Making Space for My Anger
Read Time: 4 Minutes
Words by Laci Hoyt
I am angry.
These words are not easy for me to say. Mostly, I just try to talk myself out of feeling this way or fake like I'm not feeling about-to-boil-over with rage.
Stuff it.
Distract away from it.
Do anything but feel it.
But why? Why am I so resistant to feeling anger?
I have never been good at it. Maybe because I am female and I've been taught my whole life that anger isn't a feeling women should express. That it's unbecoming and isn't nice and means something negative about me. Maybe because everyone expects a sick person to be inspirational and strong and positive and being angry isn’t any of these things. Maybe because the way anger feels inside my body is uncomfortable. And for all these reasons I've been stuffing anger down and trying to convince it to be something else, excusing it away, ignoring it.
But this time, none of that is working.
I am angry anyway.
I feel cheated. When I look at photographs of our family from 2011 and before, I see our smiling faces and I relive and remember how much fun we had together then. I was a great mom. I was taking my kids out into the world to experience things and meet new people. We did so much together.
And then it slowly dwindled away.
Every month from the beginning of 2012 on has fewer photos, fewer trips, fewer smiles, less life.
My son was in 1st grade the year I got sick. He still pronounced some of his words wrong. My daughter was in 3rd grade and still liked playing with princesses. As I write this, they are now in their sophomore and senior years of high school. My son is ready to start shaving his face and my daughter will be leaving for college in a few months and I barely remember anything of the years that got us here.
Most of my memories of the in-between are of me lying on the couch, trying not to be ill from watching the wall spin while the kids whispered to each other about the video game they were playing together because I couldn't entertain them or even be present with them.
We stopped hiking around in all the state parks in the summer because I couldn't drive us there and later, couldn’t walk that far unassisted. We stopped playing games in the evenings because I couldn't move my eyes around a game board or from the cards in my hand to the playing zone in front of me without causing even more severe dizziness. We stopped eating at the table because sitting upright was too uncomfortable and I needed distractions to help me get food down while feeling so incredibly nauseous.
We stopped traveling.
I stopped working.
We stopped gardening and planning.
Everything became about surviving.
And at the time, it was fine. I made the best of it because what else could I do?
But now? Now that my life is (generally) more manageable?
It is now that I find that I am so unbelievably angry.
A delayed rage.
I missed out on so many years of my children's childhoods...the only years I had left before they became teenagers. I missed out on making lasting, happy memories with them.
I can't get any of that time back.
Sometimes, I feel like I'm so disconnected from them and even though I know rationally it was always going to go this way because that's just part of kids growing up, I still feel like it's all my fault because I got sick and when I got sick I checked out. Everything came down to me making it through another day, to another doctor's appointment, through another unrevealing test. Most of what I thought about was my symptoms and what could be causing all of this. I spent every bit of reading that I could stand to do on researching.
The illness took over my entire life.
I can't remember the last time I hung out with a friend. Most of the time, I feel like I don't have any that live near me. Most of the people in my town act like I don't exist and I'm angry about this too. Because no one showed up for us when we were going through the hardest years of our lives. No one in our town brought meals or offered to help with laundry or kids or anything at all. No one from my community even asked any of us how we were doing. We seemed to just disappear from everyone's mind. And now, the people in my community avoid even making eye contact with me.
I'm angry that all it took was one little pill to make my life more manageable but it took seven years to find it. I'm angry that some of my issues have never been diagnosed and are untreated to this day. I am angry that every movement I make toward becoming more active again, results in a set back.
I'm angry that none of this was fair.
And I'm angry that I'm so angry about all of this. That I would even dare to use the words "it's not fair" because life is not fair, no matter who you are.
Still, there is nothing left to do with this anger but feel it. Welcome it in and make a space. Invite it onto my lap and comfort it:
It's understandable...of course you're angry...everything changed and you had no say, no control...you had plans and goals and dreams and you had to let all of those go….
I suppose this is just another part of the dance of acceptance. I come in and out of being at peace with the turn my life has taken. Right now, I am not at peace. And that has to be okay.
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About the Author:
Laci Hoyt wants to live in a world where kindness is a priority and everyone owns at least one handknit sweater. She writes from her home in upstate NY about living with chronic illness, love and relationships, and any other thing she can’t get out of her head. Her writing has been published through The Kindred Voice and Motherscope. When she’s not writing, she can be found with knitting needles and yarn, hunched over the sewing machine, or creating unique dolls and bags for her Etsy shop. Every Sunday, you can find a new haiku published on her blog.
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