Posted on by palmtreemomma

My Mother’s Daughter

Have you met my mother's daughter? 
hair pulled tight to keep 
ears from sticking 
out too far
slicked back with
dippitydoo
long skirts over banged up knees
that preferred to kneel
in the dirt
by the creek
run away
by herself
find the meadow of flowers
tucked behind the woods
where her voice could roar and 
bounce across the hills
sing songs that were silly
and dance in the dirt

The one who was a little 
too much
so they hushed her with rules
and set her up to fail if
she opened her mouth
but gave her a place of 
belonging
just for her
IF
she was quiet and
submissive
go to church but
not speak in it
bring casseroles and 
jello cakes
in colorful dishes
leave them on the table
for others to consume.
give her body
scrub the toilets
hold the babies
wash the mud and dirt 
off the floor and
the shoes
and the clothes
pull that wild curly hair 
 tighter
pin it into a bun
hide it!
all the wild glory
behind a piece of pleated cloth
cover those once-skinned knees 
with pantyhose please
don't let your skin be seen
give up
the things you want
sacrifice with joy
give your life away
but hold on
to purity and
keep those curves covered
work harder, don't stop
wipe the tears of those around you
but hide yours
it's not okay to need  or want
when others are suffering
sit here for family photo
hide the disaster that lurks
beneath the picture
perfect smiles pasted
over mental health that is rotting
turn the lights brighter to 
cover the darkness that holds us
clenches us in a grip so tight
hold the one who
wants to die
fix her
all by yourself
because you have god
and that is all you need
besides there is no one
who sees you 
all alone
carrying a load too big
staggering
stumbling
all for crumbs of praise
recognition that comes
for good girls who
are too much 
so they must
give too much

Have you met my mother's daughter? 
with the load so big it would crush her
if she tried to lay it down
her only way out then
to just keep going
keep saving others since
she cannot save herself
from a load of being
too much
so she crosses continents
and gives her life away
because there was too much
 grief to stay 
in the place where
my mother's daughter
had to grow herself up alone
be her father and her mother
knead the bread and 
be the bread
until one day
she was all used up
and the sun no longer shown
on her inner landscape
and she had nothing left 
with which to pretend
that it was light 
and she was all right
so she fell
down
down
down
under the load she had
carried for far too long
and it crushed her
split her
into
a thousand pieces

And then
Glory!
she found her banged up knees 
in the beautiful dirt 
by the creek
she found her hands
in the meadow of flowers
tucked behind the woods
and there was her voice!
roaring and bouncing across the hills
singing songs that were silly
and there were her feet
dancing in the dirt
and when she looked into the stream
it stilled as a mirror
and she saw
finally saw
my mother's daughter
as she was always meant to be
and there the wind caressed her
tumbled her curls round her shoulders
and under the light 
of a sumptuous moon
she found what they were always afraid of
she found her whole self
her too-much not-enough self
that was actually just right
so she stepped fully into her skin
all of it
and the sky dripped 
giant tears of joy 
while the hills laughed
with relief at
the sheer beauty
of a woman
who finally 
stepped into
her whole skin.

When I was 5 years old, we rented a little house next to a pig farm. Beyond the yard and the pig pen was a lovely little creek. Behind it, the woods. I would venture off, exploring, every chance I had. One day I discovered a meadow of wild spring flowers, tucked into a corner of the woods. Some of my earliest moments of happiness were there in those woods.

Time passed and we moved. From house to house. State to state. I was born a granddaughter of a preacher. Later I became the daughter of one. I grew up in a tight community. But I also grew up alone. Learned how to hide the un-health of others. Carried burdens that were too heavy for a child. Some things are not yet speak-able because, contrary to the stories some tell about me, I really do love and care for my family.

But this poem has bubbled to the surface and wants to be given wings. So I release it to the winds that watched me step fully into my own skin. All of it. And know it will be taken to my sisters who still believe they are too-much, not-enough.

And the next time the wind roars past your ears, don’t be fooled. It’s never just the wind. It’s another one of us stepping fully into our own skin.

Want to hear more? Contact me here to be added to my mailing list. You can also find me on Instagram @maritajmiller and Facebook Beyond The Cocoon.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

The Truth Wrapped in Dreams

If you’ve been following me for any length of time, you’ll know that dreams are important to me. I find they alert me to the things I need to pay attention to. They bring clarity and understanding. Fresh ways of seeing things that help me to navigate difficult situations during my wakeful hours. Opportunities to bring healing to painful events in the past. They help me to find my voice and bring me the courage to refuse to be erased.

I’m a bit jealous of people who can just go to bed and sleep for hours and hours when they feel depressed or overwhelmed. I am not a great sleeper at the best of times, and when I am feeling depressed or anxious, it’s harder than ever to get deep sleep.

One thing I do have going for me, however, is that I dream a lot. And when I start to pay attention to my dreams, it seems as if I dream more often. There have been a number of compelling dreams that have ended up in my dream journal this year, but the one I’m about to share is one of the most vivid and entertaining of them all. And it is so very telling.

The amusement park

In my dream, I returned to a faith community whose leader was responsible for some of my religious trauma. When I arrived, a friend welcomed me, yet, when we tried to find a place to sit, there was no space for me. Even though my friend easily found a place for herself. The daughter of the leader refused to look at me, rendering me invisible. Various creatures filled my dream, both human and animal. But what struck me was the feeling of shame I bore, even though I had done nothing wrong. I found it difficult to look the humans in the eye. Yet, later in the day, I saw some of them either stoned or drunk on the floor. I marveled to myself that hours earlier, they had been the ones who were deemed “holy” and acceptable.

There was a growing sense of danger. Buildings broke apart and were swept away by an unseen force, yet I didn’t leave until I was attacked and bitten by an animal. When I dialed 911, they thought I was at an amusement park. I made it clear that, no, I am at “the church” and I need to be picked up. Now! When he arrived, the first responder thought I was a reporter and wanted to drop me in the special section outside the hospital set up to treat reporters. Clearly, the catastrophe was a big one and was gathering attention.

the reporter

Let’s face it. The church has become something akin to an amusement park where the cost of entry is high and just might be costing more than we think.

Perhaps I am a reporter. One who was almost erased. One who was used and then cast aside.

There is not enough space here to list all the ways this leader and those who worshiped him both wounded and silenced me. Discouraging me from seeking mental health help when I was on the verge of breaking down. Suggesting we may have sinned when my husband and I lost a baby. Denied days of rest that were desperately needed. Shutting down our voices when we suggested that certain policies would be harmful to people we cared deeply about.

During a large gathering of an organization he presided over, this leader brought to the stage a young man who he celebrated as the first volunteer of this particular organization. My husband and I looked at each other in shock, since we had just completed years of volunteering for this very organization. I felt both humiliated and erased in one fell swoop.

the body’s wisdom

When I reflect back on those years, what strikes me most is that I was not allowed to listen to the wisdom of my body. Instead, the body was seen as evil. Not to be trusted. Even basic human needs for rest were controlled and limited. I became so exhausted and burned out that I developed compassion fatigue. But I was expected to keep going.

The ironic thing is, I can remember the leader quoting the verse about the heart being desperately wicked and who can know it. Using it to prove that we can’t trust ourselves. Our gut. Yet we were supposed to trust the things he said. And people did. They responded to his words like eager puppies, desperate for drops of affection from their master.

Refuse to be erased

This has been a difficult post for me to write and I realize this dream has stirred up things that I probably did not have the energy to fully process until now. I found myself starting and stopping more often than usual. It’s one of the hottest days of the year so far, yet I have been drawn outdoors again and again. To plant my bare feet in the grass, walk the backbone of Mother Earth and take in sweet breaths of her warm air. Bare toes curling over blades of grass as I remember the pain and disappointment I felt. First of being so controlled. And then erased. My body is showing me the way to process this old grief.

And the beautiful thing about the human body is that it knows when it is being mistreated or erased, sometimes before our minds comprehend it. There is great danger in any religion or organization that teaches this knowledge as a dangerous thing, rather than the ancient wisdom that it is.

but i refuse to be erased

In my dream, my body took much abuse and betrayal before I was ready to get myself out of the situation. And while this parallels my real life in so many ways, and I wish I had “dialed 911” sooner, I am grateful to be where I am. The tent of wounded reporters is far safer and more restful than the amusement park that the church has become.

I know there are many others like me, who have been controlled and then erased by the church. If this strikes a cord, know that you are not alone. Like the butterfly from an earlier dream, who pulled herself out of the mud and flew across the ocean with giant holes in her wings, the muck cannot hold you down. Keep beating your wings. We will not be erased. We will display the holes that have ravished our wings – and we will fly anyway.

Want to hear more? Contact me here to be added to my mailing list. You can also find me on Instagram @maritajmiller and Facebook Beyond The Cocoon.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

Almost Erased

In my introductory post, Torn Wings, I wrote about my dream of a butterfly. A graceful creature I saw who pulled herself out of the mud and muck, and flew across the ocean. The light shown through massive holes in her wings, and yet, she flew. I knew she was both me as an individual, as well as all of us who give voice to the feminine. That beautiful part of the divine that those in power have tried to erase.

In my dream, I watched in amazement as she flew bravely out over the water. With each beat of her wings she put distance between herself and those who had riddled her wings with holes. She carried a power that shattered the belief that the feminine is more fragile. Weaker. Less than. Something controllable.

Today I carry her on my shoulder. Nestled close to my heart. Her wings have healed and she has found her name. Mukti.

Becoming Free

Mukti is heard in many languages across Southeast Asia and carries with it the idea of setting or becoming free. What began as a dream on a hot summer night in Bangladesh, a few months before my husband came out, has become my Mukti, a symbol of hope and healing. Of both setting and becoming free.

Her journey is far from finished. I have her on my shoulder to remind me of where we have been and where we are going. As the artist knit threads of ink together beneath my skin, I did what she taught me. Breathe through the pain. Slowly. In and out. Again and again.

Finding our Mukti

Many us feel exhausted and brokenhearted today. As if our wings have just been riddled with fresh holes. What the Supreme Court did today shows me that the Patriarchy is afraid. This isn’t about life; it’s all about control. If it weren’t so heartbreaking, it would almost be laughable. This grasp at control. But the way of the feminine is not about control. It is about love and equality.

We refuse to be erased by showing the holes that have been put into our wings – and flying anyway.

This movement of beating wings has grown massive over the past few decades. And the Patriarchy is terrified. They are trying desperately to control us. And if they can’t control us, to erase us.

The butterfly I saw pulling herself out of the muck and flying out across the ocean, was for me that day. But today it is for all of us. We can’t be controlled and we will not be erased.

We will grieve for today. Hold each other and weep. But this is not the end. The muck cannot hold us down. We’ve pulled ourselves out before and we will do it again. Keep beating our wings until we find our Mukti once again. We refuse to be erased by showing the holes that have been put into our wings – and flying anyway.

Want to hear more? Contact me here to be added to my mailing list. You can also find me on Instagram @maritajmiller and Facebook Beyond The Cocoon.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

The Feminine Within

I am finding that the greatest challenge of being the straight spouse in a mixed-orientation marriage has little to do with my husband’s sexuality. Rather, it is rooted in my own insecurities and feelings of self-worth.

Feelings nurtured in a childhood lived under the demands of the patriarchy. A childhood where the little girl in me ceased to exist at a very young age. Instead of being nurtured, she quickly learned to nurture.

One could argue that this little girl was naturally gifted to nurture and was only stepping into her god-given role. Yet little girls, regardless of their gifts, need to be mothered. Nurtured. Protected. Given space to dream and try on…
clothes
styles
attitudes
beliefs.

when the feminine is flattened


Little girls are not designed to be poured into a replicable mold. To fill the same role as that of their mother before them. And their grandmother before that. When little girls are required to pick up maternal roles while their chest is still flat, something in their internal landscape is in danger of forever remaining flat and undeveloped.


Little girls are made to dream and dance. But when they are taught to serve from sunrise to sunset, to keep those around them happy and fed, their dreams quickly die and the only dance they perform is learning to anticipate the needs of others and to meet those needs before they are spoken.

silenced


I have struggled for a very long time with the words I want to say. Need to say. I fear I will bring shame and pain to my mother if I voice them. In her book Discovering the Inner Mother, Bethany Webster says,


“Many daughters equate silence about their pain as a form of loyalty to their mothers…. Our compassion for our mothers should never eclipse compassion for ourselves.”


So I am breaking a bond of silence because I must be loyal to myself. If I am to be fully whole, and find my dance again, I must do all I need to do to show compassion for myself.


I love my mother deeply and wish the same for her. I look back over the generations and see how the women in our family carry this wound deep within our DNA.

daughters who are mothers


As a young girl, my grandmother thrived in school. It was her safe, happy place. She loved words more than anything and was a finalist at more than one spelling bee. But tragedy struck when she was barely a teenager and her mother died. Her father, an Amish farmer, had no choice but to take her out of school and have her care for her baby sister. She found herself cleaning, doing laundry, and cooking for her father and a table full of brothers. As a young girl, my grandmother raised herself and her baby sister while figuring out how to keep a family of farmers happy and fed.


My grandmother was an incredibly resilient woman. Yet she had a deep mother wound herself and did not know how to fully embody being a mother to her daughters.


And my mother, having not been fully mothered and nurtured herself, looked to her young daughter to give her the nurturing she craved. I learned, at a very young age, how to be a safe space for the adults in my life. How to listen and hold, and how to be both surrogate spouse and therapist. Like my grandmother before me, by the time I was 14, I was cooking up to 3 meals a day, doing the laundry, cleaning, and caring for my brothers. Unlike her, I stayed in school and also took on a part-time job, sharing 80% of my earnings with my parents.

The Perfect daughter

To anyone in the Patriarchal community, I was the perfect daughter. Groomed to care for those around me and denied my own dreams and longings. Inside, however, I was dying a slow and painful death.

I quickly learned that even my basic, developmental needs were too much. All that mattered were the needs of those around me. In fact, the more I squashed my own inner longings and needs for affirmation and nurturing, the more I was noticed and praised. I share my grandmother’s love for words, so it makes sense that words convey feelings of love to me more than actions. I would do anything to hear words of affirmation spoken to me.

And I did. I worked my fingers to the bone for tiny scraps of affirmation. Because I was only noticed and praised when I sacrificed what I wanted and worked hard to meet the physical and emotional needs of those around me. So I worked harder. And harder still.


I could write a complete volume on the journey from that “good little girl” to the fierce and feisty woman I have become. And perhaps I will do that someday.


But I can’t wait that long to say what burns inside of me. Words that must be spilled onto the page today or I will go up in flames for the heat of it.

the feminine within you


No matter your gender, if you were raised under the Patriarchy, there is a feminine part of you that needs you to sit down and have a good listen. We are all a blend of the masculine and the feminine and yet we have been brought up in a culture that praises and empowers the masculine while silencing, controlling, and shrinking the feminine. This has not only hurt women; men suffer deeply as well.


I would go as far as to say that many of the problems we face are either a result of, or amplified by, the hatred of the feminine. From the war in Ukraine to the war on feminine bodies, the masculine need to control and dominate is making itself known.

hungry for life


But the little girl inside of us is not concerned about power and control. She is hungry for life. Full of love. Concerned for safety. This is why she cuddles babies. Speaks tenderly to tiny kittens. Picks wildflowers for the window sill. She is creator, not taker. And the earth itself heals when we listen to her.


She does not allow us to live in hatred. For ourselves or for our enemies. She is the embodiment of love and inclusion. Equality is the dance floor and she moves with grace.


If you are still long enough, you may hear her. If you can clear the clutter of your mind, and pause your race to the elusive top, you may get a glimpse of her.


We can stop looking for her in other women, in projects, in more work. She’s not in movies or books or famous people we admire and chase after. She’s in us. If we are alive, there is still time to find her. She held us before our mother’s arms found us, and she will hold us long after our mothers are gone. She carries the salve to heal our wounds. But this healing balm cannot be taken by force. We must be still and lean in before that healing balm is given.

Want to hear more? Contact me here to be added to my mailing list. You can also find me on Instagram @maritajmiller and Facebook Beyond The Cocoon.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

When It’s Hard to Rest

When I was a young girl, it was quite common to hear grown ups tell me things like, “You work like a horse!” Growing up in rural Ohio, where it was common to see Amish farmers plowing their fields with big and strong work horses, the phrase made sense to me.

The phrase, meant as a compliment, told me that I was very capable of hard work. That there was much value in my ability to work hard. It told me I was admired for it.

But there was a dark side to this compliment. One that I did not see for a very long time. Like a dandelion seed blown by the wind, it found a place to settle. Deep in the soil of my ego, a story took root and began to grow.

the problem with work

One day, in my early teens, it pushed its head through the surface and allowed itself to be seen. On this day, when told that I work like a horse, instead of feeling complimented, I burst into tears.

I didn’t want to be a work horse anymore. Strong and capable but useful only in working the fields. I knew I was a very valuable worker but I longed to be valued for more than the free labor I gave to my family and community. The problem with work is that it set me up to be admired for the wrong things.

Truth be told, I was balancing a lot. I got up early every morning and made breakfast for the family before school. Did school, homework, much of the laundry, cooking and cleaning and had a part time job. This is not to fault my family in anyway. Nobody made me do these things. I chose to take on more and more, for complicated reasons.

Finding it hard to rest

Fast forward a few decades and I found myself on the edge of burn out. A place that was becoming more and more familiar to me. I’d find myself dangling on the edge, but somehow climb up and work some more. Then back to the edge again.

The problem with work became a problem with rest. In fact, it was almost impossible to really rest. I’d eagerly plan vacations for the family and the thought of them would keep me going. But when in the lovely places, I would find it impossible to be at rest for more than a short time. I’d feel this urge to put my book down and go find some chore that could be done.

It was like needing a hit. Finding some manual labor gave me something that calmed me inside so that I could go and read again.

So I have a very complicated relationship with work. Truth is, I do get a lot of satisfaction from hard work. I love to clean. Do the laundry. Cook meals. Organize things. I find it incredibly hard to sit still. It’s not long until I feel my body becoming agitated. Like I will explode if I sit here another minute. Give a bucket and a scrub brush. Or, better yet, baking supplies and an empty kitchen and my heart rate slows and my thoughts calm.

when the body screams to get attention

Then one summer, about a year and half ago, I woke up with pain in my shoulder. This felt much different than the stress pain I tend to carry in my shoulders. This pain was somehow connected to my arm and movement. I didn’t think too much of it at first. It wasn’t horrible but it just kind of stuck around. I couldn’t sleep on my side anymore. Soon I couldn’t do things like deep clean my kitchen. Or rake leaves. Or make applesauce. Eventually I couldn’t chop vegetables for dinner without being in pain the next day.
So I finally went to the doctor. Then the specialist. Then the physical therapist. Turns out I have both biceps and rotator cuff tendonitis. And a long road to healing.

The problem with work is that I just couldn’t keep up with it anymore. My body had to go into full blown screaming mode before I listened. But I’m listening now.

And one thing I keep going back to is the girl who burst into tears because she longed to be seen and valued for who she was, not for what she did. She wanted to be more than free labor. She had hopes and dreams, longings and needs that were not safe to say aloud.

I understand her tears. In the wee hours of the morning, when I can’t sleep because of the pain, she gets my full attention. And she’s shown me some pretty enlightening things.

truth be told

The problem with work is that I will probably always love it. Find deep satisfaction in sparkling surfaces, freshly folded laundry and the smell of homemade sourdough bread. There is something sacred in those things for me. And I embrace that.

But what I have had to reject is the idea that my worth comes from those things. Which has been hard to separate from because for years I was only noticed when I was working hard. I heard words of affirmation that centered around the work I did. It seemed as if my place of belonging, in both family and religious community, centered around my ability to work. And that is a problem.

Another problem with work is that it made me feel safe. My subconscious self quickly became aware of the fact that while doing hard manual labor, I was safe from the things that were my trauma. No one bothered my while I was working. And I got praised for it. It was a win win situation. No wonder it was hard for me to stop. I literally had no idea how to rest. In fact, rest was not really a safe thing. So work became my identity.

Until my body just couldn’t do it anymore. I am grateful for this pain because it has brought me to a wide open path of possibilities. While I’ve been working for a long time on seeing my worth apart from my work, the physical limitations of my body have broken open a space for something new.

choosing to rest

For one thing, it’s brought about a career change that allows me to work from anywhere in the world. Austin has been completely supportive and has helped us find a solution that takes this weight of my shoulders. Literally. We have outsourced fulfillment for our business because I physically just could not haul those boxes anymore. We have contracted with a very capable team in Chicago to ship out our orders. And, thanks to technology, I can answer questions and email invoices from anywhere that has cell service or WiFi.

I’m currently testing out my new freedom. Honoring my need for green vistas, sunshine and rest by working out of a little cottage in North Carolina for a couple of weeks. I find I can type up orders and answer emails on a screened in porch that hides behind a giant bougainvillea, just as well as when sitting behind my desk in Ohio. Maybe even better.

Is it still hard for me to rest? Yes, sometimes it is. But I am practicing it. Just as I am practicing listening to the longings of the little girl who found her salvation in work. Even then she was intuitive enough to know she longed for more.

Want to hear more? Contact me here to be added to my mailing list. You can also find me on Instagram @maritajmiller and Facebook Beyond The Cocoon.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

Coming Home

In my last post, I wrote about leaving toxic places, touching on the grief that surfaces when we realize certain places or people are no longer safe for us.

I need to dive in a little deeper, to the pain of grieving something we never had.

Grief is necessary when we lose something precious. When processed well, grief can be good and beautiful, true praise of what we have lost. Proof that something beautiful was in our lives.

“Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”

Alfred Lord Tennyson

grieving something we never had


Yet sometimes grief grabs us in the deepest places and holds on because instead of grieving what we lost, we may be grieving something we never had in the first place.

The child in the closet who pretended she was straight to maintain her place of belonging in the family, will someday have to grieve never actually belonging to that family. The boy who raised himself while caring for a parent does not weep because his father died. His tears are shed instead for the father he never had. And never will. The woman who has always struggled to feel beautiful because as a child, a boy publicly humiliated her and labeled her as disgusting. She does not weep for the loss of popularity, she weeps because she has never felt seen as beautiful. The parent who is triggered into deep anxiety when facing food insecurity because of a global pandemic is not grieving today’s hardships. He is grieving a childhood that never knew that security.

Sometimes we grieve because we have lost something. But there is an equally bottomless pain of grieving something we never had in the first place.

For all who grieve and feel the pain of loss over things that never existed – yet should have existed – you are not alone. Some losses feel forever and stretch beyond human reasoning and comprehension.

This loneliness, this deep and utter feeling of betrayal, loss and isolation is exhausting.

coming home

And yet, when the song and dance is over, when the dust clears and all that is left is the raw authenticity of our lives.

Those moments where we were the truest to ourselves.

The best versions of who we could be.

With startling clarity, we can look around and realize that there is something inside of us that has outlived the betrayal, grief and losses of life.

We want to engineer a world where everyone admires us, holds us in high esteem. Where safety and security are the norm. We try so hard to control the outcome of the broader story yet all we can really do is control our own narrative. When all else has been lost or is out of our control, we can and must speak our own narrative. Make our own way. Belong to our self.

Perhaps the only way to find our true place of belonging starts with coming home to our self. Belonging to our self.

This is not a journey I can guide you on because this journey will not look the same for any one of us. Our journey of coming home to our self is as unique as each of us.

It’s taken me decades to truly come home to, and belong to, my self. More often than not I wished I could trade in my self for another one braver, more beautiful, stronger, more articulate, and better than this one. Yet I finally love her. More than being shaped by her experiences, she now experiences life by the shaping of her narrative.

By belonging to her self, she holds the pen in her story. No matter what she gains or loses, she knows she will always have her self.

And she is more than okay.


Click on the button above to send me an email and I will let you know when new posts are up! If you or someone you love is in the closet, or if you are struggling with your own guttural grief and need someone to talk to, email me. I may not have time to answer you but I will read it and hold you in my heart.

Photo courtesy of Adrienne Gerber Photography.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

Will I Ever Be Enough?

I thought it would get easier. And in many ways it has. But that underlying, nagging feeling that I don’t have what it takes. That I will never be enough. Rejection is surely just around the corner. Those feelings and fears I’ve had from the beginning are still are there.

It wearies me. After so many years. So much internal work. So many therapy sessions. Endless conversations. Countless tissue boxes and tears.

Yes, I see growth. Beauty. A depth that wasn’t there before. Wisdom emerging from the ashes. So much that is good.

But do our oldest and deepest wounds ever go away? Are they the ghosts of past, present, and future? Perhaps not visible, yet hauntingly and deeply felt.

I want to feel as if I’m the love of his life. The missing puzzle piece. But I feel like I’m only half of that missing piece. A love but maybe not the love.

That’s not what I want. Not what I signed up for.

It’s like fate has dealt us the best and worst of hands all in one. To walk away from the pain would also be to walk away from the deepest happiness I’ve ever had. How does one even begin to process that, much less live through it?

To quote Daniel Levy’s character, David Rose, in the show Schitt’s Creek,

“I’ve been burned so many times, I’m basically the human equivalent of the inside of a roasted marshmallow.”

David Rose

Deep inside I carry a weight that, whether I’m consciously aware of it or not, tells me I’m not enough. That I don’t have what it takes. One too many rejections leaves one feeling like the next one is just around the corner.

I mindfully breathe in the golden color of this fall day. The birds singing welcome to sunshine dripping on green and gold leaves. It strikes me that the earth is letting go of one season while fully waking up to a new day. Embracing and releasing at the same time.

I always thought it was either-or. Death or life. Acceptance or rejection. Sorrow or joy. But what if we are able to be enough and not be enough at the same time? What if I’m not his everything but still be the love of his life?

Maybe life is best lived when we figure out how to hold our grief and our happiness in the same hand. Not either-or, but both. Not enough, yet still enough, at the same time.


Click on the button above to send me an email and I will let you know when new posts are up! If you or someone you love is in the closet, or if you are struggling with your own guttural grief and need someone to talk to, email me. I may not have time to answer you but I will read it and hold you in my heart.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

If I Loved Myself

Most of my life, she said, I was my worst enemy. Then the cancer gave me a gift in the form of a question. It might be too simple for you…

If I loved myself, what would I do?

Notice the question has an if. It never assumes I do. Just if. So I could ask no matter if I was in pain or laughing or crying. Just if… I asked and I asked and I asked and it stopped all the behavior that impeded me. I never had to do anything. Just answer this one question.

Kamal Ravikant in Rebirth

Rebirth is the story of a pilgrim walking the Camino de Santiago. The above quote came from a conversation he had with a pilgrim he briefly bumped into on his pilgrimage. The question – “If I loved myself, what would I do?” has stuck with me in poignant and real ways.

If I loved myself

Self-care has always come hard for me. Probably because self-love was not modeled. In fact, the community where I grew up insinuated that self-love was wrong. Self-sacrifice was the thing to strive for instead. “Love your neighbor” was propped up on something else instead of the “as yourself” bit.

But the thing I have come to learn later in life is that loving your neighbor is shallow and trite if you do not first love and care for yourself. I know from personal experience that the “love” for others can slowly turn into hate. All my good intentions, self-sacrifice, and service sent me spiraling into depression and compassion fatigue because I did not know how to love and care for myself first.

The question, “If I loved myself, what would I do?” is especially relevant in times of crisis and high stress. Let me give you an example.

Loving myself in stressful times

I have trouble sleeping well in the best of times. Maybe it’s midlife hormones creeping up on me and causing havoc. I don’t know. But normally when I wake in the night I soon fall back asleep when I meditate and focus my breathing. Lately, however, that has not been working.

I find myself waking out of a deep sleep to the sound of a nonexistent alarm. Instantly I think of my son on the West Coast, struggling to get groceries and find work after his film studies program was shuttered. I worry how we will pay the bills now that sales have all but ground to a halt. A million worries and questions dance through my brain and I try to take deep breaths, but somehow there is no depth to them.

So the other night, as I lay in the quiet darkness, I let this question play itself out in my head.

“What would I do if I loved myself?”

In that moment, I realized I needed some self-care. So I spoke to myself and calmed myself down. My fears were irrational. I reminded myself that I was in a safe place. That I didn’t have to take care of anyone. There was nothing I needed to fix. I could just be. As I let myself sink into the softness of my bed, the fears drifted away and I was soon back asleep.

This morning I answered the question by leaving the house and taking a walk in the rain. Normally I hate walking in the rain, but today it soothed me. As an introvert stuck at home with some wonderful yet loud extroverts, caring for myself has become a challenge.

Now that school has shut down, coffee shops, the gym, soccer, tennis, high school club and all the normal hang out places for my extroverts are no longer an option, we are all home. Pretty much all the time. The heat has all but been turned off in our office building so every day we are bringing more things home to be able to work from home. Our tiny house is bulging at the seams and we are making it work. Yet I am feeling the strain of it. The only time I truly feel alone is walking out in the park. Or sitting in a chilled office building.

Surviving the crisis

As the world is in crisis mode, with COVID-19, stress levels everywhere are through the roof. All of us have things on our plate that we didn’t ask for. Fear and stress tend to find their way onto our plates as well, even if we don’t want them to. But we are not helpless creatures. We can keep asking the question – “If I loved myself, what would I do?”

It might mean getting outside and taking a walk. For some of you, it may mean staying at home to protect your health instead of letting life continue as normal. Letting a friend pick up some groceries and drop them on your porch. It may mean that you stop trying to take care of everyone else and give yourself whatever care package you need. Maybe you need to turn off the news and give yourself a break from social media. And in the answering, we can find the ways to not only love ourselves, but to let the ripple effects spread out to our family, our neighborhood and the community at large.

I’ve seen people shine this week, by doing something they love and are good at, and sharing it with the world. Playing live-stream guitar and taking requests. Reading a book aloud on Facebook Live. Painting and creating art. Local businesses creating care packages of ice cream or sandwiches and offering delivery.

You might think that this crisis is bringing out the worst in us. And it may be doing that for some people. But I see it bringing out the best in us. Especially in all who are brave enough to answer the question.

“If I loved myself, what would I do?”

Because loving myself is not a selfish thing. Done well, it preserves ourselves, our homes, our communities and the earth itself.


Click on the button above to send me an email and I will let you know when new posts are up! If you or someone you love is in the closet, or if you are struggling with your own guttural grief and need someone to talk to, email me. I may not have time to answer you but I will read it and hold you in my heart.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

Embracing Self-Worth

In my last post, I talked about how knowing my self- worth was an important key to staying in my marriage. Truly knowing and embracing my self-worth has not only helped me to look at my marriage holistically, it has also changed the way I view my body.

This has taken a lot of work. I had to recognize the lies I carried with me since middle school that told me I was disgusting. I cannot tell you how much I identified with Toula in My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It was a long and painful process, to replace the lies with truth. To actually see myself and then to let myself be seen.

Body Image

I was in my mid forties before I valued myself enough to face something that had always bothered me about myself. My crooked teeth. I cried big ugly tears on the way home from my first orthodontist appointment. Not because of how much it was going to cost – though that was reason enough to cry! But because I never felt I was worth that cost. Faced with the reality of more teeth breaking as I aged due to the crowding in my mouth, along with the painful self-awareness when I smiled, I was finally ready for change.

Embracing my self worth in this way brought initial discomfort as my teeth had a lot of moving to do. But seeing my teeth begin to straighten has been totally worth it. A few days before my 47th birthday, I was finally able to look in the mirror and see the smile that my heart had always been smiling, even when my body couldn’t.

I needed to take this drastic and costly step to reinforce in the depths of my being, that I am worth it.

Embracing age

Another body decision I recently made was to stop dying my hair and embrace the silver that has been trying to be seen for nearly a decade now. I realize that for some, covering up the silver may be essential to embracing your self-worth. That is okay. But for me, I felt a wise old crone waking up inside of me and this is how I wear her in my waking life.

It’s been nearly a year now since my last color was applied. I have lots of silver spilling out the top in contrast with my dark ends. It makes me wish I would have never started dying my hair. That I would have always embraced this part of who I am. But it is what it is. And from here on, the silver is my friend.

And can we talk about wrinkles for a minute? I haven’t fought these too hard. Somewhere along the line, I decided I had earned them. That they are road maps to a life well-lived. I look down at my hands sometimes and I’m beginning to see my Grandma’s hands. And that gives me a lot of joy. I remember her, with her silver waves and piles of wrinkles, and her heart of love. If I’m turning into her, I’m okay with that.

Embracing your journey

There is no journey towards wholeness that is the same for two people. The things that represent health and wholeness for me will probably not be the same things that you need to do on your journey. Your journey must be uniquely yours. In her book Belonging, Toko-pa Turner says

The only antidote to perfectionism is to turn away from every whiff of plastic and gloss and follow our grief, pursue our imperfections, and exaggerate our eccentricities until the things we once sought to hide reveal themselves as our majesty.

Toko-pa Turner

Keep digging and sifting until you find the things that are your majesty. The world needs grace and beauty that only the shape of you can fill.


Click on the button above to send me an email and I will let you know when new posts are up! If you or someone you love is in the closet, or if you are struggling with your own guttural grief and need someone to talk to, email me. I may not have time to answer you but I will read it and hold you in my heart.

Posted on by palmtreemomma

Why Stay?

Many wives, upon discovering their spouse is not the straight partner they thought he was, decide to leave. I get it. No judgment. Mixed orientation marriage is hard. Sometimes the marriage that was built on an illusion cannot be rebuilt. There are so many reasons why some stay and some go. After years of working through this myself and of hearing the stories of others, I have come to the conclusion that there is no black and white answer, no manual guaranteed to work. There is no script to follow, no map. No way to pray the gay away. There is only the journey of the soul and each person must undertake that journey for him or herself.

In my journey towards wholeness, I have come to realize the importance of knowing my worth. The ability to stay well or leave well all comes down to knowing my worth. For those struggling to discern whether to stay or not, I believe the answers will reveal themselves as the journey shifts from finding the right answer to the journey of moving towards wholeness.

Knowing my worth

In the beginning, when I felt my marriage was all a lie, I stayed because I had no energy to do anything else. I did not know my worth, and, in some ways, stayed because I felt I had no worth. No one else would have me, or so I believed. I had no career path. Surrounded by 3 little ones, barely functioning myself, I could not begin to think about anything but survival.

As I began to do my work however, my self-worth slowly began to solidify. Out of the ashes, my true self began to emerge and I realized that I like my self and truly believe that I have something special to offer. I am still on the journey, for it never truly ends, but have come far enough to see a vista I wasn’t able to dream of in those early days.

Why I stay

I stay because I love my husband. I mean, really, he is pretty amazing! But there is another reason that, to me, is equally important.

Now I stay because I know my worth. And my worth is honored in this marriage. I am seen and valued. Not perfectly and not without a fight sometimes, and I’m still learning how to let him know when I am not feeling seen and valued. But for any of that to happen, I must first experience my own worth.

Knowing my worth enables me to keep my head up, on the days when I look at statistics and am afraid things will someday change between us.

Being confident in my own value means I’m not staying because I have to. I am staying because I want to.

Knowing my worth has given shape to the boundaries I set for this marriage. And where I set those boundaries is nobody else’s business.

Knowing my worth also gives me a solid container to both grow love and to share it generously.

In short, you can’t give away something you don’t have. To give love and value to another, it must first grow deep within you.

So if your relationship is in shambles, please stop trying to fix it. Look in love’s mirror until you see yourself reflected, until the self you see is someone you can embrace and honor. You are worth it.


Click on the button above to send me an email and I will let you know when new posts are up! If you or someone you love is in the closet, or if you are struggling with your own guttural grief and need someone to talk to, email me. I may not have time to answer you but I will read it and hold you in my heart.