Dwarves of Grief

From "O" Magazine

**Excerpted from "This Does Not Have to Be a Secret" from the book "An Exact Replica Of A Figment Of My Imagination" by Elizabeth McCracken**

"...In the hospital in Bordeaux one of the midwives looked at us and asked a question in French. [The Author, McCracken explains her and her husband Edward's mediocre grasp of the French language during when they were in the hospital in France and their son, Pudding, was born stillborn at nearly full-term.] This particular [midwife] was a teenager, checking itmes off a list. The room was like a hospital room anywhere, on a ward for the reproductively luckless, far away from babies and their exhausted mothers. Did we want to speak to -

'Excusez-moi?' Edward said and cocked an ear.
'Un femme relgieuse,' the midwife clarified. A religious woman. Ah.
Here's what she said:
'Voulez-vous parlez a' une nonne?'
Which means, Would you like to speak to a nun? Of course in Catholic France it was assumed we were Catholic.
But Edward heard, 'Voulez-vous parler a' un nain?'
Which means, Would you like to speak to a dwarf?

When he told this to his friend Claudia, she said, 'My God! You must have thought, 'That's the last thing I need!''
'No,' Edward told her. 'I thought I'd really like to speak to a dwarf about then. I thought it might cheer me up.'
We theorized that every French hospital kept a supply of dwarves in the basement for the worst-off patients and their families. Maybe it was just a Bordelaise tradition: the Dwarves of Grief. We could see them in their apologetic smallness, shifting from foot to foot.

In the days afterward, I told this story to friends over the phone. Our terrible news had been relayed to my friends...and now I phoned to say - to say what I wasn't sure, but I didn't want to disappear into France and grief....We ordered carafe after carafe of rose', and I told my friends about the Dwarves of Grief, and I listened to their loud, shocked, relieved laughter. I felt a strange responsibility to sound as though I were not going mad from grief. Maybe I managed it...."

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Dear Oprah & Ms. McCracken, please don't sue me.

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I loved this for so many reasons.

I loved Elizabeth McCracken's writing.

I loved humor and heartbreak coexisting like lover's fingers interlaced on a walk down the beach.

I loved the impossibly lovely image of the "Dwarves of Grief"... so out of place and unexpected and almost gruesome that they fit perfectly into a situation of agonizing loss and suffering. [Though I have not experienced the tragedy of losing a child and won't even pretend to compare, my grief over Mr. M's drinking and the death of my marriage and all my hopes and dreams while we have 4 kids depending on us, has been profound and devastating in its own right.] How many times would someone's offer of a Dwarf have been welcomed? It seems like a validation of the crazy out-of-placeness of what is going on in my life.

"None of what is happening in my life makes any sense. What is happening?" I flail against reality.

"Excuse me Madame, would you like to talk to a Dwarf?"

"A Dwarf?" I would respond

"Why yes, of course, Madame, A Dwarf."

"You know what?" I feel a little calmer, a little more understood "This situation definitely calls for a Dwarf. Please! Bring out the freakin' Dwarf!!!"

And finally, I love the last paragraph where the Author acknowledges that she feels a responsibility to be OK, to offer a laugh, to not be too much of a "downer" in the midst of her entire world being ripped apart at the seams. So ridiculous. So unnecessary. And yet, so me!

Ah... what a deliciously beautiful piece.

Thank you so much "O" Magazine and Elizabeth McCracken that "refreshed my spirit".

Thanks Oprah.

This is my second post about Oprah.  
My first was in February '08 (when I first began this on again, off again blog) and now, my second post, in late August '08.   I confessed in that blog that I record (on my DVR, which is like "tivo") the Oprah show every day.

I still do.

In my defense, I have it set to record only new shows (no re-runs).  I probably only turn on the TV 4x's a month, and when I do, I usually spend a little time going through my long  list of old Oprahs and deleting 95% of them.  

DELETE LIST

I delete all the celebrity, Tom Cruise bouncing on the sofa episodes, 

I delete most of the book club ones (although I will read almost any fiction she recommends now - some of my all time favorite reads have been "Oprah books"), 

I delete the "favorite things" episodes, etc.  

KEEP LIST

I will keep an occasional diet, health, and weight loss episode.

I will keep almost anything Lisa Ling does; visiting prisons, child soldiers, slaves, etc.  (I want to BE Lisa Ling when I grow up!!!)

I kept several shows about cleaning up clutter and about a hoarder... yikes!  This inspired me and I got up and cleaned out my entire hoarding office... ugh!!!

I have kept shows about families in crisis or, as I mentioned on my previous post, about children of divorce.

Anyhow, all this to say...

All this to say WHAT?

Hmmm... all this to say that there are times and circumstances the
Oprah show has value to my life.

And there are times it doesn't.

I guess I am trying to be clear - to protect my own dignity -HA! - that I am not an Oprah groupie and I do not obsessively watch or follow or 'obey' her, but there ARE truly times when I DO indeed glean some wisdom from her show.

I am about to share one of those times.

In my recent post Signs of Strange Behavior, I listed signs I saw and missed or ignored  (DENIAL) that told me that Mr. M was drinking again.

Definition of Denial:
the act of asserting that something alleged is not true
(psychiatry) a defense mechanism that denies painful thoughts
abnegation: renunciation of your own interests in favor of the interests of others

That's why I am thanking Oprah, it was she who opened my eyes and ended my denial (at least on that issue at that time).

This was several (3?) years ago and I think the show was about women who were abused by their husbands or boyfriends.  (I say "I think" because I MAY be blurring 2 or 3 episodes together in my mind, so don't hold me accountable for the accuracy, just go for the meaning, OK?)  Anyhow, one woman had had something severe happen to her at the hands of her 'man'... I think he had shot her face off or something like that.  And another woman had maybe been set on fire by her 'man'.  (Again, I could be combining episodes.)  Oprah was asking them if that had had ANY indication or sign that he was the kind of man who could harm her like that.  Each woman said "no"... "No, he had never done anything" that would lead them to believe he could be a harmful person... But Oprah wasn't satisfied.  She didn't just let them go on with their stories.  She kept pushing in this one area:  when you were first dating, was there anything there that shoed how controlling and possibly violent he might have the potential to be?  "Well, there was this one time when he didn't like what I was wearing and grabbed my neck and shoved me up against the wall and made me go change because I looked like a whore" (or something like that).  "And he didn't want me talking to any of my friends and took my cell phone away"  and...

This was Oprah's point.

There were indicators.  They had had signs.  They had had gut instincts that they ignored.  She was talking to camera and to the audience of millions at home and told them to LISTEN to that tiny, inner voice.  WHAT IS IT TRYING TO TELL YOU?  WHAT DO YOU KNOW RIGHT NOW THAT YOU ARE IGNORING AND NOT LISTENING TO?

And it hit me.

I know that I know that I know that Mr. M is drinking.

No matter what he says, not matter what excuses or stories there are, I know.

I am not crazy.

I believe myself.

It may come out today, it may not come out until next week.  it may NEVER come out, but I believe myself... Mr. M is drinking.

[REMIND ME: I want to write more about that inner voice and how and why we ignore and deny it.]

It was a relief to finally believe me. 

(And the truth finally came out about 4 months later that he had been drinking and lying and sneaking and hiding for about 3 years... but of course, I already knew that... I wasn't crazy... I just needed to believe myself.)

Thanks Oprah.

Menstruation, Melancholy & Oprah

Today is a "wanting a divorce" day, but a better one.  I did not take any medication (neurontin or anything else) for depression.   My "monthly" started and  I feel less depressed and heart-broken.  Still sad and grief-stricken, but more functional... more able to do what needs to  be done without feeling like I am on the verge of falling apart.  This makes me deeply question how much of my sadness, anger, depression, fear, hurt, overwhelmedness, crabbiness, melancholy, excitement, passion, lack of passion, creativity, energy level etc. ad infinitum are more related to hormones than anything else.  I feel at the mercy of my monthly cycle.  My poor kids!  No wonder they don't know which way is up.

I am embarrassed to admit that I record Oprah every day.  I end up deleting 90% of them, but I am so afraid I will miss that life-changing episode that the entire planet is talking about that my whole DVR list is filled with Oprah and Intervention on A&E (am I a glutton for punishment, or what?  I live it AND watch it on TV!).

  Anyhow, I watched one show on adult children of divorce confronting their parents who divorced when they were kids.  In most cases, the Dads had left the moms.  The Moms had been the ones left with the kids.  The adult kids (sobbing and devastated) seemed to have the most pent up anger at their Moms.  They had faced and grieved their Dad's abandonment... but what seemed to kill them the MOST was how unavailable their MOMS were to them after Dad left. 

Moms were hurt, bitter, abandoned, alone, and scared, so they shut down on their kids and were crabby and disconnected (many times working one or more f/t jobs).  The Moms had good reasons/excuses (I was exhausted, your dad left me, I didn't know how we would make ends meet, etc.), but that was not the point.  The point was that the kids seemed to have so much more anger and bitterness with the parent that stayed and held the whole family together.  The abandoning affair-haver or alcoholic or abandoner was just excused - because that's all anyone expected of them.  But the stay-er the holder-together-er... they were the ones the kids seemed to have the most resentment toward.

Now I am smart enough to understand that it is SAFER for the kids to blame to parent who stayed... that parent is the one who will not abandon them when they are crappy and nasty.  But it is also that they stopped expecting anything from the abandoner and expected EVERYTHING from the stay-er.  So when the stay-er fell short and didn't meet 100% of needs, the kids felt abandoned x10 because they needed present parent to be their everything.

This was not necessarily an encouraging show for me (the stay-er), but it was a little enlightening.  And it DID remind me to not sell my soul to make my kids happy because they will probably NEED to blame me when they are grown.  And it also reminded me to just try to HEAR my kids... not to make excuses or try to fix them or explain things... but just to hear them.  

Easier said than done.