Download Steven Mead - Wrapping
Download Steven Mead - Wrapping (experimental)
Audio Clip - A Gift by Lynne Shapiro
Download Lynne Shapiro - A Gift
A Gift by Lynne Shapiro for Mourning Sickness
A Gift by Lynne Shapiro for Mourning Sickness
Audio Clip - A Memory Or Its Ghost
Sound file of Douglass W. Millikin's piece "A Memory Or Its Ghost"
Download Douglas W. Milliken - A Memory or its Ghost
Download Douglas W. Milliken - A Memory or its Ghost
I was emotionally paralyzed today... by Jesse Loren
I was emotionally paralyzed today, transfixed in the most awkward of places: the women’s restroom in the staff room. After 8 years of working for the same high school, you get used to the walls, the rhythms, and when architecture changes, you whine or get used to it. I am not really attached.
I used to use the bathroom in the administration building. It was the closest one to my classroom. I had a special affinity for that place because 6 years ago I passed a kidney stone in the handicapped stall and was so weak afterward, I lay on the cold tile floor for a good hour before I could get help. It graduation day for the class of ’02.
This time it was just as awkward, just as intimate, and even bloodier. Being squeamish, this would be a good time to turn away. After several months of prednisone, I finally started my period. It was relentless, painful.
I have barely grown accustomed to the new staff bathroom with its bright interrogation style lights. It could be that because I have Lupus, I am just light sensitive, or it could be that they over lamped the building. At any rate, I did my business, stood up, and looked down before flushing.
.
Because of years of kidney infections and stones, I have learned to look right at what my body has produced in order to rate my own health. I even think of Oprah in these moments…. S shaped, she says S shaped is healthy… I think many people think of Oprah when they are in the bathroom.
This time I was looking at large amounts of blood, clots and something translucent like a tiny angel. It is not every day that something translucent with a human eye, a human shape and wisps of wings, falls out of you, but there it was, and there it wasn’t. It was clots of blood, and something small and human.
I ran in there after the state proficiency tests; I had only a few minutes before another bell. I had a human thing come out of me, there with the blood in the very busy teacher toilet.
I couldn’t move, I couldn’t flush it, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t flush it.
What if it was alive? What if it was alive a few minutes ago? What if I hadn’t had a period and it had nothing to do with the prednisone? What if I didn’t know I was pregnant? What if alone again, like passing that kidney stone and laying on the cold tile floor, something bigger, something human was there in the water. I started to cry.
I am not one to be immobile, but the water was gross, public. It was too dirty to reach through.I looked for something to try to fish it out with, a pen or maybe a h air clip; all I could find was toilet paper and a Winnie the Pooh box. I didn’t think of MacGyver, but I am thinking of him now. I wished I had something besides the key to my classroom and my fingers.
I was suddenly in my ex husband’s family home in Michigan where the Monroe land grant was on the deed to the property. I remember looking at the deed, his parents were so proud to show me and I was so young, and so barely pregnant. I think I was 10weeks, with very pink cheeks and a pregnancy glow that was easy to read. Except that night, after a lot of back pain, I went to the bathroom and bled. There in the toilet was a translucent human shaped like a miniature Barbie but with different proportions. I did not hesitate to plunge my hands into the water. I put it on a stack of folded tissue paper. Like a jellyfish, it could hold its shape and yet it was also collapsing in parts. I wanted to find a box, a perfect box to bury it in, and was in a house that was not my house, in another state, in a place where everyone was so happy for me. I stayed there and held it, as if it would sting me, as if I wasn’t also bleeding, and I didn’t know what to do. I cried, which is often the only thing to do in this life. I cried and said I was very sorry. I cried almost silently and marveled at the little thing.
What could I do but wrap her in tissue and send her back to the sea?
I thought of walking downstairs with her to show my mother in law. What would be worse, to carry it downstairs and explain I fished it out of the toilet, or to just flush it back away. I wanted it to go away, all of it, all the expectation and hoopla, the prodding to eat, and the beaming looks from my father in law.
The next day, I convinced my new father in law that we had to plant a tree, a family tree, there on the old homestead to commemorate our marriage. It was a lie. I lied to all of them, but mostly myself. I had to make something grow, something that could be tangible, something outside my body that I could visit. It reassured me. We planted something red leafed that he always wanted, and I no longer remember what it is, because I have never been back. Sometimes I hate myself for this. Sometimes I am glad for the courage to go on.
Imagine again, at 40-something, after divorce, remarriage, illness, and aging, another translucent angel, the inability to touch it, and an empty box cheerfully mocking with Winnie the Pooh design. I could not fish it out and save it for after school.
Last year when my cat died, I kept her a whole 4 hours in my room. When my daughter found out, I told her he was just “sleeping.” I said this, not because I believed it to be sleeping, but because my joints were so painful I couldn’t figure out how to dig the hole to bury him. My daughter has mainly seen my keen survivor skills, but the Lupus stuff has really worn me out. I was too embarrassed to ask for help to dig the hole. I would rather appear crazy than appear needy or afraid.
And there it was, this thing I can’t explain, a bell and thirty teenagers waiting outside my room. I decided to poke it, to plunge my hand into the germy water. When I poked it, it melted away like tissue paper, it seemed like a real jellyfish pulsing away.
I used to use the bathroom in the administration building. It was the closest one to my classroom. I had a special affinity for that place because 6 years ago I passed a kidney stone in the handicapped stall and was so weak afterward, I lay on the cold tile floor for a good hour before I could get help. It graduation day for the class of ’02.
This time it was just as awkward, just as intimate, and even bloodier. Being squeamish, this would be a good time to turn away. After several months of prednisone, I finally started my period. It was relentless, painful.
I have barely grown accustomed to the new staff bathroom with its bright interrogation style lights. It could be that because I have Lupus, I am just light sensitive, or it could be that they over lamped the building. At any rate, I did my business, stood up, and looked down before flushing.
.
Because of years of kidney infections and stones, I have learned to look right at what my body has produced in order to rate my own health. I even think of Oprah in these moments…. S shaped, she says S shaped is healthy… I think many people think of Oprah when they are in the bathroom.
This time I was looking at large amounts of blood, clots and something translucent like a tiny angel. It is not every day that something translucent with a human eye, a human shape and wisps of wings, falls out of you, but there it was, and there it wasn’t. It was clots of blood, and something small and human.
I ran in there after the state proficiency tests; I had only a few minutes before another bell. I had a human thing come out of me, there with the blood in the very busy teacher toilet.
I couldn’t move, I couldn’t flush it, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t flush it.
What if it was alive? What if it was alive a few minutes ago? What if I hadn’t had a period and it had nothing to do with the prednisone? What if I didn’t know I was pregnant? What if alone again, like passing that kidney stone and laying on the cold tile floor, something bigger, something human was there in the water. I started to cry.
I am not one to be immobile, but the water was gross, public. It was too dirty to reach through.I looked for something to try to fish it out with, a pen or maybe a h air clip; all I could find was toilet paper and a Winnie the Pooh box. I didn’t think of MacGyver, but I am thinking of him now. I wished I had something besides the key to my classroom and my fingers.
I was suddenly in my ex husband’s family home in Michigan where the Monroe land grant was on the deed to the property. I remember looking at the deed, his parents were so proud to show me and I was so young, and so barely pregnant. I think I was 10weeks, with very pink cheeks and a pregnancy glow that was easy to read. Except that night, after a lot of back pain, I went to the bathroom and bled. There in the toilet was a translucent human shaped like a miniature Barbie but with different proportions. I did not hesitate to plunge my hands into the water. I put it on a stack of folded tissue paper. Like a jellyfish, it could hold its shape and yet it was also collapsing in parts. I wanted to find a box, a perfect box to bury it in, and was in a house that was not my house, in another state, in a place where everyone was so happy for me. I stayed there and held it, as if it would sting me, as if I wasn’t also bleeding, and I didn’t know what to do. I cried, which is often the only thing to do in this life. I cried and said I was very sorry. I cried almost silently and marveled at the little thing.
What could I do but wrap her in tissue and send her back to the sea?
I thought of walking downstairs with her to show my mother in law. What would be worse, to carry it downstairs and explain I fished it out of the toilet, or to just flush it back away. I wanted it to go away, all of it, all the expectation and hoopla, the prodding to eat, and the beaming looks from my father in law.
The next day, I convinced my new father in law that we had to plant a tree, a family tree, there on the old homestead to commemorate our marriage. It was a lie. I lied to all of them, but mostly myself. I had to make something grow, something that could be tangible, something outside my body that I could visit. It reassured me. We planted something red leafed that he always wanted, and I no longer remember what it is, because I have never been back. Sometimes I hate myself for this. Sometimes I am glad for the courage to go on.
Imagine again, at 40-something, after divorce, remarriage, illness, and aging, another translucent angel, the inability to touch it, and an empty box cheerfully mocking with Winnie the Pooh design. I could not fish it out and save it for after school.
Last year when my cat died, I kept her a whole 4 hours in my room. When my daughter found out, I told her he was just “sleeping.” I said this, not because I believed it to be sleeping, but because my joints were so painful I couldn’t figure out how to dig the hole to bury him. My daughter has mainly seen my keen survivor skills, but the Lupus stuff has really worn me out. I was too embarrassed to ask for help to dig the hole. I would rather appear crazy than appear needy or afraid.
And there it was, this thing I can’t explain, a bell and thirty teenagers waiting outside my room. I decided to poke it, to plunge my hand into the germy water. When I poked it, it melted away like tissue paper, it seemed like a real jellyfish pulsing away.
...but won't people think these stories are too depressing?
Several years ago I enrolled in a writing workshop for mothers. The first assignment was to write two pages about something we’d lost. One mom wrote about looking down at her hand and noticing the diamond from her wedding ring was gone. Another mom wrote a funny story about the mischief her toddlers made knowing she’d temporarily lost her sight in the shower when shampoo got in her eyes. I wrote a simple story about the death of my daughter, Corinna, five hours after her premature birth.
We had to read our stories aloud to the other workshop participants. I won’t lie…when my turn came I felt shy and awkward. It’d been over three years since my loss. I had never written about my experience, and I rarely shared it with others. I figured that when it came to talking about such an uncomfortable subject, most people had a “let’s not and say we did” attitude.
When I finished reading and looked up, many students had tears in their eyes. I went home that night with the story tucked inside my spiral notebook, and a newfound sense of accomplishment for writing and finding the guts to share it. But I figured that would be the last of that simple story.
Then an odd thing happened. It was like an invisible hand took over to guide my story to a wider audience than just my ten or so classmates. The workshop instructors arranged to air a recorded version on NPR. A local publisher heard it on the radio, and printed it in his newspaper. A theater brought it to life on stage in a play. The effect was profound. For awhile, it seemed like everywhere I went someone was familiar with my story. Many, including people who might ordinarily say nothing, reached out to me with genuine gestures of comfort and affirmation.
What I realized is that this subject is not too depressing to talk about. People do in fact want to hear stories—real stories without a sugarcoated spin on them—about miscarriage, stillbirth and infant loss, just as those who have had to endure the tragedy want to tell their stories in an authentic way.
Jesse and I are proud to bring the story-tellers and listeners together with Mourning Sickness, and to use this literary approach to loss to arrive at the heart of the matter.
-Missy
We had to read our stories aloud to the other workshop participants. I won’t lie…when my turn came I felt shy and awkward. It’d been over three years since my loss. I had never written about my experience, and I rarely shared it with others. I figured that when it came to talking about such an uncomfortable subject, most people had a “let’s not and say we did” attitude.
When I finished reading and looked up, many students had tears in their eyes. I went home that night with the story tucked inside my spiral notebook, and a newfound sense of accomplishment for writing and finding the guts to share it. But I figured that would be the last of that simple story.
Then an odd thing happened. It was like an invisible hand took over to guide my story to a wider audience than just my ten or so classmates. The workshop instructors arranged to air a recorded version on NPR. A local publisher heard it on the radio, and printed it in his newspaper. A theater brought it to life on stage in a play. The effect was profound. For awhile, it seemed like everywhere I went someone was familiar with my story. Many, including people who might ordinarily say nothing, reached out to me with genuine gestures of comfort and affirmation.
What I realized is that this subject is not too depressing to talk about. People do in fact want to hear stories—real stories without a sugarcoated spin on them—about miscarriage, stillbirth and infant loss, just as those who have had to endure the tragedy want to tell their stories in an authentic way.
Jesse and I are proud to bring the story-tellers and listeners together with Mourning Sickness, and to use this literary approach to loss to arrive at the heart of the matter.
-Missy
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