The Power of a conversation is connection
This past year has been one of the most difficult moments in my life. My brother was diagnosed with Grade 4 glioblastoma and had four surgeries to remove the tumor, stop the bleeding, and put an implant to prevent pressure from building in his brain. My family and I had to set up his care, manage the logistics of care, and cover the costs. I spent six hours a day waiting to answer a generic phone number from the hospital. I wouldn’t want to miss the critical dense medical information that I had to distill for my family to decide on my brother’s care. Once missed, then who knows when I will get the callback or know who to call.
During those 6 months, I was speechless. I didn’t know how to convey the confusion, anger, and frustration I had with dealing with inconsistent information and such an inefficient medical system. I didn’t know how to ask for help because I was in the thick of figuring out the problem, collecting data, and sorting the critical tasks at-hand. I was at a loss for words. After those 6 months, my brother was stable and all the care logistics could be done without new information. I started to sit back and processed the “what just happened” moments. I reflected on the times I had to leave my kids when I flew down to see my brother or the moments I lashed out because I felt overwhelmed with the screaming. But in fact, my emotional bucket was empty and I didn’t have enough to tolerate even loud noises. I felt nonfunctional because in my mind I was still unfairly comparing myself to my 20-year-old self and wondered “how come I can’t think as fast or still retain the same memory like before”.
My deepest healing started from a conversation with a friend. Even though I didn’t necessarily have the words to describe the mountain of feelings, she just sat and started drawing with me. We didn’t do anything specific except a marker on thick paper. Slowly our parallel play opened us up to talk without eye contact. Something about making eye contact when you’re vulnerable cuts so much deeper and the avoidance of the eyes helped me open myself up to listen. I heard her story of losing someone dear to cancer as well and that opened my heart to listen deeper; deeper to the loss and grief and deeper to the tragedy. Part of coping and healing is processing the tragedy and slowly evolving the feeling of grief as unexpressed love.
For me, the deep sorrow is deeply rooted in the assumption that I had more time with my brother and that we had time to share a rave one day, and now that day will never happen.
After 6 months, I searched for space to delve into my connections with myself, my feelings, my body, and my relationships. I teased apart the important connections I needed to make with myself and understand how my body, mind, and feelings worked as a 40 year old woman. I began to listen to my inner voice and hear them to understand where they were coming from. I dove into my ancestral past and delve deeper into the generational trauma of my parents’ escape from the Vietnam War. After my excavation, I have learned to redefine what it meant to love myself. I envisioned myself as art and admired myself for the first time after believing that self-love is defined by the people who love you. I realized that I love and should love myself more than anyone else hence I should be more patient, more gentle, and more kind to myself. Even the ones that love us the most can never love us the way we love ourselves. That is what I promised to do and honor my brother’s tragedy: I will love myself more and honor my feelings. Slowly but surely, I am building my foundations and principles on how to connect with myself. This connection makes the healing journey more powerful and I hope to teach these skills to my children and folks suffering from the same pain.
