Lessons of Winter

"In the depth of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer" Albert Camus.

Part of my childhood was spent in a small midwestern town outside of Chicago. I felt like an outsider there. In this beautiful crisp winter scene, you’d think only spectacular things happened in that place. I mean looking at this picture, I can almost hear the song... “Over the river and through the woods to grandmother's house we go”, erupting in the distance.

There are so many layers of symbolism that can be found in winter. It makes room for new growth. It’s about being able to see the beauty despite the pain. Sometimes though, it’s beauty can best be appreciated in the warmth of the indoors. However, if you’re the one looking from outside, it can feel rather harsh, bitter, and uninviting.

I always felt like the one in my family that was always looking from the outside in. I was either too introspective, or my laugh was too loud. I wasn’t outgoing enough, or I made friends with the wrong people in their eyes. I don’t know about you, but I have a love hate relationship with my family of origin. It took me years to figure out that I was only a shadow of what my parents wanted me to be, not in any way representative of who I really was. For me it took a lot of hardships and challenges to finally get to the place where I was ready to start speaking up for myself independent of my family.

I took this photo after unexpectedly finding myself back in my highschool home. To me it represents the beauty and hardships I had endured throughout my life, but especially in that home. In November 2018, after a freak car accident, I was there to recover: physically, mentally, and emotionally. Only a week or so prior to this accident, I unexpectedly lost my job as well. It was heart wrenching, because at the time I thought it had been my dream job. My heart was weary, and it needed rest. Despite that, it took a lot of ass kicking from the universe until I finally submitted to what I knew I needed to do all along... go back home.

For whatever reason I felt this draw to go back there, and it wasn't because I have fond memories of the place. In fact, I offered very little emotional support to my 14 year old sister. My parents were in the process of selling this country home, and she was grieving the loss of it. For her, it had been the only home she had ever known. Me on the other hand? I was relieved to have this home no longer be a part of my life story. I was eager to move past the pain.

Funny thing about pain though, is it keeps on coming back around until you’re ready to face it. Gabby Bernstein calls these slaps across the face, “universal assignments”. You can avoid them, but it’s like running around a track, it’s just going to keep coming back around no matter how many times you try and outrun it. Facing my highschool home again with all the traumatic memories held within, was a major universal assignment for me.

When I arrived there, I was greeted with an unexpected snow storm. As I began to pursue my past, it felt odd and somewhat uncomfortable for me. It’s funny how memories work, you are so set on how they happened, but then a picture will pop up that tells a different side of the story. I had this experience while organizing our family photos. As my family prepared to move, I was given the responsibility to organize 20+ years of ALL our family photos. It was overwhelming at times, but I’m grateful I did it because it helped me see different sides of myself that I had long forgotten existed.

As I was going through all the different items, I came across one of my highschool report cards, and it seemed to transport my mind to a different time, to my highschool years….

Those years were rather isolated and lonely times for me. Everyone is struggling to belong in highschool. For the most part though, I feel like if you didn’t have friends at least you had a family to fall back on and vice versa. I on the other hand had neither. At least that’s what I felt like at times.

Back then the few friends I did have, weren't exactly my mother's cup of tea. They were loud and swore which were kind of a bad combo to a family that was rather religious. There were limits and lots of control in this home. Free agency, I was taught, was important. However, the only free agency I experienced was when I was making choices that my parents agreed with. Otherwise, everything was kept a secret in my house. So I felt really limited in what I was able to experience during those years.

Not only did I feel like a reject in my home, but also in school. I was the kid who sat in the back of the class just hoping to remain invisible. I think that stemmed from my first day of highschool in my Algebra class. I was terrified, because I never had truly learned how to do multiplication/division in my grade school years. I have NO idea how I got through school, let alone a BS degree. I was already insecure in that math class, so when my algebra teacher received my homework, and said (in front of the entire class), “What? are you a stupid blonde or something?”. It really shut me down emotionally, and it made me feel really shameful. I know now, that he was honestly an ass, but at the time I thought it was my fault. After going years of thinking I was just not smart enough, this experience kind of confirmed that belief.

Despite that though, I had finally found my niche and passion for learning during my junior year. I came alive during debate in my AP history class, and found a love for the human body in my anatomy class. It was the first time, where I felt the freedom to make my own choices. Rather than go for all the classes my peers went for (AP science courses, and esp physics), I chose my own path. I had a sense of what was right for me, and it was the first time that I chose to listen to myself rather than an “authority leader” outside of me.

My family and many others had often labeled me as the “shy girl”, but my junior year changed that for me. I suddenly became outspoken and willing to get involved in class.. especially in Human Anatomy. As much as I loved it, my new found passion for learning was actually the very thing that the other kids mocked me for. It hurt me deeply, because the moment I felt free to be myself, was the very moment that others wanted to tear me down.

My willingness to participate and ask questions in class came from my genuine interest to learn about the subject. I'm grateful for human anatomy, it set me on a career path that has been able to sustain me during challenging times (as a Registered Dental Hygienist). However, as a young girl who so desperately wanted to feel like she belonged somewhere, anywhere…receiving condemnation and being mocked for my genuine desire to learn was something that filled me with a lot of sorrow. It felt like no matter who I was, It never was enough in high school. So my promptings to go back to this place that held these deeply painful memories, was not an easy decision.

As I sorted through family pictures, old report cards, and what have you. For the first time, I let out bouts of emotion I didn’t know were still trapped inside of me. I grieved for those teenage parts of myself that had been mocked, torn down, and not accepted. I allowed myself to profusely cry. It was cathartic to finally let myself FEEL and to not hide the pain anymore. Through this process, I started to see sides of myself that I never knew before. Pictures of my 6 year old self being all fun and sassy. I never remember being portrayed as “fun”... EVER… by anyone in my family. Yet here was proof that I was! It was amazing to realize that just because I was reserved, did not mean that was who I was deep down. In fact, a lot of my personality traits were a result of a child just trying to survive and cope with trauma.

The more I shifted through old memories, the more I started to uncover elements of myself that had long been deeply buried. I realized that it was up to me to discover who I really was, that it didn’t matter what others thought. They had no right to tell me who I was, because they never walked a day in my shoes. I have every right to declare who I am and what my values are, no one has the right to do that for me anymore.

I realized that although my external circumstances have often appeared as brutal as this winter scene. I have within me a spirit that is capable of holding onto incredible amounts of: warmth, kindness, compassion, love, and a bit of sassiness too. My circumstances don’t determine who I am, I determine who I am. This was the beginning of healing my childhood wounds, this was the beginning of my new story.