by Donna Bishop
I like to think the risks I took — writing cheques for groceries when I knew there was no money in my account, driving rattle-trap vehicles and crossing my fingers that the kids were safe with their father — helped me to empathize with the families I would be tasked with helping. Armed with equal parts of enthusiasm and idealism, I ventured forth into the world of child protection, addiction, mental health and family counselling.
Not long after we moved to the city, I was summoned to visit my father in the hospital at the coast. My brothers were much more attentive to him than I. My excuse was my busy life and living in a faraway city, but the truth was, I didn’t want to be with him. On his deathbed, he cried as he said to me, “Livvy, I’m on this train and it won’t stop. It’s going backwards and it won’t stop. It’s making me see all these things I don’t want to see. I’m a bad person.”
He was trying, I suppose, to apologize for being such a terrible father. I don’t know if he believed in God, or in heaven or hell, but I imagine he was probably fearful, envisioning the mountains of coal fueling the infernos of hell just for him.
Instead of letting him apologize, I placated him and told him he wasn’t a bad father. He looked so scared and skinny and yellow and hollow. I couldn’t bear to cause him more pain, so I denied us both the opportunity to speak the truth. Instead, I made the lie larger and told him he was a good father — and frantically searched for something to illustrate this fallacy.
“You were always there for… my car. You cared about my safety, so you fixed the brakes, changed the oil. Remember that time that you rescued me when I drove into that huge, water-filled ditch when I was seventeen?”
He smiled and reached for my hand, but I gently pulled it away. I was remembering the rest of the car-in-the-ditch story — I’d left out the detail that I was dead drunk at the time and so was my dad, in the throes one of his relapses. He’d been too drunk to notice I was drunk, too drunk to see that I needed some parenting. I had such a huge tolerance for insane behaviour that I didn’t even feel any danger getting in a car with another drunk and enlisting yet another drunk friend of his to illegally tow my smashed-in Volvo. I left home two weeks later.
“Dad,” I said to him on his deathbed that day, “You don’t need to go backwards on the train, just let go and let yourself rest.” I meant it — I honestly couldn’t bear to see him suffer. It seemed to me he’d suffered enough. He died the next day when I was driving home. It bothered me that I couldn’t cry.
What I feel now, as a mature woman sitting under an oak tree in Mukteshwar, is not as pure as forgiveness for my father. It’s more like freedom from anger, bitterness and regret — a kind of detachment.
I’m so grateful to have had Celeste and then subsequent counsellors and mentors, who helped me in so many ways. I learned to not be so afraid of my own anger, or the anger of others — that these strong emotions are most often an expression of fear or unmet needs and must somehow be released. Just like my grandmother, I have my own favourite adages. One I’ve used a lot in my work is: “Holding onto anger is like swallowing poison and hoping the other person dies.”
The foibles and fears I’ve retained are possibly too deep for me to completely let go of in this lifetime. I don’t feel safe when I’m in my bed alone. I feel fearful and repulsed when I’m around people, even family and friends, who are drinking to the point of being drunk, especially when they get loud or speak aggressively. I just don’t trust drunk people and don’t want to be around them.
I also have what I have termed “casaphobia.” It’s a name I made up to describe the opposite of agoraphobia, where people experience anxiety being outside their own home and tend to spend a lot of time there. My anxiety pops up when I am inside my own home or indoors anywhere — I get a sudden need to go outside and walk, bike, swim or paddle my kayak, preferably in a natural area with trees or gardens or water. Then my heartbeat slows and I can breathe and think clearly again. The abuse and assaults I experienced in my younger years all happened inside four walls and it has been hard to shake the feeling that being inside walls is not safe. My past life as Veda, who was shot inside a well, probably didn’t help with this particular neurosis, either.
During my years as a counsellor, I’ve been honoured to have had clients trust me with their stories and allow me to guide them toward healing themselves. Many of them made me think of Joey. His story gave me a visceral awareness of the reverberating, devastating effect of the residential schools. My hypno-journey with Joey helped me gain one particularly useful understanding: any notion that I know what’s best for another person is fundamentally wrong, just as the policy of assimilation that produced the residential school travesty was absolutely wrong. Just like the actions of Hitler and his armies were absolutely wrong. No one can ever assume to make decisions for another person, let alone an entire culture. We must all weave the fabric of our own lives.
I realize that my life is one of white privilege. Although I came from poverty and violence and all the emotional aftermath of those things, part of the reason I was able to rise out of the ashes was that I was white and attractive according to European standards. Had I been Indigenous, black or brown-skinned, or had ancestors from a non-European culture, and had I not had the great good fortune to have Celeste in my life, chances are I wouldn’t have been given the opportunity to complete my education or find the kind of support I needed to put my past behind me.
It took me a long time to really get value from my past life as Detlef. But I finally came to understand that we are all capable, under certain circumstances, of being deviant or doing harm to others. We can’t be afraid of acknowledging that. In my work as a counsellor, I found this useful when I encountered people whose lifestyles and behaviour repelled me or seemed immoral. I was able to put myself in their shoes, to see their context even if I could not understand or relate to it. We all have a shadow.
The reason my tapestry includes a fair bit of social activism, I believe, is connected to Veda and her deep love of Gandhi and his teachings, as well as my experiences as a child and young woman. I’m here in these foothills today because of the threads that connect me to all those women, children and people without power or voice, who desperately need others to stand with them and speak loudly. As Gandhi said so beautifully, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” To have taken the pain I experienced as a victim and transform that emotion in a controlled way to help others has been the most healing thing I have done.
One of my pet theories as a counsellor is that as long as someone has one person — maybe a parent, friend or mentor — just someone who truly cares and has unconditional regard for them — there’s a far better chance they’re going to be okay. Without that, sociopaths are created. I had my grandmother and I also had my mother. As hampered as our mother was by her situation and by our culture at that particular time, she loved her children and we knew it. We learned from her how to be good parents and decent human beings. Her dying wish was for her five kids to be there for each other. And through marriage collapses, health issues, holidays, happy and sad milestones, we have done that. My brothers have long since grown into good men with children and grandchildren of their own.
Rather than shutting out my childhood years, I can take them out and look at them with a smile in my heart. That doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven everything that happened to me, but I have been able to mend the pieces of my soul that were torn by the actions of others. With help, I have woven through the tears, with sharp needles and colourful threads. My stitches bled at first, but now the images of abuse are all but invisible. They are now just a tiny piece of my story and take up no more space than any other part of the design.
The village children begin to emerge from their homes after lunch. The boys chase each other with sticks and the girls sit in a circle, singing a song. Things haven't changed that much since I was a girl. The social workers here in the Himalayas were shocked to hear that we have women’s shelters in Canada, too. They
were surprised that, for all our wealth and seemingly advanced society, domestic violence, sexual assault and child abuse are still huge issues in our country. This revelation seems to bring us closer together. We’re not seen as people doing charity work for those less fortunate, but as like-minded people joining together for a common cause. It makes the world feel smaller and more connected.
I think back to all the young people I have counselled, many of whom had experienced sexual abuse. With some, I’ve shared parts of my story, hoping it will help them to see there is light at the end of the tunnel if you look for it.
I hear voices and turn my head to discover the source — a group of four women walking down a dirt path, chatting in Hindi and laughing. They carry impossibly huge bundles of sticks upon their heads. The brilliant hues of their saris and head scarves remind me of Moragh and Veda — bright and wonderful parts of my tapestry, rich in a rainbow of colour. These cheerful women find joy in each other's company despite their simple, poor existence. Like them, I have been fortunate to have female friends who have sustained me in the worst of times and nourished my happiness throughout my life.
Liam and I met under the most contrived of circumstances, the blind date. Two friends and self-appointed matchmakers chose him as my perfect match and promoted him to me tirelessly. He’s a medical doctor and he wasn’t an alcoholic, married or even mentally unstable. I was unsure at first, thinking that I wasn’t suitable for a completely healthy partner. “A doctor? I don’t think so,” I reasoned with my persistent matchmakers, one a doctor and the other a nurse I was working with on a mental health outreach team. I imagined this Liam doctor guy as being brainy and conservative. Even if I gave it a chance, I expected disagreements about things like pharmaceuticals versus counselling, self-care and herbal remedies…let alone past lives! But I had to admit I wasn’t doing a great job of choosing a mate for myself.
Neither Liam nor I had ever gone on a blind date before, but we self-consciously agreed and met for dinner. The waiter came by several times to take our order before we were able to focus on the menu, instead of looking into each other’s eyes and thoughts. Any doubts I had dissolved before dinner arrived.
“I need to warn you that I have a fair bit of baggage,” I said nervously as our orders were finally taken and the small talk made way for much larger talk. Even as I said it, I realized it sounded like a challenge — Run, good doctor, while there’s still time! Without missing a beat and without dropping his soft green-eyed gaze, he said, “I’d be happy to help you unpack that baggage and figure out where it belongs. I’ve got my own and it’s heavy and dusty and old and it would do me a lot of good to unpack it as well,” he said and that was when I knew.
I have never known a kinder, more thoughtful, or principled man. He’s utterly egalitarian — a homeless heroin addict deserves exactly the same care as a billionaire, in his opinion.
We fell deliriously in love, got married and our family grew to seven — I gained two amazing step-children and Liam embraced my three. We endeavoured to raise these five kids from the unrealistic, well-intentioned perspective of our love bubble! Yep, we made lots of mistakes and had many crazy times with five kids aged eleven through fifteen. We built a home or two and wove a vibrant life together over the past couple of decades, rich with hard lessons and wonderful moments — but that portion of my story will have to be told in its own volume.
When Micah was still in high school, Ross died of an overdose. We will never know if it was an intentional or accidental. He was sixty and alone. Not quite alone — his newest Labrador retriever, Jasper, was with him until he was discovered four days after his death. Surrounding him were syringes and vials of old medicine and an ancient leather medical bag, which was likely passed down to him from his father who was a medical doctor in Nelson. The coroner discovered traces of cold medicine, heroin, alcohol, pot and barbiturates in his system. We all agreed that it didn’t seem his style to commit suicide and not leave some kind of dramatic note or message.
The shock sent us all reeling. Ross’ death left a dark, empty space in his children’s hearts that took many years to heal.
Before his death, Ross had recently gone into recovery and had been going to AA. He’d bought a small farm near Nelson and had begun to reconnect with the kids. He attended both Leah and Molly’s high school graduations and Micah had spent two weeks with him the previous summer, fishing and fixing up an old truck. Ross had even visited Liam and I at our home and we had a few pleasant cups of coffee and talks about the kids.
“Looks like you finally have your beautiful castle on a hill and a prince to match, Queen Liv,” he teased me when he entered our large new home. Even sober, he had a way of making me feel uncomfortable, but he was trying, and we knew the kids would love to see both of us getting along. I laughed and said, “Yeah. All I need now is a drawbridge to keep the riffraff out.” He chuckled and so did Liam. No one had any thought that these would be our last moments with him.
Liam, the kids and I drove for nine hours to Ross’ home on the Kootenay river and over the next three days, we went through his belongings, setting aside some things to store and hauling off truckloads of stuff to the dump and the Salvation Army. Friends from Little Mountain came to help and to attend the memorial service. The convoy back home through the dangerous mountain pass must have been quite a spectacle — a pick-up truck full of crazy things, including pinball and vending machines that Ross had turned into a bit of a business. Our son Micah, with his learner's driving license, rode out front on his Dad’s motorbike, causing my heart to be in my mouth the entire time.
The kids were so regretful that they hadn’t known their dad better and that he would never again have the chance to be a part of their lives. Molly seemed especially devastated, I believe because she had the most distant and complicated relationship with him. The loss stirred up convoluted feelings of guilt, regret — even blame — in each of us. But for them, it was the thought that he loved them and now he was gone. He would never get to follow their careers or be a grandfather to their children — a role I’m sure he would have loved. He would have been thrilled that his oldest daughter, who used to line her stuffies up on the couch and teach them how to read and how to behave, is now an elementary school teacher; his second oldest, the one who knew and understood anxiety and the need to be included and loved for who you are, now makes her living as a social worker, helping others navigate the world; and his wild little daredevil son, who now makes his living welding and pipe-fitting giant oil rigs and ships.
And so, the last vestiges of Ross took up residence in our garage. At one point, the urn containing his cremated remains fell off a shelf and spilled onto Liam’s head.
“Damned Ross, I knew he’d find a way to get the last laugh,” I cursed with amusement as I grabbed the Dustbuster and vacuumed up his ashes and put them back in the tin, laying Ross to rest one more time.
I like to think that, having endured my lives as an orphan, a witch, a cast-off girl, a Nazi soldier and a victim of the residential school system, and, in this current life, a sexual abuse and assault survivor, I would be in good standing for a really awesome life next time. But there is no way to know. If reincarnation exists, there are many unexplored centuries in the history of my soul, and I’d need to do much more hypnotherapy to find out the rest of the story. But the final third of my life is just beginning and I find that I want to live it as much in the present as possible, feeling grateful for every moment.
My sessions with Celeste opened my eyes to alternate ideologies. Throughout my life, I’ve explored a huge variety of philosophies and techniques for managing the angst of living.
In Buddhism, there’s a practice called Tonglen, which seeks to transform negative emotions such as anger and fear into positive and productive energy. One starts by acknowledging you are not the only one having these feelings — you aren't alone. From there, you let them come to the surface. Breathe them in, in all their discomfort, and then breathe o
ut compassion and love. The negative feelings dissipate and are transformed into love for yourself and for others and transmit just a little bit of healing energy to the world.
With this dreamy thought, I suddenly realize my life story is not just for me — it’s asking to be told, asking for a voice. Parts of it will not be easy to share and probably not easy to hear, but maybe it could be like a Tonglen offering which, having been shared, may help others with the same pain. It could be like weaving it into the Wyrd.
I have a perfect visual memory of myself at thirty, running along that tree-lined path to Celeste’s house many years ago, terrified by the present, sublimating the past and unable to look to the future. I’ll tell my story, beginning with that day in 1987. This village in Northern India, dusty and poor and yet vibrant and colourful, is the perfect backdrop for such a life-rattling epiphany.
I hear Liam calling from down the hill — he wants me to come to the internet tent, where we can sometimes get a sketchy signal for a few minutes in the late afternoon. Is it my imagination or is a strand of pure blue light leading me to him and the iPad he’s holding?
“It’s our grandkids, Liv — they’re on Facetime and they want to sing Happy Birthday to you.”
I jump up and run down the path to the tent, as though I’m a much younger version of myself. I’m missing them so much and even though we’ll be back home in a couple of weeks, I can’t bear to miss a chance to feel their love and give them mine.
~ The End ~
“"Do not be dismayed by the brokenness of this world.
All things break. And all things can be mended.
Not with time, as they say, but with intention.
So go. Love intentionally, extravagantly, unconditionally.
The broken world waits in darkness for the light that is you."
~ L.R. Knost