The Scream
Last week, a minor incident stirred up a whole lot of big feelings for me. Some of them were merited and a direct product of the situation that had transpired. The majority were dust particles that had settled somewhere on the shelves in the back of my mind; the small gust of wind that had caused me to momentarily lose my balance sent them all dancing into the atmosphere, a chaotic, unsettling ballet that forced me on to my own tip toes. For a few days after – and even now, as I write – it left my head and heart feeling heavy with the weight of a mist I tried hard to see through. Whenever it tugged too tightly, I tried to poke my hand through in search of my rational being, but the fog was too dense. It was consumed by so many atoms of the past and present – their origins as obvious as they were unidentifiable – there was no way to make rhyme or reason of neither.
Standing on the corner of Lost and Ashamed looking like a modern-day Munch painting on what should have been a sunny and light Friday afternoon, I vaguely confided in a friend.
“I’m feeling burdened with a lot of ugly feelings.”
“Ugly feelings. Putting it this way, first of all, is a subjective assessment. And feelings are just feelings, ugly or not. I think if everyone put their "ugly" feelings and thoughts on the table, we would be amazed, truly amazed, at what would end up on the table. Are your feelings ugly? I don't know. But they’re feelings, they come from somewhere. And I think the longer you leave them inside and try to hide them - well, you know how it goes.”
He had told me what I already knew; what I, myself, have always believed. And yet, in this moment, I felt I needed the permission, the space and the security that would allow me to truly feel it all. Without shame. Often, I am so focused on regulating my emotions in order to give my girl the room to express hers, I forget how important and comforting it is to be held in my own shit sometimes. I forget The Art of Asking, which is stupid because my greatest teacher is right there living by example every day: the daughter feels freely and openly, the good, the bad and the ugly, and trusts us to love her unconditionally. Why is it so difficult to grant myself the same grace? Why do I insist on punishing myself for certain thoughts and feelings that are just small fractions of the colourful spectrum of human emotions?
*
A couple of months ago, during a time of important transitions and a cycle of colds and tummy bugs and all sorts of kindergarten-goodness, there was a day when the daughter had a strong reaction to leaving one place for another. She screamed and contorted her little body in protest of the car seat. We gave her all the time we could to allow her to calm down, breathe and collect herself, but it wasn’t happening. She cried all the way home, all the way to the door and into the couch pillows. We tried everything. To soothe and distract, to offer comfort or privacy, but she didn’t want any of it. She cried and cried, inconsolable. An hour passed and we were getting desperate. Finally, she asked me to take her outside, “arriba und laufen[1]”, something she asks for when she’s overwhelmed or poorly.
I walked her up and down the paths of our urbanization as she continued to spill snot and tears onto my shoulders. My shoulders cramped, my back ached and I was worried she was going to get cold, but I knew that bringing her back indoors would exasperate her more. Instead, I walked up the steps to the community garden and sat on the top of the hill right below the tree with the big, sturdy leaves. She squirmed on the squishy grass, using my legs as her security fence, my chest and stomach to land on time and again between wails, allowing her lament to become more physical now. A full body expression of what she was feeling inside – a potpourri of so many things she could not verbalize even if she had the vocabulary.
*
A few weeks ago, I was at the gym, drowning out the infuriating electro remix of The Verve’s Bitter Sweet Symphony and tuning in, instead, to the quiet hum of treadmills and stationary bikes, the occasional cling and clanking of weights and a steady chorus of grunts and breath-catching. In walked a regular, a cheery type who is palsy with everyone. His face always seems open and smiling. The bags under his eyes staring back at you, a question unasked, a story untold.
How you really doing, man?
That day, I think he answered, unprompted, though I’m not sure many heard. I could hear it though, in the way his steps quickened on the treadmill, loudened, as he seemed to stomp on the rats that kept him racing, grew angrier and more desperate, his upper body cramped, his face down, forehead pushing against the wall he’s been wanting to break out of.
It went on like this forever, the whirring of the running belt heightening in pitch, alarmed. Every time I thought he couldn’t push himself further, that it was not humanly possible to accelerate any more, he did. Maybe I should have been admiring his stamina, his determination to reach an abstract goal, a visual only he could see on his miniature screen. But all I did was wonder what he was running from, worry about the intensity of the chase. And then, finally, I heard him slowing, the machine shocked to return to manageable magnitudes, the descent so sudden, a loud, exhausted cry escaped his chest. Just one sharp, imprisoned sigh pushed out into the morning, as loud as the 50kg weights that are often dropped onto the matts by groaning body builders. Only my guess is, this drop of pretence was heavier and more relieving than the weightiest dumbbell in the room.
He slumped over the handlebars of the treadmill, his head hanging between his arms, his feet now almost dragging and I knew: this was him. Crying. Screaming. Releasing.
*
Thinking back to that day, sat under the tree that was no willow, as my daughter wept and fought off the overwhelm that had accumulated in her little body, I realized that I was the only one feeling helpless in that moment. The daughter was perfectly capable of helping herself; she was being proactive by letting it all out in every way she knew how. All she needed from me was to give her the freedom to do so, and that’s what I did. We sat under the shade of that tree for more than thirty minutes, until the ground beneath us soaked up her last, fat tear and she fell asleep in my arms, her breath slowly returning back from hyperventilation to normal, her body heavy on my strained shoulders, her spirit noticeably lighter again.
I felt honoured to have been the one allowed to sit with her through this. To have received this mighty lesson from this tiny human.
And so, that Friday evening, I walked into my writing room, closed the door and the curtains, reached for a pillow and screamed into it until my lungs ached, my tears dried and the mist finally lifted.
[1] “pick me up and walk”
