Grief

 Grief...

As human beings, it is inevitable that we will encounter losses and pains, in one way or another... And in it, we grief.

Yet, there are times when the pain or loss seems too great, too painful for us to deal with at any one time. So we put off dealing with this pain of loss. We put off grieving...

When we suffer a loss, it is natural that we go through the 5 steps of grieving:

Shock > Denial > Anger > Bargaining > Acceptance

I know that I, for one, is not someone who deals with grief and loss very well.


As a child, I remember feeling very intense emotions, very intense pain when dealing with minor separations and losses. It was so great, that I didn't know how to deal with them. Surely, it did not help for adults around me to just downplay my emotions...

"Oh, it's no big deal. Get over it..."

"Stop crying. Don't cry over such silly things..."

"Don't worry, we'll get another one in the future/we'll see them again next time..."

 etc.

As a child, hearing these words, I can only assume that emotions are not normal or even not real, that I'm being ridiculous or weird for feeling the way I felt. So the only way is for me to do what seems to be the most practical thing to do - push it down and numb it out.

 

For a long time, that's all I did...and kept trying harder to do... numb it out, push it down, pretend that everything is ok...

But everything is not ok...

And sometimes, they spill out. Or someone perceptive would tell me - "it's all over your face..."

Yet, I didn't know what to do with them. Try harder to hide?

It is only much much later, in my years of teaching dance, discovering my dancing body, going deep into meditation and trusting the voices within me, that it started to become obvious. All those pain that I thought I've pushed down or numbed out, were all still inside of me...hidden...

The pain manifests in tightness, and even injury. Sometimes they express themselves in sickness, or drama with people around me... but they all were there for a reason - I need to feel them...

Feel, process... in other words, go through the grieving process of it.

Over the years, one by one, things came out. Sometimes, they just rush past like a storm. Others, they come through one by one for me to contemplate and see clearly.

Either way, there is no escaping. It is only through acceptance, allowing...

Allowing myself to feel, to experience it in its full extend, and let it go, that I can fully heal from them...

As many are saying now, "you gotta feel it to heal it...".

I knew it all too well myself.


And now, I am grieving. There is so much grief in my body, I can't just force myself to dance and pretend that it is ok. But I slowly work through them. Sometimes, I seem to be progressing, sometimes, I seem to be taking 3 steps back. While there is new grief, there are also lots of old, unaddressed grief, and all kinds of things I didn't know I would feel, but it's ok. I trust the process, and I'll keep going, and healing.

And with each cycle, I feel lighter and brighter, more clearer and centred within myself.

The Beginning of a Biography

Wow....

 It's been so many years... Looking back at these posts, so poignant, yet I've come so far. But have I? Some of those posts, feels so familiar and still so relevant, I thought they were written at a later time.

But yea... here I am again...

I have a friend who have been talking to me about writing biographies and it's benefits.

At first, the benefits didn't seem very clear to me, but recently, I saw some video ads of Dr. Jordan Peterson, promoting his Self Authoring Program, talking about how important it is to map out events in your life, so that you can also author your future, and hmm... I thought, ok, that makes sense.

So here I am. Not sure where to put all my life stories, but I guess, this page is personal enough in that sense.

So, where do we start? Hmmm.....

Let's start with a brief summary of my childhood and where I am.

I grew up in the suburbs near the capital city. I have both my parents, and a sister who was born 3 years after me.

Honestly, this part just started to get scary. I didn't realise how intense it is to just think about my childhood...

 I remember childhood being pretty confusing to me. There were a lot of things I didn't like, a lot of things I struggle with. Not to mention a lot more pain eventually.

I guess early childhood was ok. I was quite the docile child, easy to teach. But I get emotional and cry easily sometimes. This includes times when my mom, back during those times, often had to travel overseas for work. There is a photos of me, probably 2+, at the airport, in my mom's arms, holding a small Minnie Mouse, looking sad. My mom, with big 80s curly shoulder length hair, would smell nice of car air conditioning. She don't use perfume, but that smell is something that would be very distinct over the years, especially when she drives to pick me up from school. 

See, my mom's a career woman. She has a professional job. She loves her job, but she also had no choice. She was the breadwinner of the family as my dad was not very successful in his career, which is mostly attributed to his character, but that's a story for another day. 

Oh dear, so am I then determined to relive my parent's life as my own? With the roles flipped? Not great...

 So yea. There were often nights where my mom would come home late. I spent most of my days at the babysitter, which I've had a few. Some I was fond of, others, not so much... I had shared about this one old granny nanny I really loved, whom I was most fond of, but unfortunately, couldn't stay long with her as she had committed to baby sitting her own grandchild, which is of course of her utmost priority.

But of course generally, nothing would match having mommy by your side. But that was not my choice to make.

My mom was a rather... emotionally avoidant person, I would say. She's very professional, technical, you can say it's cold. Not that she don't love me, I know she does. But she has no idea what to do with emotions, especially since I have a lot of it...

I remember that I would cry during a certain sad scene of a Charlie Brown movie. I was too young to even know what they were talking about, but I knew they were sad, and I can't help but feel for them.

I would cry when I see people chop down trees to clear land...

But mom would probably say things like, "That's silly, it's nothing to cry about..."

 I remember one time when my mom wants me and my sister to take a picture, standing on her car bonnet. My sister have no qualms about it, but I was terrified! One, I was terrified of heights, even though that wasn't very high, and two, I was scared of the slipping down since the surface was inclined and slippery. But yet, they forced me to be there, stand up and smile to take a picture. Damn, I hated that...

Shows how sensitive they are huh...

And, my mom admitted that she had used crying it out to manage my night cries. And oh boy, if I could remember those nights, they were terrifying and lonely. How can I not be traumatised?

 So, that was just the beginning.

Still, I remember moments of playing on my own, which I actually very much enjoy. I have a favourite tea set, and some mini buckets. And later on, Legos and Play Dohs. Wonderful times!

My mom loved to get me books, and I could read very early in my life, probably around 2+ as well. She would read to me and with me way before that. Looking back, she's had high hopes in me. She knows I'm smart, and she intends to make the best of it, by cultivating my reading habit, starting my education early, both in maths and languages. But I have other interest, that is art.

She had supplied me with colour pencils, crayons, water colours, all through my childhood, and of course pencils and papers, and I would just draw anything, whether from imagination, memory, or referencing real life. It felt easy for me. Just putting mental perception to paper. I never grew up to be a very accomplished artist, but that was the case with many talents of mine. It was very easy for me to learn the basics, but I never get very far with them...

I could very easily spend much of my time just quietly drawing and colouring them on my own. There was one time when I needed to draw so much right after coming out of a shower, that I just laid there on the floor, still wrapped in towels, on the floor of my parent's bedroom and I started drawing...hahaha....

I guess the world did feel like my oyster at that time...

And then my sister was born.

The birth of my sister

After my sister was born, things changed (obviously). The first thing that was most significant to me was that, the promise of a sweet little sister I could take care of was shattered.

My little sister was nothing like what was, I guess my mom promised me - that I could take care of her, love her, play with her, and protect her. She turned out to be this loud, arrogant, demanding, epitome of a boss-baby. 

When my mom was away, like in the toilet or such, I would try to approach her, play with her, or do the things adults do to check on babies, especially if she seems to be crying or writhing. But upon my attempts, she would start crying, or cry even louder if she already was. The more I try, the more she would cry. Can you imagine the sense of disappointment and rejection? She would look at me with judgy eyes and cry with a judgy tone..."Stay away, you fool..."

My parents and their marriage

I can't say when I started noticing, but back before my sister was born, my dad used to take us on joy rides on his motorbike. I guess he's had solo joy rides or with his friends. Sometimes, he would take both me and mom. Sometimes, it's just him and mom.

But as my mom got pregnant with my sister, she got more wary of riding the motorcycle. Not that she needs to since she drives a car. It was more practical. She started refusing to join those motorcycle joyrides. And also started protesting that it was not safe for me since they don't have a proper helmet for me. 

I remember one such conversation that went like...

Mom: Don't take her, it's not safe, she don't have a helmet.

Me: But I can wear yours.

Mom: But it's not the right size. Cannot...

Me: Then we can buy one my size.

Mom: Waste money. Why wanna buy one? You don't need it.

I remember feeling very sad about it. I don't understand why it suddenly mattered when we had done that so many times. Either I don't wear a helmet, or I sometimes wore mom's. I remember feeling safe, loving the feeling of wind blowing in my hair and face. I loved the intimacy of it, the quietness, the silent connection. There was so much of my dad in those bike rides. It was his way of expressing who he was, and his love for us. It was his way of communicating himself to us...

I remember very vividly, one of those last few times we went for those rides. My mom had just rejected dad's invitation to go for a ride. She needed to cook, she said. And as we were getting ready to leave, I remember seeing her silhouette, standing very pregnant, near the stove. She seemed disgruntled, frustrated that he didn't know better but to bring me for a ride again, reminding us that I didn't have a helmet on, and that he needed to be careful. 

I remembered, how it was so sombre... He took me to the hills of Section 10, an hilly area just up a long slope. It was being cleared for new development. I remember the barren brown soils, and a few remnant patches of trees of what used to be lush greenery. Looking over the end of the slope, right before the valley, we just sat or stood there for some minutes. With wind blowing in my face and hair, and then there were other who were there doing the same, looking at the massive development that is about to happen before our eyes. Sometimes my dad would chat one of those strangers up, getting more titbits of what they know. Soon after, there was nothing left to see, and we got on our way back. I think we went around the neighbourhood for a bit. I can't remember, but we do that sometimes.

I remember that being the most intimate moment I had with my dad... perhaps, one of the most peaceful ones, before he .. changed? I dunno if he did, or he just got worse from what he had already shown of him. A bad temper. And of course, my sister was born.

Never the same again

I guess there is a major part of me that held those periods with a lot of nostalgia. I couldn't let go of the fact that things changed so much after that and was never the same again. It was never sweet again. There was much tension between my parents, never much love.

There probably were a handful of rides with my sister, but very few and only around the neighbourhood as my mom wouldn't approve of dad taking us to the main road up the hill to Section 10. Plus, soon after, the roads were fully paved and traffic got busy. I don't have a memory of how it was like during the construction phases, but before I knew it, there were houses, roads and apartments built already. 

Mom recalled that around the time my sister was born, my dad  lost his job. I guess that's the source of tension I felt back then, aside from the fact that their relationship was falling apart.

I guess there was a part of me that blamed my mom for her rejection towards my dad's shows of affection via bike rides, that caused the demise of whatever affection they still had for each other. But I guess, what do I know right? I was just a child. Surely, there was a lot more going on between them, that was the cause of tension and loss of love.

But the bike rides, it was symbolic to me. It was a symbol of my dad's identity. When they first dated, I was told, he would always take her on his bike. Surely. But a few years later, she insisted that my dad sell his bike. By then, she got herself a second car, and he gets the older car. The bike was there, just for recreation. The occasional rides. But most important of all, a fragment of his identity, and memories of romance they had together before this.