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| Pieta William Blake |
Joan Didion, in her formidable memoir The Year of Magical Thinking describes the way she thought in the year after her husband's sudden death as I was thinking as small children think, as if my thoughts or wishes had the power to reverse the narrative, change the outcome. In my case this disordered thinking had been covert, noticed I think by no one else, hidden even from me, but it had been, in retrospect, both urgent and constant. Didion, of course, was grieving for her husband, and her magical thinking, although not entirely conscious, was that she could actually bring him back. Today was the second day of Sophie having quite a few seizures, certainly far more than the few to none that she'd had in the previous two weeks. I heard her thump onto the floor in her room just a few moments ago, and when I stood up and ran to her bedroom, I knew that she was probably seizing, had probably stood up from her bed and then gone down like a tree, felled. I picked her up off the floor and comforted her, changed her diaper for the fifth time and pulled the covers over her. I felt bitter and not a little angry, wondered if she'd eaten anything off or whether she was having an allergic reaction to something or other. I went over the day -- the last two days -- and wondered if she was having a delayed reaction to the cold she'd been struggling with for a week. I even, for a moment, thought that she might be reacting to me. Don't assure me that this is not so. There have probably been hundreds of times in the last near-twenty years that I've thought it -- wondered if the core, the reason for Sophie's seizures lay in me, in my literal cells. It occurs to me that this is a sort of magical thinking -- a black magical thinking, the subversion of magical thinking. The power to reverse the narrative is beyond my grasp, and if I don't stop grasping, trying to figure out why, why, why, the outcome won't be changed.
This black magical thinking is childlike, near primitive, actually, and definitely urgent and constant.
It makes perfect sense that you, like Joan, would struggle to define or control your experience, even when control is not possible.
ReplyDeleteDo you think the Charlotte's Web is overall becoming less effective? Maybe Sophie's body has adapted to it over time?
Thanks for your thoughts, Steve. No, I don't think Sophie's body has adapted to it over time -- I think she's had a virus for well over a week and any slight to the nervous system affects her. I don't know of any "habituation" that happens over time with the Charlotte's Web. In fact, many of the children who have seen great success (like Charlotte herself) have been seizure-free for well over a year.
DeleteWhat you are describing is so perfectly human. We cannot help but feel that there is some hidden key to the whys which plague us. And my god, your writing is so beautiful.
ReplyDeleteIt's a brilliant explanation and term for the line of thinking. Thank you for sharing. It fits how I feel about watching my own daughter with her extreme struggles of OCD, panic disorder, and fear of reality. You're the best for reassuring many of us out here that we are not alone. You have an extraordinary way with words that reach depths.
ReplyDeleteSophie is in great hands with you as her mom. Sue March
In extreme situations, even things we know are impossible seem that they must, somehow, be possible. I'm so sorry to hear of more seizures. I love you all.
ReplyDeleteI heard an interview of Joan Didion on the radio one day. She said that she often doesn't know what she's thinking until she writes it down. It's how she sorts through her thoughts. Me too.
ReplyDeleteAnd for you and Sophie, sending hugs and prayers for an end to the electrical storms raging through her head.
I'm sorry the seizures have returned. But am I right in recalling that they returned before and went away again? I shall hold this hope, and try with my most light-filled love-filled magical thinking to help mold the universe to make it so.
ReplyDeleteYes, you're right. There's a pattern of weeks with no seizures to speak of and then a day or so of multiple ones. That's far more preferable than what we had before!
DeleteI have also thought of a possible allergic reaction from my being. Sounds like the familiar continued seizures have come around again to fit the required level of adrenaline that is produced as a response from caregivers. What has all the flight or fight signals been up to? Frankincense and Lavender inhaled during a seizure makes me think about all the plants in the Garden of Eden and what they were inhaling as they walked around and I wonder if it helped them to be perfect and without disease.
ReplyDeleteLingering question-was the homeland security drone hovering over your blog an april fools prank? I wonder.
ReplyDeleteYou are not alone in magical thinking. I love that comment about Joan Didion not knowing what she was thinking until she wrote it down. Words are clarifying and release for some of us, and that is good. I pray that you can breathe, breathe, breathe through these seizures and come to rest.
ReplyDeleteOne of the things I enjoy about yoga is the attention which the teachers pay to all kinds of "clenchings," large or small. I love it when it is gently pointed out in class, or when I begin to notice it in myself. "Engage the bandhas, soften the jaw..." So many times a day, I clench, brace, tighten my jaw, stiffen, dig in. So many opportunities to let go, soften, surrender. Not easy, and I appreciate the reminders!
I keep thinking about my friend whose family has struggled with chronic illness and how she says healing is not always linear. Healing involves some ups and downs, but not to give up hope. I sure hope this is the case for you, and that her recent seizures are due to the virus. Praying things calm down back to what was starting to feel like your new normal soon!
ReplyDeleteI won't reassure you - wouldn't dare! Love.
ReplyDeleteThere is something so powerful about being a mother, about carrying and then birthing and then caring for that young child that I think instills a deep sense of responsibility in us - that sense of being responsible for a child's personality and physicality and even their experiences of the world. It is inescapable for me at times, both good and bad (boy, do I love to take advantage of those thoughts when I'm proud of my kids). It is a strange phenomenon that I often have to remind myself that my children, even though they are "of" me, do not belong to me in any sense of the word. Love.
ReplyDeleteI've had the same thoughts about my son's seizures, that maybe something about me triggers them. Thanks for writing this.
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