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Day 11 - Expressing Emotion

2/10/2020

“Well, as my mother said, ‘If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all,’” I announced smugly, looking around the therapy room for approval. “That’s a terrible thing to say to a child!” said one of the other group members, as the rest nodded their heads in assent. “What do you mean? That keeps people from saying horrible things to one another!” “No,” my therapist said gently, “that keeps children from learning to appropriately express what they feel.”

For many years I have followed the rule of “What’s said in therapy stays in therapy.” My wonderful therapist passed away several years ago now, and I hope any of my old group members who might read this post will forgive me for sharing what was an important wake-up call for me.

I grew up as a people pleaser. Even writing those words feels strange now; I’m such a different person than I was a quarter of a century ago. I’m growing more and more into my crone energy, and frankly, I don’t give a shit what people think about me anymore. If you can’t be yourself by the time you’re sixty, when are you going to do that? It took me years to learn to love myself, to see the value in myself, to learn to express my true feelings. What a relief to finally be on the other side of all that crap.

Rocking my purple hair and my inner crone energy. This is what 60 looks like.

But back in my mid-thirties, that wake-up call had just begun. Learning to express my feelings was painful and did not come easily to me. I was constantly afraid that I’d be picked on, laughed at, or told that my feelings other than anger were just plain wrong. Putting a toe into the water of saying what I wanted, what I needed, or how it felt to not have that in my life rocked my entire world from top to bottom.

After my mother died, my local support system vanished. I had learned to speak such a convoluted language, and the only other person who understood it was my grandmother. We couldn’t talk without fighting, because I simply refused to put up with her constant attempts to manipulate me through guilt. Being with my daughter was a daily joy, but I certainly wasn’t going to try to rely on a 5-year-old for support. I’d been a teacher for long enough to know what a bad idea that was. So, I was very thankful to find my therapy group. It was a handpicked group containing people working on similar issues, and we were encouraged to support each other outside of our weekly meeting. And we did, in ways large and small for which I am eternally grateful. The generosity there was something I hadn’t much experienced in life. While going through my divorce I started to see the world as a place of abundance, instead of scarcity. I also came to understand that there were people I could trust to call me on my bullshit, time after time, until I learned to find a healthier way to express my emotions. Slowly, I healed.

Now, I spend a lot of time listening to other people. I’m not a therapist, but old stuff comes up for people in their Alexander lessons. My job is to witness them while they process. I’m thankful for all my previous life experiences as they serve me well in my work. Ultimately it was my understanding how to be an embodied person through Alexander Technique that gave me the skills to process my emotions and stay with myself through trauma. I am grateful for the opportunity to teach those skills to others.

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Day 10 - No More Llamas, Please

2/7/2020

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I subscribe to a daily email message from the TUT (The Universe Talks.) It’s an inspirational message from Mike Dooley that in some way teaches if you visualize what you want with positive intention, you’ll get it. Yesterday’s message (below) literally had me laughing out loud.

If there’s one thing I know I’m not very good at, it’s asking for what I really want. I set myself up to get a lot of llamas. Just ask Dave. If there’s anything I do that drives him crazy, it’s that.
I’ll say, “It would be really nice if somebody would close that door.” He’ll huffily respond, “If you want me to get up and close the door, just ask me to do it.” Or, in a flat tone, “Uh huh. It would.” He’s tried to train me for 15 years to say exactly what I want and it hasn’t worked consistently yet.

When I ponder why I don’t feel comfortable asking for what I want directly, the answer is related to both the way I was parented and my first marriage. In my parents and friends houses in the 1960s, children were to be seen and not heard. I certainly never interrupted adults to ask for something I wanted. I waited, and then when I got glared at for standing there while an adult conversation was going on, I tentatively put out some feelers about what I’d like to have. If it went well, I’d be specific. If it didn’t, I left the room. In school, girls never asked for something they wanted to be explained clearly during class, especially if the teacher was a man. Girls waited until later and spoke privately to the teacher. In my first marriage, nothing ever succeeded if it was my idea, so I learned how to plant seeds that would make what I wanted his idea. It was crazy, it was convoluted, it was “How to Deal with a Narcissist 101.” I don’t recommend it. All told, forty years or so of this kind of “training” left me pretty debilitated in the asking for what I want department, particularly from men.

I’ve processed the “why” thoroughly since meeting Dave, who would be happiest if I could just let my habitual responses to these old messages go. I can, and sometimes I do, but I really have to notice consciously before I open my mouth. I also know that if I think he will disagree with me, I shrink back into old behaviors. Alexander Technique helps when I remember to pause before speaking, let go of habitual indirect questions, and then ask clearly for what I want.

My daughter was here at Christmas for a visit, and Dave got very frustrated with me about something I was being unconsciously indirect on. I had to laugh, because Anne came to my defense and translated perfectly to him what I was actually saying. Then she said, “Geez, Dave, you’ve been together for 15 years. You can’t figure out Mom-speak by now? Are you still trying to change her?”

It’s amazing how powerful the core language of a family can be. It persists despite our best efforts to change it. In our family of origin we understand one another perfectly, yet to others we can sound totally unclear. What quirks do you have in your family language? What old messages do you carry around with you?

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Day 9 - The Womb Story

2/6/2020

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“Mrs. Rosenbrock, you lost your baby. What you’re telling me is impossible.”
“But Doctor, it’s true! I still feel life!”

The climax of the story of my mother’s birth is imprinted upon my DNA indelibly. It’s a story I heard over and over from the time I was old enough to understand human reproduction, and it’s a story that has had lasting ramifications for my entire family. If you know me well, you know this story. I’ve processed it for years. It’s time to write it down.

The facts are this. Unbeknownst to anyone, my grandmother had a double uterus. In 1934 she and my grandfather conceived two children, one in each uterus. She was unable to carry both children to term and miscarried a child very early in the pregnancy. As far as the medical establishment was concerned, the miscarriage was the end. But my grandmother knew differently. She knew she still was pregnant. When she finally convinced her doctor to look at her more carefully, he did a thorough internal exam and discovered that she was correct – and, a medical marvel.

At that time my grandparents were just starting out. They had very little money and none to spare for special medical care. The doctor, who worked at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, made them an offer. If my grandmother would consent to weekly examination by residents, she could stay in the hospital for free for the duration of her pregnancy (about 6 months). The decision they made to say “yes” affected everything that was to follow for the next 60+ years. The hospital, which was about 7 years old and state of the art for the time, had just purchased some amazing new equipment called the X-ray machine. Using this, the residents could actually see the baby developing and see both uteruses inside my grandmother without the trauma of repeated internal exams. My grandmother’s abdomen was x-rayed (without the benefit of lead shields) more times than she could remember. Yet, in the immediate, the extraordinary care she received resulted in her being able to carry my mother safely until she was born at about 8 months. My grandmother was strongly advised not to have any more children.

When my grandfather got his first look at the wizened little preemie that was my mother, he recoiled. All these months of worry and now, there was the ugliest child he’d ever seen. As the nurses cooed, “Isn’t she beautiful?” he fled. He ran out of the hospital and down the street to take solace in the barbershop. Outside the door, he simply panicked. He couldn’t breathe. How was he going to take care of his wife and this ugly child? What if he wasn’t strong enough? How could he go on? He told me that he walked for miles that day until he ended up at his mother’s house, where he broke down and cried. She comforted him and told him to be strong and go back to the hospital. From that day forward, he was. And he needed to be.

My grandfather was the family photographer. It's telling that the first existing photo of my mother, who was born in May, dates from August of that year.

The future would include simultaneous breast and uterine cancer for my grandmother, who found the will to survive thanks to my mother becoming pregnant. I heard over and over that the only reason Nana was alive was because of me. My mother died of ovarian cancer at 50 after living her adult life legally blind due to a very rare condition attributable to radiation and premature birth. My grandmother outlived my mother and never forgave herself for simply doing the best thing that was possible at the time. There was never any solace for her after my mother’s death.

I spent much of my adult life with the fear of ovarian and breast cancer hanging over my head. Thanks to DNA testing I’ve known for about 15 years that my family’s cancers were environmentally caused and not hereditary. I still go for a pelvic ultrasound every year because logical knowing only goes so far in eradicating deep-seated fear. Losing my mother when I was just 26 changed my perspective on life. I miss her every day. The loss never gets easier, just different.

Of all the stories, of all my life experience, this one is the primary story. The story that accompanies my family from womb to womb. I feel it in my bones every day.

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Day 8 - The Dance of a Long Life

2/5/2020

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My grandfather taught me to dance by standing on his feet. When I was four or five, small enough that my little feet fit on top of his big ones, we’d dance to songs on the Lawrence Welk show in our TV room. I remember feeling so grown up. Afterwards, we’d tumble onto the couch and I’d snuggle up in his lap to watch the rest of the show.

Pops was an oasis in a home filled with sharp-tongued women. Every Thursday evening, he would bring my Nana over to spend the night at our house. On Fridays she got her hair done downtown. After work on Friday evening Pops would come to our house for Family Dinner. Then they’d go home. While with us, Nana talked incessantly. She gossiped, she was mean, she lived her life as it were a soap opera. It was widely acknowledged that my grandfather “couldn’t get a word in edgewise” living with my grandmother. When Pops had something to say, it was generally said thoughtfully and quietly. We listened.

Pops was the first in his family of 11 children to graduate from high school. He read voraciously. I listened to classical music at his house with him. He encouraged me to learn more about music, and he subscribed me to the entire set of Reader’s Digest Piano books, which were collections of songs from the 20th century by decade. He’d pull out his trumpet and we’d play together. Consequently, I know more about Cole Porter, Gershwin, and Rogers and Hammerstein than most people of my generation. I remember all the words to those old songs because my mother would come in and sing with us while we played. The joy of making music inspired me to become a professional musician.

My Well-worn Readers Digest Songbook collection

My grandfather was also extremely well-coordinated. He played baseball in high school. He was so good that he was recruited by a bank in New York City to play for their team and hired as a teller. From there, he was scouted by the New York Yankees, but he turned them down because in the 1920s the bank paid better than the major leagues! I remember him doing all sorts of magic tricks with a baseball for small children and dogs – he could completely spoof you. I was in awe of his athleticism.

Pops retired at 65 as Vice President of HR for that same savings bank, having spent his entire career there. I was blessed to have him in my life for another 28 years, 10 of those without my grandmother. Those years were when we really talked about everything. One day he confessed to me that when he was in his 20s he’d had a mental health crisis, suffering panic attacks after becoming a new father. He’d held that inside for 70 years – afraid to talk about it due to fear of losing his job. My grandfather refused to get a haircut professionally for 20 years because he’d had the panic attack outside the barbershop door. The odd thing was that I’d had a panic attack a year before. I’d read that they could be hereditary, but I never expected that my strong grandfather was the one who had had that experience. I was so glad he trusted me to help him finally process that experience aloud. Our mutual experience brought us even closer together.

Pops and I during a vacation in Maine.

My grandfather was my rock, a constant in my life for 43 years. His passing was a huge loss for me. I gave the eulogy at his funeral and it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, but I felt him supporting me the entire time I spoke. I was that little girl again, standing on his feet while we danced.

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Day 7 - Understanding Onliness

2/4/2020

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“You’re just a spoiled only child!” Tears sprang to my eyes as yet another classmate on the playground delivered the trump card at the end of a spat. These people had no idea how hard it was to stick up for myself, to not have brothers and sisters to help me out when I was being picked on and bullied. I knew I wasn’t spoiled, but my Onliness was undeniable.

Years later I asked a girlfriend with lots of siblings what it was that people envied most about only children. She answered that it was two things – people see Onlies as able to have all their parent’s available resources, their time and attention as well as all the money budgeted for children’s expenses. This makes people with siblings jealous, and they perceive Onlies as being spoiled because they get “everything.” This made sense to me, and also made me laugh.

I did have the entire focus of my parent’s attention, which had both up and down sides. There was never one day that my parents were alive that I didn’t know that I was loved and wanted beyond measure. (When my mother died young, I fell into a deep depression fearing I’d never have that kind of love on earth again.) Unfortunately, there was also a hyper-focus on what I was doing in any given moment. Sneak out the window to join my teenage friends? You’ve got to be kidding. My mother heard every sound and there was only me to make them. Not going to happen.

Above all, I was taught the value of self-reliance at an early age. I learned to be independent. I learned (with difficulty) how to stick up for myself on the playground. I didn’t ask for help from my mother because it just upset her. I didn’t ask for help, period. I learned to do and fix everything myself, a mixed blessing that had ramifications later in my life.

My parents didn’t have a lot of money, so I didn’t get a lot of presents and toys from them. I got an allowance at the going rate of the day and bought my own things, just like my friends did. I learned the value of saving for what I wanted, and the excitement of finding a bargain. I think what my friends envied the most was that my toys were in great condition. Without siblings to destroy them, my Barbies had perfect hair and all their shoes.

The "Creepy Barbie Graveyard" as my daughter calls it. Did I mention she hates Barbies?

Perhaps I wasn’t “spoiled” in the conventional manner because we had a lot of Onlies in my family. My mother’s mother was an Only child who spent her childhood sadly neglected by her stepmother. In her turn she enjoyed overindulging my mother, her Only, who hated it. My mother was having none of that with me, and frequently told her mother to stop buying me things. My father, also an Only, grew up poor and was extremely frugal. In my house, being an Only was just normal. I didn’t mind not having siblings, but I wished for first cousins at family get togethers.

When it was my turn to have a child, I had another Only. It was not intentional, but that’s how it turned out. I didn’t spoil her. I like to think I taught her to ask for help when she needed it. She has a passel of first cousins, two of whom are more like her big brothers.

Each of our four generations of Only children changed something significant from the parenting of the generation before. Our shared understanding of Onliness remains the common factor, the rock on which our little family was built.

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Day 6 - Processing a Work/Life Balance

2/3/2020

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“My name is Robbin, and I’m a perfectionist.”

If there was a support group for recovering perfectionists, I’d be its star member. Heck, I’d be the president. The NATIONAL president! And then I’d start the group all over the world.

I jest of course, but in a nutshell, that’s what my work ethic looked until about 10 years ago. Be the best. Be perfect in your perfection. Go big. Work as hard as you can. Sure, be a mom. Be perfect at that, too. Volunteer. Say “yes.” You can do it all.

"Supermom" cartoon from E.P.I.C. Parenting

By the time I was in my early forties I was over-committed to everything in my life, especially work. One little childcare hiccup in my schedule and my entire day fell apart. I was a nervous wreck with no time for self-care. Is this what “having it all” in my career was supposed to look like? How did I get this way?

My father was a pretty laissez-faire guy around work, so it wasn’t from him. He enjoyed his job, but he left his office at 5 pm and didn’t work after hours. He was also a pretty big Type B – life came, life went, he rolled with it. My mother, on the other hand, had had her academic and career dreams dashed when she became legally blind in her early 20s. As a frustrated housewife, my mother wanted me to be the first in the family to graduate from college. She wanted me to be a lawyer. She made sure I practiced the piano every day and did all my homework. When I’d bring home a paper with an A- on the top, she’d ask me questions like “What could you have done to make that better?” Being an obedient daughter, I’d spend hours trying to figure that out instead of being thrilled with my A-. I took to perfectionism like a fish takes to water.

Culturally in the 60s and 70s, Women’s Lib was everywhere. From Virginia Slims telling us we’d “Come a long way, Baby” to the Mary Tyler Moore show, young women were bombarded with images and words telling us that we could have any career we wanted to. Many books have written on the harm suffered by my generation trying to “have it all” as career women in the mold of men while simultaneously being mothers in our mother’s mold.

I lived in the crucible of those conflicting cultural messages, always doing my best. It nearly broke me. With a looming identity and health crisis over my head raining down drops of reality every day, I finally started to give in to taking care of myself and asking for help. I learned to say “no.” There was no other choice.

At my lowest point, I found Alexander Technique, which offered me a way to slow down mentally and physically. I could breathe and be Aware of the present moment. I could take the time to process my thoughts through the pause of Inhibition. In that moment, I could see choices that were presented to me and make a clear one to Direct my next set of actions. And I could do this over and over again, all day long, whenever I needed to. Choices were available to me. I just had to slow down enough to see them. Gradually, my work and my life started coming back into balance.

If I really did run that perfectionist’s support group, I’d teach them Alexander Technique.

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Robbin Marcus

An occasional post from me, about stuff that interests me.

2025 blog series:
Cleaning Out the Old

2024 blog selections: Resistance

2023 blog series:
Slow Forward

2020 blog series:
1) Processing - Experience, Thought, Action
2) Diving for Light - Shedding light on a dark time

Day 11 - Expressing Emotion

Day 10 - No More Llamas, Please

Day 9 - The Womb Story

Day 8 - The Dance of a Long Life

Day 7 - Understanding Onliness

Day 6 - Processing a Work/Life Balance

Robbin Marcus

2019 blog series: Exploring the Power of Habit

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2019 blog series:
Exploring the Power of Habit