Before we gathered for a scheduled class weekend, she shared with me that one of her students was interested in Jimmy, and she wasn’t sure how to handle it. The student had asked Gemmia if she would be okay with her seeing Jimmy, who also happened to be the student’s landlord. Inner Visions staff and students all knew that Gemmia and Jimmy were Niamoja’s parents, and that they had been involved in a long-term relationship. Very few knew that their intimate relationship had ended. Gemmia, with her classic diplomacy, reminded the student that she had not come to Inner Visions to find a personal relationship. She had come to heal her life and learn how to be a life coach. She suggested that the relationship might need to wait until she had completed her studies.
Inner Visions was a teaching, healing environment, and there was a relationship based on trust between our faculty and students. People came to us trusting that we would support them in moving beyond the mental and emotional blockages that had stalled them in their lives. While many other psycho-spiritual programs like Inner Visions had strict rules about personal involvement between staff and students, we had not considered the need for a specific policy, because most of our staff and students were female. Jimmy was one of two male staff members. As my administrative assistant, he had access to the intimate personal history of our predominantly female student body. At the level of professional responsibility, it felt inappropriate for a male staff member to be intimately involved with a female student who was working through personal issues at Inner Visions. And this particular student had a pattern of being involved in forbidden relationships, which is why it became a student issue for Gemmia and an administrative issue for me.
We were beginning a class weekend, where the student in question would be present. It was customary for students to bring their current issues and challenges to the floor for coaching. I discussed with the faculty how to handle this particular student if the issue was brought to the floor. We decided that we should not wait. We should call her out and deal with it in order to establish parameters for the entire student body. Little did we know that there was something bigger than we knew in store for us.
I called the student to the floor, asking how her month had been and what she was moving through now. She must have assumed that I already knew. I always told the students to assume that if I asked the question, I already knew the answer. It was an outgrowth of my training in law. It is a rule among attorneys never to ask a question unless you know the answer. Unwittingly, I was about to break that cardinal rule.
“So what’s up for you, my dear?”
“Well, I moved.”
“Great! Is there more?”
“Yes. I think I am physically and sexually attracted to my landlord.” kay, that wasn’t so bad. That was expected.
“Really. Tell me more.”
“Well, I am attracted to him.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that we are having a sexual relationship and I want more.”
With that, the bottom fell out of my planned line of inquiry. The students gave a collective gasp that sucked all of the oxygen out of the room. I glanced at the faculty. They all sat stone-faced, Gemmia among them. I continued. I had to. It was part of the process.
“So you are having a sexual relationship with your landlord and you want more. If that is true, why are you calling him your landlord? Isn’t he more than that for you?”
“Yes.”
“What meaning does this relationship hold for you?”
I could feel the heat and horror emanating from the student and the cold panic emanating from the faculty. The student said she knew it was wrong because of this man’s relationship to her faculty advisor. She admitted that she had lied and that she was actually living in the man’s house. I am not sure what else she said; I just knew that if I looked over at Gemmia, I would lose my mind. That didn’t last long, however, because what happened next sent me into another level of horrification.
Another student stood up indicating that she had something to say. I acknowledged her, granting permission.
“I have had a relationship with Jimmy too.”
She knew it was inappropriate, she said, and she warned the other student that they were both being used. I was speechless, utterly speechless. When the third student stood up, indicating that she too had been personally involved with Jimmy, the room erupted into total chaos. Each of the women was a student on Gemmia’s roster. Each of them knew full well of Gemmia’s relationship with Jimmy. The students were furious. The faculty were disgusted. With whom? I wasn’t sure, but I had to restore order. I didn’t dare look in Gemmia’s direction.
This, I told them, was a matter of integrity. The integrity of the program and the faculty was in question. I accepted full responsibility for creating an environment where something like this could occur unbeknownst to me. I dealt with each student about her own integrity and her choice to engage in this behavior. We looked at their pasts and their patterns. For one, it was the thrill of sneaking around. For another, it was payback to a sister who had stolen a boyfriend. For the other, it was just stupid, mindless gratification.
Once I had dealt with the students, I turned my attention to Gemmia. She was sitting perfectly poised as if none of it had anything to do with her. I called her to the microphone in the center of the floor. Obediently, she came. I asked her forgiveness for having aired this in such an impersonal way. I explained that one of the hazards of our working together was that I was first her immediate supervisor and then her mother. She said that she understood. I told her that the mother in me wanted to run and put my arms around her, but that I needed to address the integrity of the program and the needs of our students. She acknowledged that she understood and said she would and did forgive me. This woman was a master, and as proud as I was of her, my mother’s heart ached for her.
I had to ask Gemmia the hard questions. I had to treat her as if she were a student in the program, who had created an experience that was up for healing. I just had to go there. I knew and so did she. This was what the work of Inner Visions was all about.
“So what does this represent for you, my love? Why are you having this experience?”
“It’s about my false pride. The relationship is over, I know that. In one sense, what he does has nothing to do with me. In another sense, for this to come out this way tells me that I did not make myself or my relationship with him clear. It wasn’t clear to me, to him, or anyone else. I was too proud to say, I am done with him.”
“Is there more?”
“Yes. This is also about betrayal. In some ways, I have always been betrayed by the people I love. Well, obviously this man has betrayed me. I asked him about this woman and he lied. My father betrayed me by leaving and never looking back. My brother has betrayed me, my sister has betrayed me, and my mother has betrayed me.”
“What can you share with me about feeling and being betrayed by me?”
By now everyone in the room was crying. I think they were crying at the sheer magnitude of Gemmia’s presence. She wasn’t bowed. She didn’t cower. Her spine was erect. She held my gaze. Her voice was strong and clear as she prepared to take her hero down. All the faculty members were standing with their hands projected outward in front of them. Some were directed at me, others at Gemmia. They were holding the space, sending us love. I could feel it. I needed every ounce of it.
“One of the reasons I didn’t end the relationship was because I was too proud. I didn’t want to be like all the other women I know, women who allowed themselves to be used, dishonored, and disrespected by men. I lied to myself, telling myself I was different. I’m not different. So, I guess I have been betrayed because I betrayed myself.”
Just as Gemmia was an excellent teacher, she was an excellent student. Gemmia had learned all of the lessons I had taught her, the good ones and the not-so-good ones. The magnificent news was that she knew how to apply spiritual principles to herself for her own healing. She was not a victim. The
bad news was that we were not finished. There was more she needed to say and more I needed to hear.
“Can you tell me where or how you learned to betray yourself?”
“From my mother. My mother taught me to lie to myself, to deny my true feelings, and to always keep a happy face. My mother was the first person to betray me. She lied to me about my father. She lied to me about so many things, I can’t even count them any more. And, for some reason, most of the lies she told me involved a man.”
I could not move and I dared not breathe.
“Don’t get me wrong. My mother is a good person, a really good person; but there are things that I heard and saw as a child that felt like betrayal. She put men, and people, and her work ahead of me, my brother, and my sister.”
Now Gemmia was crying. That was a good sign. It meant that the energy in her body was moving. I knew better than to cry or move energy or move one fiber of my being. I was sitting on a stool 20 inches off the floor. It was too far for me to fall.
“Intellectually, I really do understand that is what you—I mean my mother—had to do. She has a very high calling in her life. But as a child, I didn’t know that shit. I just knew that my mommy had important things to do, and that meant I would be left with someone or alone and scared. Intellectually, I knew she loved me, but it still felt like betrayal.”
I could barely get the words out of my mouth.
“Is there more?”
“I helped my mother build this place. I put all of my time, energy, and resources into creating this dream, her dream. Then one day, I heard her thank all the people involved. She thanked the faculty and her friends. She called them by name. Then, she said, I would especially like to thank my husband, for without him, none of this would have been possible. It was like a knife in my heart. I thought to myself. Either she is crazy, or I have just been royally f——d! He didn’t do a damn thing but take her money, use her name, benefit from all of my hard work, and walk away with her looking like a fool—and she thanks him publicly. Me she ignores. That, I believe, was the ultimate betrayal. That, I believe, is what has led to this. It is time for all of this shit to get cleaned up. It doesn’t feel good, but it is time.”
I don’t think I had ever heard Gemmia swear, not like this, anyway. I’m not sure what happened next, who said what to whom, but I know that it was healing. I know that Gemmia and I spoke words of forgiveness. She forgave herself first, then her mother, then the man, then the students. She reminded them that we are all human, and that being so makes us good at teaching what we need to learn. She told the three students involved that she loved them and that they would be held accountable for their choices by something higher than her or me. She asked them to seriously consider their patterns and advised them to work toward healing. The woman was a master, pure and simple.
The next few days were awkward on all levels. As a faculty member, I had to repair the breach of safety and deal with the students. As an administrator, I had to deal with the possibility of sexual harassment charge against a member of my staff, which jeopardized the integrity of the program. As a mother, I had to find a way to support my child. As a woman, I had to heal. I talked to my godfather, my best friend, and the faculty and staff. I hired a management consultant to come in and govern the administrative part of the process. The stench of the entire ordeal hung in the air like a cloud.
Because of the enmeshed relationships between myself and Gemmia, Gemmia and Jimmy, and Jimmy and me, I had to protect myself and the organization from potential liabilities on a number of fronts. When the meetings and testings and conference calls were complete, it was recommended that Jimmy not be terminated. Instead, he was placed on 60 days of probation and ordered into psychological counseling. Each of the students was reassigned to another faculty member. Gemmia and I continued to come to the office each day in an attempt to address all of the issues, the professional as well as the personal.
When we finally got around to talking about what had happened, it started out as two coaches talking about a nasty situation. It ended up as a daughter sharing her most intimate feelings with her mother. She said she didn’t blame me, although I blamed myself. Why hadn’t she ever talked to me about any of this?
She was working through it. The feelings were too intense. She was confused. So much had changed. I wasn’t that person any more. She hadn’t known the depths of her anger. The conversation lasted for hours and then for days. She was, in so many ways, much stronger than I. She was, in every way, so much clearer than I was at the time. She reminded me of everything I had taught her, told her, shown her. It was a challenge that we would get through together. Each night, we would go to our separate homes and then spend hours on the telephone until one or both of us broke down. Each call ended with “I love you” and “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Jimmy dismissed Gemmia and her concerns, telling her that they were no longer together and what he did in his personal life was none of her business. Bringing students into his home in front of Oluwa and Niamoja was her business. Threatening the viability of her mother’s lifelong vision was her business. Dishonoring her and her mother among the students was her business. He didn’t see it that way.
With me, Jimmy was cold and malicious. I asked him to take off his administrative-assistant hat for a minute and address his behavior on a personal level. He had lived in my house for more than 15 years, I loved and treated him like a son, I had bought the house he now lived in and the car he drove. How did he justify his behavior?
His tirade began. It was none of my business pure and simple. We didn’t have a relationship. We never did things together like a mother and son. The car and the house could have come from anyone. As far as Inner Visions was concerned, it was a job and I was his boss. He didn’t know it was necessary to report to his boss about what he did in his personal life.
For a moment, I entertained the notion of feeling sorry for him and making excuses for him. After all, he was my granddaughter’s father, he had grown up without a mother and with an emotionally unavailable father, and he said he felt that he had never had a real family. We were it. After five minutes of that train of thought, I slapped myself back into reality. This man was a detriment to my well-being. How had I missed that? I had made excuses for him, just as I had with my father, brother, my husband, and every other man I had ever been involved with.
My friend Shaheerah reminded me that there comes a point where a person’s psycho-social history is of little or no consequence. There comes a moment when you simply have to say no to their behavior, their attitude, and whatever else it is that they do that causes you harm. I accepted Jimmy’s presence in my home because of his relationship with Gemmia. I also realized that any mother worth her weight in salt would have never allowed her daughter to live with a man in her house for years without being very clear about their relationship. He lived with us for his convenience, not from his commitment. I had failed myself and my daughter miserably.
Gemmia decided to take a few weeks off to clear her head. She was going on a 40-day pray-and-fast vigil. I left her alone as she requested. I would respond to her calls, but I did not initiate any. I had my own multiple madnesses to deal with: the incomplete divorce process, the IRS payments, my feelings of guilt and shame about how absent I had been from my and my daughter’s lives, and what I needed to do to clean it up.
One of the students moved out of Jimmy’s house almost immediately. The others were focusing on healing from their participation in the betrayal. The faculty and I did our best to maintain a spiritual, healing mode. Several of us put ourselves in therapy. I did my best to keep working and bringing money into the organization. The organizational consultant continued to work with us.
When Gemmia came back to work, she looked great and said she felt clear. She had lost some weight and cut her locks. She was ready to get back in the saddle, to continue moving the program forward. She was an inspiration to us all.
Ultimately, Jimmy failed to meet t
he terms of his work probation and was terminated for cause. Then I realized how long I had tolerated unnecessary crap in my life. With his departure, the stench lifted. It was very, very sad and eye-opening. For most of her life, Niamoja had seen her father every day. Although visitation had been negotiated, it was a shift, and Gemmia was doing her best to occupy her daughter’s time and her thoughts to camouflage the change. Hence, the mommy-daughter activities began. Those two, Gemmia and Niamoja, became inseparable. Although the circumstances that created it were tragic, it was a beautiful thing to watch. Niamoja had a chair and a desk in her mother’s office. After school each day, they sat and did homework together. Then, they would go home for the private activities— baking days, movie nights.
When we had late nights at the office, both Niamoja and Oluwa were there, along with the children and grandchildren of the other staff. Gemmia made a special children’s corner that included books, games, a small television, and, of course, snacks. The children kept themselves occupied while we went about the business of rebuilding the insides of our organization.
I was amazed and pleased at the resourcefulness of this group of dedicated women. We loved each other, and we created a safe, loving environment for the children. Every now and then, my husband would stop by to see Oluwa, but we barely spoke. It felt surreal as Gemmia and I both settled into to being single mothers.
The Institute was running smoothly but it brought in very little income that first year. I did as many speaking engagements as I could, but my lack of public appearances was showing up in my royalties. They were down more than 75 percent, not enough to cover the cost of running the program. Once again, I began to eliminate staff positions. Once again, they refused to leave. Gemmia and I both took a cut in salary. Thank goodness she had encouraged me to nest a little bit on the side for emergencies. We were barely making payroll, and the payments to the IRS were out of the question.
Peace From Broken Pieces: How to Get Through What You're Going Through Page 22