Kissed To Death

Youngest son is moving in with his 15 year old girlfriend and her family. For a time. He doesn't know how long. He came home Sunday night after being gone 10 days. He said he would stay for 3 nights but this morning told me he was leaving again tonight. I want to warn him that he is on the edge of the precipice but cannot. He is deaf to my words. That's to be expected considering I've spent the past 10 months nagging and saying things in anger. Trying to manipulate him to see things my way. Concentrating on behaviours instead of on relationship.

Without that wall of sand crumbling earlier this month, I'm pretty darn sure I'd be looking for some kind of serious fix right now. Well, I did consume all edible sugar products in the house. Frozen chocolate just doesn't cut it. It's a crappy substitute when what I'm really tempted to do is numb myself with my drug of choice or taste the sweet kiss of a rye and coke after 18 years of passing it by, but for today frozen chocolate is the best alternative.

"Shit, piss, fuck, damn." That's the mantra my husband says when things go to all to hell. I haven't heard him say it in years but he's repeating it like a stuck record these days. Dearest one has aged overnight. Visibly. I looked at him when he woke up yesterday morning and asked if he had a headache. The deep lines etched in his face normally mean a migraine's attacking his head. But no headache....just deep heartache.

I think if making this choice is what youngest son must do to individuate, then do it. I sense that he just wants to be on his own and can't afford it, so this is the closest thing to being on his own/cutting the apron strings that he can do. I was close to 40 before I became my own person, separate from my parents. Youngest son has watched both his siblings move out permanently in the past 6 months. He sees them in the process of becoming their own people. He hates being alone. He often says he wishes he was 9 years old again - a time in his life when he was carefree.

Where is the hope in all this? It is there. And I can sense it even though my heart is heavy. I have this knowing that God is bigger, will always be bigger than the circumstances we find ourselves in. We all walk this crooked path to peace, to healing, to wholeness. It is strewn with pain. It is wet with our tears. Sometimes we just want to puke. I look at my own path and while there are many moments, extended periods of sheer stupidity, I like where I am today. I like who I am. I like that no matter how many less-than-stellar choices I make, it's a forward journey.

Of course I wish youngest son was making different choices. He asked me last night if he was a disappointment to us. I told him that he, himself, never. He was created in God's image and what God creates is good. His choices - yes, a disappointment. We talked for a while but without that driving need on my part to make him see life my way or else know I'd be pissed off at him until he did. Thank God the wall crumbled. His ability to fend off my pissyness with his own choices says there is a strength there. My concern is that he is making these choices, not from a place of inner peace, but from a place of pain and confusion. Up until a few weeks ago I would have had a snarky, "I told you so" response had he started to make choices that made more sense to me. I would have rubbed it in. I can be so predictable.

None of us journey alone. It is a process. I sit here and hold us up to the Light and pray we find our way on the path. Hopeful to do it with as little puking, tears and pain if possible. I read last week somewhere that pain is the kiss of Christ. It feels like I've been kissed to death.

Many years ago I phoned a counselor....overcome with deeply imbedded anger at my husband.....telling her if he didn't change I was leaving. She replied, "Oh no, you need to come to a place of peace first before you can make any decisions." I remember thinking - "What are you talking about? I'm not the problem - he is. If he would only change his behaviour I would be in a place of peace!"

I can laugh about that phone call now. I went to see her for many sessions. I deleted instantly everything she told me that didn't line up with me getting my own way. Last year I saw her daughter at a church service and asked her to tell her mom that all the deleted stuff made sense now. Yes, I need reminding that operating from a place of inner peace is much better than knee jerking my way through life, but that's okay. Today I know there is a place of inner peace to be had whatever the behaviour or circumstances. I know the Source of that peace, too. Thanks be to God.