Today I decided to use the EMDR sound plus music therapy that is used to address trauma. I thought 15 minutes as part of meditation would be a good idea. Just like all my meditations my mind was all over the place until I arrived in my childhood home.
I was in our den with the braided oval rug and I can see my mother now laying on the teal couch that Lurlene from our church had just recovered for us. My mama spent most of her days sick on her favorite couch. She never had chemo therapy just radiation but food was the enemy for her and when she was sick this is where she stayed..
In the meditation she could see me as I am now and she called me over and took my hands. I told her I didn't know she was going to leave us and she said that she was sorry for not telling me the truth. She took my hands in hers and said "look we have the same hands". She said that I have always been a part of her and that she was proud of who I have become. She offered to let me lay on the couch with her but since I am not a child I am too big. I laid my head on her chest and she stroked me. I cried the whole time and I am still crying just writing about it.
All my life my memory of my mother has be from a distance. I could see her and remembered things she did but I never remembered what she said or recognized her as a flesh and blood person. I thought it was because I had forgotten and not because I was blocking the feeling of loss. I have never let myself feel that loss. I have felt it through other losses in my life but the one true loss I had I never really acknowledged. I was a child and I didn't know how to deal with it so I put it away forever.
I always thought I was a burden to my mother when she was sick. I was strong willed and tried to be good but I never was sure what I was doing wrong. Seeing her in my meditation she felt like a real person and not some far away dream of a voiceless person.
The way EMDR is suppose to work it that the eye therapy, sound or tapping distracts the conscious mind and lets unconscious memories of thoughts come to the surface. I am not an expert but I have had two breakthroughs that have helped me to address beliefs I have had about myself my whole life. The reason I think "I am not enough" the reason I think people leave me even if with my mother it was in death. My child's mind put this idea there and I have built on it with every loss.
I believe that we form our ways of coping with life from a child's perspective. When we become grown up we just take those core views and embellish them to suit our current situation. The brain always takes the simplest route or routine so it is easier not to question our thinking. This is why when we have some life altering crisis we start to question our thinking. It is too hard for most people to give up who they believe they are because without our identity we feel naked and empty.
I know this first hand but this doesn't last long. Even without our identity we are still here and can choose again. We can choose to re-create a happier healthier person by rejecting the idea that we are permanently damaged and without hope. This is a lie built on the ideas we formed as children. We can choose again and know that it is only our thoughts and false beliefs about ourselves holding us back.
Whether my meditation was brought on by EMDR or if it is the belief that it might help me have a breakthrough it worked. I have been that young girl hold people at arms length because I thought they might leave me like my mother did. I haven't wanted to take that chance again. Today I can see that and I feel dancing around the house.
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