. So she had people…she didn’t go through it alone. I also think that she probably didn’t want me to be the one that was there for her through all that…because I was really young at the time and she probably knew I couldn’t handle it. I think she made sure she always had brave face and that I never really saw what was happening. But now that I’m older and have seen others go through this…I can’t only imagine how hard it was for mom and it breaks my heart that I wasn’t there for her more. Whether she really needed me or not.
I didn’t realize that I was carrying this guilt until somewhat recently. Once I admitted it…it kinda flooded at me. Fortunately it was not for very long. Because I looked at it directly and was as honest with myself as I knew how to be. I didn’t do anything malicious. I didn’t avoid her purposely. I didn’t do anything wrong. I was just young and stupid and didn’t try as hard as I could have. So I forgave myself for it.
I didn’t talk to my mom about it because I saw no point. I know that she never held anything against me for it and honestly if I talked to her about it…it would just be a big festival of waterworks and we’d both cry and hug and be ridiculous piles of hormones.
But I did go ahead and forgive myself. It doesn’t make it completely go away. I still have the regret that I will always have. But I’m not going to carry guilt about it anymore. I let that go. It was useless.
In the past 4-5 years, I’ve done fund raisers for Susan G. Komen. Thanks to my friend Debbie Langley – who I used to work with – I did my first Race for the Cure a few years ago. And I’ve been involved every year since then. I have done several Dallas 5K walks and several Tarrant County 5K walks and even did the 3-Day last year. I involve my mom in all of them and have even gotten her walking the 5K’s –which she didn’t think she could do. So instead of letting guilt own me and trying to “make up to her” for not being there during that…I do what I can to help others that are fighting it now. And sharing it with mom means we celebrate her life and her victory over breast cancer instead of letting my guilt make me feel bad.
I highly recommend admitting guilt for passed perceived sins…and learning to forgive yourself and let it go. It has this amazing, heart-lightening effect on you. Every little bit of past pain I let go…frees up my heart for other things. And who can’t use a little extra heart?
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