Three years on: liberation through loss

This last weekend I commemorated the third anniversary of my mother’s death.  At the same time, the suicide bereavement group Solace held their annual candle lighting service.

I went along to this in order to mark this anniversary, to think of Mum, to be in solidarity with others who had experienced similar loss, and because I like the idea of ritual.

It turned out to be a different experience than I thought it would be.

What would have been Mum’s 80^th birthday marked a turning point for me in terms of thinking about the direction I’m headed.  I covered this in my previous post, and in several others I talked about my loss of autonomy early in adulthood.

Before this anniversary I had already had issues come up for me around areas fundamental to my identity.  These were already turning over in my head before her birthday anniversary came up.

I have begun a retrospective journey and begun to question everything I have known since I was a child.  Naturally, one’s mother is the predominant guide through the early years while ideas about how life might look like are forming.  As I grew I decided that I wanted my life to look like hers. 

But looking back now, I wonder if I decided that, or if it was decided for me. I made conscious choices that led to a life like hers, but was I really fully informed about what those choices might mean?

Retrospection has meant looking at some experiences of my teenage years, and wondering ‘what if?’ 

I am fortunate to have detailed diaries from the age of 11 to about 18 where I have laid bare my soul.  I have to read between the lines of adolescent angst, but there is plenty to draw from.

As I sat in the church while everyone took their turns to light their memorial candle, it dawned on me that sitting here was not about Mum.  It had become about me.

With her passing I had been freed from all the constraints of the life she conditioned me to live.  Of believing that was the only way.  Of disappointing her if I didn't live that way.

I had been freed from the pain of her loss, but it’s possible that the pain isn't over yet.  Now it’s time to deal with the pain of self-examination.  It’s time to figure out who I am, what I believe and what I want my life to look like now that I no longer have the trellis of her life to grow against.

It’s made me realize that I don’t really know and that it’s not going to be an easy process to find out.  Until now, for the last twelve years at least, my identity has been tied to other people, and it’s a struggle to figure out where and who *I* am.

So now I begin.  Books.  Space.  Reflection.  Dreaming.  Thinking.  Crying.  Confusion.  It’s all there.

It’s going to be hell of a ride.