Some Thoughts On Love

This is a selfie I took after showing my mom pictures and comments on Facebook of all who were wishing her a happy birthday, which she thoroughly enjoyed, June 8th, 2020

The More We Love,

the More Real We Become

— Stephen Levine

 

Since May 12th, and after two months of window visits and FaceTime only due to the coronavirus, I haven't missed a day of visiting my mother inside her apartment at Glenwood Place Senior Living, which is less than 15 minutes from our Vancouver home. My mom had been on hospice for six months when it was decided to allow me inside again given my mother's steady decline. No one knew how much time she has left. It could be hours, days, or weeks. No one knows. Hospice and Glenwood management wanted my mom and me to have as much time together as possible. At Glenwood Place there is so much tenderness, support, and love and this felt sense that we are like family. I am filled with the deepest gratitude.

Every day my mom is here is something I obviously treasure with all my heart. At the same time, I am in my own process of letting go of my mother, and in my prayers I am letting her know that it is okay to leave. It is okay. I'm here to support what she needs and whatever it is that is in her highest good. This very much includes, for me, acting as loving midwife during this transition as she lets go more and more of her human body and moves into her soul.

So much is falling away. The pictures I'm sharing here are glimpses from recent visits together, some in which my mother has been able to be present and some where she is not able to awaken. Even when there are no words that she is able to say, or when her eyes are closed, there has still often remained this exchange of love. Again and again, I am reminded that there is no greater gift that we give to each other and to ourselves as human beings than love. 

These sweet, tender moments with my mom are priceless for us both. 
 

* * * * *

Every day, as I witness her continued decline, I am mindful of holding both grief and gratitude. My commitment to my mom and to myself, as always, is to keep my heart open as best as I can to whatever is unfolding in our moments together. Gone are the "shoulds" of how things "should be." There is just this ongoing surrender into what is. This practice of surrender, acceptance, openness, and love is something I've been engaged in for many years now. I don't do it perfectly, which is fine. I get to be human, a fully embodied human being with foibles and struggles and with strengths and gifts. And the intention is there — to surrender and to be with what is — a powerful, powerful intention grounded in compassion, mindfulness, wisdom, and love.

This makes it possible for me to be available to whatever presents itself with each visit with my mother. It makes it possible for me to keep my heart as open as I'm able and to be a receptive, loving presence. Love is always the foundation of what I know is needed. There are no conditions, no expectations, no judgments, no wishing for something different. Just simply love.

Often now there are no verbal greetings when I arrive. But then my mom will sometimes surprise me with "hello darling" or "hi beautiful" (after I greeted her with "hi beautiful") or "my darling." More frequently when I arrive now, I find my mother asleep or staring off into space with this vacant far away look. I'll then lean in, touch and kiss her, and tenderly say, "Hello Mama. I'm here to be with you." Sometimes my words and the warmth of my presence will bring her back, and her whole energy shifts and a smile will begin to sweep across her face. She knows that I am there and is then able to allow love to bring her back to some degree into her conscious body.

Other times, and most recently, there is no bringing her back. She simply does not wake up when I come to visit. I then simply sit with my mother next to her bed or chair and hold her hand, pray and speak to her gently, kiss her hands and forehead, and just love her.

When I arrived yesterday for the dinner hour, I found my mother dressed and in her recliner. Her caregiver said that she'd been very tired, but communicated wanting to get up when she heard I was coming. I leaned into my mom, kissed each cheek and each hand, said that I was here and that I love her. Mom's eyes did not open, but a slight smile came across her face. She looked very peaceful. 

I sat next to her and held both her hands. I massaged her one arm. I asked if she might want to eat something. No response. Eyes still closed, and her smile still there. It became obvious to me that Mom would not be eating any dinner. I felt the warmth of her skin and watched her stomach move with in-breaths and out-breaths. I took in how thin and frail my mother looks now. I'm aware that on May 30th she weighed 112.5 pounds, and that on June 12th she weighed 106.5 pounds. That's a drop of six pounds in two weeks.

And I'm aware that out of the last four visits, my mother has only been able to awaken enough to eat on one of those visits. And now her caregiver told me that my mother hadn't eaten any breakfast or lunch yesterday, only a little ensure. Now there would be no dinner.

And I sit and pray and I speak to my mama out loud. "It's okay to go, Mom. John and Dad and Nana and Papa are waiting for you. It's okay to leave. It's okay. I love you."

My phone rings. It's my youngest son who's called to Facetime with his grandmother. Mom is asleep with her slight smile still there. Matt and I talk for a few minutes. Then I realize that Mom's eyes have just opened. I switch the phone to in front of my mother. "Look, Mama, it's your youngest grandson Matt." Mom's eyes remain open and she smiles slightly while looking at her grandson. "Hi Grandma. You look sleepy. I love you, Grandma." Then her eyes close again. Precious moments.

* * * * *

My husband and others have pointed out to me something I know deeply in my heart — that it isn't just a miracle that my mother has been able to receive and give love, but that it is also a miracle that I have kept my heart open to loving my mother.

I believe that we humans come into this world wired for relationship, belonging, and love. Some of us are blessed with being born into families where we felt cherished, safe and protected, seen and affirmed, and received and consistently nourished by deep and abiding love — a love that we could trust. 

And for many others, including myself and my mama and many generations in our family, we were not born into an environment which was able to hold us in the ways that were needed for us to flourish and grow into the wholeness of who we most truly are. Instead we experienced shame and fear, anger and abuse, a chronic neglect of our heart's deepest needs, and unhealthy and harmful generational legacies and cultural messages which stunted and often severely limited our growth and development. We learned to build walls around our hearts, developed addictions and other harmful ways of coping with trauma and loss, and became lost to the truth of who we were and our purpose for being here.

For a long time, there was this tragedy which endured. For our family, and completely without intention, there were generations where we learned to shield our hearts from love. We did not trust that it was safe to open to the vulnerability and intimacy that love requires. So we shut out, shut up, and shut down. This happened to both my mama and me.

It's my belief that our human purpose is in some way rooted in love. Without love, we wither and contract and disconnect and suffer deeply.

* * * * * 

Many know our story, which I will not go into in depth again here. Suffice it to say that I've had two mothers — one who was narcissistic, brutal, and unable to experience compassion and love. And then there is this second mother who, over the past seven years, began to root into a journey of gradual awakening. 

It has been beyond extraordinary to be witness to — and to act as midwife to — this miraculous transformation from a tortured human being who was compelled to push away love throughout her life to this courageous woman who, beginning at age 87, began to let love into her heart for the first time.

This is where the power of love comes in.

Things could have been different. I could have never forgiven my mother. I could have remained in my addictions. I could have remained angry and bitter and resentful and unforgiving and unconscious. I could have just hated my mother and told her to fuck off years ago. I could have remained stuck in blame and my own trauma, which was also the trauma of my mother and her parents and on back — and the trauma baked into a culture rooted in domination, separation, hierarchy, oppression, and violence rather than one grounded in partnership, connection, caring, generosity, compassion, and love. I could have resisted and refused to embark on the decades long journey of healing and awakening and allowing my heart to break open again and again and again — and with each heartbreak dismantling the walls that I had built, brick by brick. I could have slammed the door shut on healing my heart. But I didn't.

And along the way, I've learned a lot. One great teaching is this: Each time we allow our hearts to break open, more space is cleared for love.

And so by the time that my mother had the inevitable breakdown and attempted suicide in early 2013, forcing her to be hospitalized and for an intervention to begin, I was ready. I was ready to receive my mom. My heart and mind were ready. I had enormous loving support in my life. I'd come to deeply understand her mental illness. I understood how she was compelled to project her self-loathing onto others. I understood how she was not able to actually see me... or anyone else. I understood the tragedy of Mom's alcoholism, mental illness, and lifelong trauma. And instead of hating her or in any way adding to the tragedy of our family, I came to grieve for the enormity of my mama's great losses. And I held her in my heart with compassion and unconditional love.

Does this mean that I had no boundaries, that I would be complicit with her abuse of me or anyone else, or that I wouldn't act to stand in protection of my heart and those of others? No. But I was freed from hatred and ignorance. I was freed from not understanding why my mom had been compelled to project her torment outward for years and years. And I was ready to receive my mother with my eyes wide open. I knew the severity of her illness. Still, I was ready to bring my mom home, home to her flesh and blood, as Mom came to refer to her family as.

What I didn't anticipate was the power of love and grace. I had no idea that this power was so great, so extraordinary that I could land in such a place where I was not only ready to receive my mama, mental illness and all, but also embody a depth of love that would, in part, make grace-filled miracles possible.

When my mother finally came here to the Pacific Northwest to live near us, there was no more alcohol, which was now replaced with powerful antipsychotic and antidepressant medications. There was no more need for my mom to just shut up, shut down, shut out; no more being stuck in the prison of image management and the false self she mistook for her true self. She could come to me with all the self-loathing which she had stuffed down so deeply, but which was now surfacing and being projected onto herself instead of others. 

And each and every time the tragic negating voices arose telling my mother that she was not lovable, I seized the moment to affirm the truth. Over and over and over again, I told my mother that she is loved. "You are loved, Mama... You aren't trouble to me, you are my treasure.... I understand that you want to die. I want to just hold you. And kiss you. And love you... You are loved, Mom. You are worthy of love. You are worthy of love..."

Instinctively, I knew to simply immerse my mother in love. Again and again and again. And as I did so, that love also permeated my own heart. The great healing that was happening was happening for both of us.

* * * * *

There is a saying that we can only go as deep with someone else as we've first gone ourselves. Without all the teachers and healers and loving souls who nurtured me back to life and acted as midwifes to my heart — which needed to be broken open after so many years of being walled up — I never could have known how to be the deeply compassionate and loving presence that was critical to my mother coming alive herself. She was pulled back from the dead, the walking dead, the torment and starvation of a soul deprived of love.

Do you hear what a miracle this is? Do you hear the power of love?

If my mama can come back from a lifetime of being hateful, violent, vindictive, and totally lost and gone, then anything is possible. And it is possible, I believe, because Love is our true nature. Under all the flailing about and inhuman acts we humans are capable of, rests the deeper nobility and loving essence of our sacred souls. God/Goddess/Creator/Spirit/Buddha nature — whatever we call the Divine — is not just outside of us, but also within.

I imagine a world where we humans awaken to love. I imagine a time where the illusions of separation fall away and our capacity for love grows and expands. 

And this is what has happened for my mama and me. To one degree or another, we've both engaged in the deeper work of recognizing and dismantling the walls that we built against love. Even my fear-riddled mother at age 87 began to courageously choose love. Such a powerful, powerful teaching. I only wish everyone could know the love that we have experienced and shared, a love that I once thought was impossible. Yet, it's been there all along, buried deep inside our hearts and souls — this love that does not die.

Bless us all,

Molly 

♥

My mom on June 14th, a day where she did not eat, but smiled with eyes closed with my presence, and opened her eyes to Facetime with her youngest grandson Matt.