Tomorrow my husband Tom celebrates his 58th birthday. Tomorrow is also the tenth anniversary of our 19-year-old daughter's death due to bulimia. The fact that these two "anniversaries" land on the same day has always made June 16th bittersweet...while we celebrate Tom's birth we must also honor and recognize Andrea's death.
I've been surprised at how deeply this tenth anniversary is affecting me. It seems that issues around our daughter's death that had been too difficult for me to look at up to this point have surfaced. So...I have been grieving anew. It is a humbling experience. It is also a reminder to me that we cannot deal with what we are not yet ready to deal. It has taken ten years, the last five of those in therapy weekly with a skilled therapist, for me to become ready to face certain aspects of our daughter's death.
And what if Andrea had lived? Would it have taken ten years for me to have attained the same level of understanding and compassion for the suffering she experienced? Would I have had the same intense drive to seek this understanding and compassion?
I am always asking parents of those who suffer with an eating disorder to learn all they can so that they, too, can develop these two qualities...but if my daughter had lived would I be able to do what I now ask of others? I think there would have been a laundry list of things I could not deal with because I was not ready...but would I have had the courage to do the hard work of getting myself ready, to stay in therapy for five plus years to learn the lessons I needed to learn? Sadly, knowing who I was then and what I valued and how I thought, it seems unlikely. I desperately want to believe I would have tried, though.
Knowing that at any given moment we are doing the best we can with what we know at the time allows me to forgive myself for not being able to "deal with what I was not yet ready to deal." Andrea provides perspective on this notion in a journal entry written a few days before her 19th birthday:
To everything there is a purpose and a reason for each experience we have. There is a depth to the universe which is profound and extends far deeper than the pain you feel now—circling back around until there is a time in the future when that experience, that lesson is needed and useful—not painful but beautiful. Search for the lessons. They are the roadmaps for tomorrow.
And so ... I will continue to "search for the lessons."
Blessings until next time,
Doris
My 20 year old daughter has just started outpatient therapy for ED she weighs 97lbs and is 5ft. the therapist has recommended inpatient therapy. She has no insurance and her options are not looking good for the inpatient therapy because i/we do not have 136,000. Do you know of a place that i could send her to where the cost would not be out of this world? Please help!
Posted by: Sherry | August 19, 2009 at 01:08 PM
Thank you for this open-hearted, intimate sharing, Doris, and your on-going work. Your new website is beautiful and so well organized. Warmest blessings to you!
Posted by: Mary Maddux | July 31, 2009 at 01:16 PM
the lessons that andrea continues to teach are amazingly beneficial to me. Doris, the way u are always learning and sharing your personal life lessons is a constant reminder to me that I need to keep moving ahead! Thank you from the bottom of my heart!
Posted by: Cindy | June 29, 2009 at 11:12 AM
Is this Tom the science teacher from Van Wert High School? ...back in the late 90's?
I'm not sure if it is or not, but somehow I found this page as I am relapsing into anorexia after reovering on my own 3 years ago. I'm kinda scared.
Posted by: Girl with problems | June 28, 2009 at 01:34 PM