::Being True::

Truth. Being true. At this point in my life, I’m longing, more than ever 

before, to be that. To be true. To be the authentic person I was created to 

be.

When I was small, about four or five, I was the truest me I’ve ever been. Some say that at that age we are perfectly connected, above and below. We are still holding the hand of God. And we are waking up to the earthly world. I think that’s the purest description of it; it rings true. 

The years went by. I got older, and lost track of the Hand I was holding, or if I was still holding it at all.

I got caught up in the world of school, and parents, and siblings, and trying to get things right … early on, I fell into the habit of shaping myself to fit whatever it was they thought I should be. 

“Be sweet.” “Be good.” Be quiet.”

In my private hours, though … in my little back bedroom at 1135 South Quaker … I would lean my forehead against the windowpane, look out at the trees, and wonder who I was. I was eight years old, and I had already lost myself.

Life kept on, years passed, more siblings were born, and I fell further and further down the pecking order. Some people think being the oldest has its benefits. I’d argue that being oldest has its burdens. The only real benefit that I could see then was, I’d get out of the house and on my own first. And as a teenager, I marked the days with a black X on the calendar I hid under the mattress.

College was a waste. I had a full scholarship, but no understanding of how life worked, who I was in it, or where I was headed. As I left for college, my mother’s final words to me were, “I don’t know why you’re doing this. You’re just going to go up there and fail.”

And I never disobeyed my mother.

Alcoholic parents tend to leave their children rudderless. In my case, it seemed deliberate, though I didn’t know anything was missing at the time. I can see now that I had no “true North;” I didn’t even know there was one.

Adding it all up, it breaks my heart a little. That girl had so much talent, in so many areas; so many gifts that could have been developed. All she’d ever wanted was to be true, to have people see her as she really was. But by that time it had been ingrained in her that who she was, was unacceptable. Unloveable. So she really had no choice, did she? She’d be who they wanted, so she wouldn’t be alone. She’d let the world have glimpses of pieces of herself every now and then, but the whole picture was hidden from view.

I got pregnant, and got married, and that baby kept my young husband out of Vietnam. We were so young, college students who had no clue who we were or what we were getting into. 

But we jumped in with both feet, and I think I can say that we each gave it our best shot, at least in the beginning. 

It was fresh and sweet, the way new beginnings are. We had our baby girl, and in another two years four months, our baby boy was born. College guy friends hung out at our little house, and I’d cook for them every so often. Life was good, as good as it could be during wartime. Music, and laughter, and babies. We were blessed.

But eventually, the nagging of my authentic self got so loud that at times it was all I could hear. I tried to quiet it with projects of my own while the babies were sleeping. I told myself I was the problem, and to “Be sweet.” “Be good.” “Be quiet.” This went on for years. 

I had a third pregnancy, but I didn’t know it at the time. I just knew something wasn’t right. I was bleeding so hard, I dropped clots on the way to the bathroom. My doctor was having me come in for bloodwork every Friday. I was young, twenty-six, and didn’t even know enough to question him about anything. I lost so much weight. I look at pictures from back then and I can’t believe no one said anything to me about it.
Eventually, during the month of my twenty-seventh birthday, I had a complete hysterectomy. After the surgery, the doctor told me that I’d had an ectopic pregnancy. He said I’d needed five units of blood, and that my uterus was granulated and completely prolapsed. I had the reproductive organs “of a woman in her nineties.” I cried. For years. 

That first night, post surgery, my Daddy came to my room, still in his suit and tie from work, and fed me ice chips all night.
My mother never came, never called, until the final day I was there. She showed up unannounced, breezed into the room bright and cheery, with two of my cousins in tow – sweet cousins whom I had not seen since childhood. I was horrified. 

I think that was the moment I realized that my mother had never known me, or cared to know me. 

Due to as severe nursing shortage, I hadn’t been given so much as a sponge bath all week. All I’d done was lie in that bed and cry, I was so broken. The girl in me wanted her mama, but my mother had brought a party. Not good. Not appropriate. Not kind. Not true. 

It took years to accept the fact that there would never, ever be anymore babies. That was such a hard stretch of time. My heart broke, over and over, like ripples from a stone. I prayed to God that He would hold close the baby I lost, and that He would heal my heart.

I loved up on my two little ones and did the best I could to show them that who they truly are is who I wanted them to be. I said “Yes” as often as possible, and “No” when necessary. 

All of that is so far away, so far in the past. There are details, both sordid and sublime, that I’ve skipped over, but the throughline is my focus: I dodged, then denied, then bartered with my true self. Let her out a little, hide her completely, neither one worked. If I let her out a little, she’d end up fully exposed because there was no controlling the truth of her. If I hid her completely, I coped with that choice by using destructive habits to keep her under wraps. 

Looking back, it’s hard to admit. But I can see clearly from here that missed opportunities happened because I was never fully present to claim them. 

And then there’s this: 

God’s plan for me is still what it always was. My choices have not changed that. The ‘destination’ He has for my life can be reached by any number of routes. 

As C.S. Lewis says, “For you will certainly carry out God’s purpose, however you act, but it makes a difference to you whether you serve like Judas, or like John.”

The marriage finally fell apart twenty-five years later. There was nothing left to save. It was brutal and heartbreaking; I just knew that God could not do what He wanted with me inside it.

Now, decades later, I am still single. I have not figured out how to be fully who I am inside a primary relationship. I have friends, my children are married, and I have grandchildren.

All of those relationships are healthy, and good. I am at peace with being myself now. I’ve learned to ‘temper’ certain aspects, and I’ve grown in wisdom of who I am, of what’s appropriate. I have, finally, found my “true North.” I am honest about the past, both the good and the bad. Painful events caused by people I loved really happened. I’ve written some about those, and I will write more, as I’m moved to do so. But more than that, I hope to write about the lessons learned, and the goodness that’s been found in all of it.

And, in the end, I’m reminded of what Anne Lamott said:

“You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.”