It’s OK to Cry

Whatever set me off a few months ago, the trigger shot its bullet into the center of my heart, again. “What was it?” I wondered, as another set of tears shook me so hard I could hardly stand up.

Was it that morning’s dream of returning to work as an RN on an overflow floor, where no-one was available to orient me? And I dabbled in one thing or another only to realize I hadn’t gotten an assignment and hadn’t done any patient care or passed any meds. I realized I was there but I wasn’t contributing anything and had forgotten how to do the job. “OK,” I thought, “unsettling dream. The third in a row.” Was that what made me so vulnerable, the feeling of being useless or out of sync with the world?

Perhaps it was the looking in my mirror and seeing the sores on my face left over from a dermatologist’s liquid nitrogen gun. Or maybe it was that I felt defeated about dieting again or that no one had returned my calls for two days or. . .  or . . .  or . . .

Suffice it to say I searched all the daily astrological, numerological etc. reasons for sadness while trying to blame a few people who came to mind.

Finally, I realized, I just had to cry!!

It is my fact of life. If I don’t have a good boohoo on a semi-regular basis, I get stuck. My mom knew this. She always said, “Earlene is really predictable. She cries when she’s happy, angry, sad, frustrated, tired, and anything in between. If she’s really gritchy, sit her down in front of a movie about a dying dog or child, she’ll have a good cry and then be singing.” You can bet that on that day I was waiting for the singing part to start.

What I have come to know is that shedding or releasing tears is a good thing. Some studies have shown that we release toxins in our tears. Others have noticed a reduction of stress, and a few investigators have hypothesized that the release of tears changes our electro-magnetic field to reduce the number of damaging positive ions that circulate throughout our systems.

These positive ions can nick the inside of blood vessels causing a place for the body to try to  heal this wound with (simplistically explained here) a plaque build-up. Others spark a change in how a cell reproduces itself. It is believed by some that this is how cancer can develop.

I don’t know what’s true. I only have one personal experience to go by. My late husband never cried. If he did, only a few tears would water his eyes before he would shut them down. In the 34 years I knew him, I only saw him spill a few tears during several intense losses: when he was left as a divorcee, when his son was in trouble, when each of his parents died and two mentor friends passed on, and when his daughter crossed over.

His tears were sparse even though I knew his heart was heavy.

It’s ironic that when he passed it was caused by an extreme collection of fluid (caused by metastatic cancer) in his pericardial sac which ultimately crushed his heart before causing it to explode in his chest. I can’t help but wonder if all that fluid might have been unshed tears.

Accumulating and Letting Go

In August of 2011, I had to make the decision of whether or not to place my mother permanently into a skilled nursing facility. It broke my heart to leave her with a few personal items around her in a windowless room. My only comfort was that she would be watched more closely there than on the assisted living floor where she had fallen four times before they realized she was having small strokes and also had a bladder infection.

I honestly expected, as most percentages predicted, that she would go downhill from that point and would not last more than two years. It has been five years now, and she has coped with the challenges of living in and out of a hospital bed. She was moved into a double-bed room where she now overlooks the same garden she used to see from her and my dad’s first apartment. I believe she is more than content, or at least that’s what I think I see when I visit.

After I made that guilt-ridden decision to have her stay permanently in skilled nursing care, I began to empty her studio apartment on the assisted-care floor. I realized, at that time, how much my mom had been quietly and steadily letting go of her life over the years leading up to that move. She had one pot and no pans. Her dishes were enough for four but she had only one coffee mug. Her dresser drawers were barely filled and then only with essentials. I found one purse, one hearing aid, one hand lotion. Her knitting needles were packed away and there was no yarn in any of her usual caches.

Most of her clothes and underwear had her name sewed into them or marked with a marking pen.

Over the course of these last five years, her memories of the past have begun to loosen. Her ability to perform her activities of daily living are diminishing. My mom is reminding me of my youngest granddaughter who will be turning six next week. Bella continues every day to add one more skill or word or concept into her experience so she can grow and cope in this world. Where Bella is assembling her personality, my mom is dis-assembling herself until, perhaps, she can become light enough to float away.

In the Scheme of Things

I am remembering attending a Standing for Mother Earth event two years ago where we were asked to form a circle. Each of us then were instructed to name one word that described what we were grateful for. Many said rain, community, families, friends, God, and the offerings were sincere and beautiful.

I spoke a Lakota word, Tankuskaska. The word does not translate exactly (and may not be spelled correctly either) but it does create in my mind a meaning that presents itself as a whole concept. I was thinking about that circle this morning and my choice of that particular word. “Why in the world did that term at precisely that moment want to be said by me?” I could have said anything, but I chose a naming of something so dear to my heart and my being that I had to say it.

I also wondered briefly this morning if, while I was standing in that circle, I had needed to be different. “Had I needed to call attention to myself?” I wrestled with all my self-judgements, until I came to understand that I simply had to express this term which has layers upon layers of meaning to me.

The intention of this word is to refer to: “All that is, all that has been, and all that ever will be.” For me, it’s a term that is beyond any concept of God or Great Spirit. It reminds me there is a blessing in the present moment, in all the past moments, and in those moments of the future, because they are all happening right now.

It reminds me there is a continuum of what has had to happen to make this moment be what it is and that what is being done in this moment is what will affect that which is to come

It calls to me to understand that when I pay attention, I am part of this moment (and of course even when I don’t). I am part of what has happened and definitely will be part of what will be.

I personally am responsible for what I do right now, what I have done, and what I will do.

And, if, as I am coming to understand, there is no such thing as time, but it is only a construct of the mind, then this term ushers me into the space where all is one, right here, right now, and again now, until it is all a smooth being-ness encompassing all occurrences without judgment.

I am thinking of how I am then required to act so consciously with regards to all things, people, beings, environment, everything in my life. Fortunately, I also believe if I have a miss-step, it can become absorbed in the fabric of all that is. (That is, unless it is a huge miss-step.)

I am so thankful for the understanding that this term brings, its potential, its memories, and its promise. I pray we, or at least this one person, me, can learn to be more inside of it all, to know I don’t have to be invited to be a part of the whole. I only have to remember to invite myself.