Because, no matter how painful the losses, there’s always room for more loving.
Archives for category: therapy
Bent
A.V. Walters
My sweetie, Rick, is in a funk. I understand; I was, last week. There’s very little I can do to help. You see, Rick and I are in the process of divorce. The situation is really bent. But I’ll have to back up a bit to explain.
Things are bent when circumstances can only make sense in the context of some larger idiocy. Rick and I find ourselves in the category that the New York Times calls “The Undivorced.”
Up until recently, we actually considered ourselves to be a happily married couple. You see we are happy. We are a couple. And we are married…just not to each other. Perhaps now, you’ll begin to understand. And that’s what’s bent about it, that it only makes sense in the larger picture of lunacy.
I left my marriage six years ago. I was suffocating and the only way I could find air was to leave. I left with almost nothing—I was so broken, so guilt-ridden by my failures, that I fled. It’s not like my ex was generous in the process. I have stories that would curl your ears. I found refuge in Two Rock, and have been here ever since.
Rick has a similar story. He, too, fled an unhappy union. He found a safe harbor in a little apartment near his home, so he could maintain relationships with his children. Three years ago, we found each other. It was dicey at first. We’re both a little roughed up, and battle shy. But we share common values and humor and… well, we both like Scrabble. Neither of us felt we were in a position to end our marriages.
I am self-employed. I didn’t pick the best of economies in which to launch my freedom flight. Married, I share in health care through my husband’s retirement. Those rights were earned during our marriage, and so long as I remain married, I have coverage. I also have a pre-existing condition. It’s not serious—I’m fine so long as I watch my diet, but it’s enough that I would not be able to procure health insurance, independently. So I’ve remained legally tethered. That’s bent. My husband didn’t mind—it’s put him in the catbird’s seat. So long as I needed health insurance, I couldn’t squawk about the fact that he’d kept all of the marital assets.
Rick is a cancer survivor, and self-employed. He also has kids, which meant that maintaining “the family unit” was important to the health insurance picture for his whole family. My pre-existing condition pales next to his, yet we both enjoy relatively good health. His business dried up in the bust of the housing bubble, and we’ve shared that it took every ounce of our combined ingenuity to make ends meet during tough times.
The much-heralded American health care reform means that, soon, insurers will not be able to discriminate against those with pre-existing conditions. While I’d much prefer a sane single-payer system, I can finally see a horizon where health coverage needn’t dictate my life choices. In January, I steeled myself, and filed for divorce. My ex is not happy that he’s finally being asked to share what we built together. He has a short admonition for why I should walk with nothing, “But you left.” As though that explains everything that happened in a failed, 28-year union. There’s acrimony and accusations and unreasonable demands. We both have lawyers. It’s a bit ugly, but it’s not surprising.
Unexpectedly, things changed in Rick’s family dynamic, too. He filed shortly after me. I don’t think he expected his ex to be as much of a jerk as mine but life provides many revelations. So we’re divorcing. Simultaneously.
In the long run, it’s a good thing. We’ll get through this. In fact, we can really empathize with each other—it’s common ground. Under the microscope, though, there’s an insanity to it. Lives should not revolve around some insurer’s definition of health, or family or coverage. As a nation, we’ve handed the reins of our lives over to corporations that care more about profits than about the services they render. Health care, eh? And that’s just totally bent.
NYT’s The Undivorced: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/01/fashion/01Undivorced.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
The following is an article written by guest writer TRESSA S. EDWARDS, daughter of our intrepid editor. Originally published in her high school newsletter, Tressa has given us permission to post her article. Though the content is not typical for Two Rock Chronicles, we feel Tressa’s voice deserves to be heard, and look forward to her future contributions to the blog and to Two Rock Publishing.
New Hope in the Battle Against AIDS/HIV
Tressa S. Edwards
For the last 32 years, AIDS has been a somewhat mysterious disease, killing off nearly 30 million people since its discovery.
On June 5th, 1981, American Epidemiologists reported that five previously healthy men in LA had become ill. Two of them died, becoming the first lives claimed by a then unidentified virus. Now, over 33 million people are infected with the same virus that causes AIDS. Though there is now a name for it, a cure hasn’t yet been discovered. Or has it?
In 2007, a man known as the ‘Berlin Patient’ was cured of HIV, the virus that leads to AIDS. His name is Timothy Ray Brown and, at the time, was the only person on record to be cured of HIV. He received a life-saving (in more ways than one) bone marrow transplant for Leukemia. Found in the bone marrow was a gene mutation which made the newly produced white-blood cells resistant to infection while playing host to the HIV virus. Though he was lucky, not everyone can have that same opportunity. Aside from being incredibly painful, bone marrow transplants can be fatal or have severe side-effects. This rules them out as both practical and as a cure.
Recently, however, there was a baby who was cured of HIV. She was born to an unknowingly HIV-positive woman in rural Mississippi. Just 30 hours after she was born, her bloodstream was tainted with signs of the virus. She was indeed HIV positive, having most likely contracted the disease in the womb. After confirming her status as HIV-positive, she was transferred to the University of Mississippi Medical Center and given her first dose of AIDS medicine. Within a week, the viral load was almost undetectable. She was then continually treated for the next 18 months, until the mother disappeared with her child. She re-appeared some time later, telling doctors that she had not given her child her medication in over 5 months. The doctors assumed that the virus would have continued to replicate, and start to deteriorate the child’s immune system. However, they ran tests and found her to be HIV negative. After checking and rechecking the results, the young girl was deemed ‘cured’ by researchers at the University of Massachusetts, as well as John’s Hopkins. She is now 2 1/2 years old, and still HIV free.
So what does this mean for a cure? It means that those at risk of being born with HIV, as well as those already born with HIV, are given a possible chance to remove the virus from their systems. Though there are preventative measures already available for mothers who could potentially pass on the virus, they are not always effective. Instead of simply giving people a way to potentially prevent the disease from being passed on, there may be a way to now ensure that even if it is transferred, it doesn’t have to claim more lives. Scientists and researches along with doctors are figuring out ways to measure the proper dosage, and length of time which newborns need to be given the standard AIDS medicine for it to effectively remove the virus from their systems. Let us hope they find a way soon. In the mean time, we must remain proactive and aware.
Hearth and Home
A.V. Walters
It’s a strange underpinning to the season of renewal, an almost depressing release of the winter norms, that comes before the longer days and warmer weather can step in to ease the transition. You see, in winter we endure the long, dark days with the light and warmth of our woodstove. There is a center to our home, as we cozy up each evening in front of the fire to rehash the day, or play Scrabble, or just sit and read. When it’s warm, the fire isn’t necessary for heat, but we miss basking in the golden light of the flames. There’s an intimacy to it and a ‘place’ where we belong in the winter evenings.
The day-time temperature in our home now ranges around 64˚ (F)—that’s about what we heat it to, in the winter. Somehow though, especially if it’s gray out, it doesn’t seem quite warm enough. And we’re not sure where to sit in the evening—the living room suddenly darker, without the glow of the stove. I confess we’ve lit ‘cosmetic’ fires—small fires with just enough warmth to keep the “hearth” in “hearth and home.” The cold glow of a computer screen just isn’t the same, even if it does spell a certain increase in productivity.
Both Rick and I seem to be experiencing a similar winter withdrawal. We wonder whether this is common, or just us. The rhythms of spring and summer, gardening, long evenings outdoors, sometimes chatting with the neighbors—beer in hand, aren’t due for at least another month. Now, with daylight savings, the days are longer but not yet appreciably seasonal. Mostly, it just makes us feel tired.
We theorize that, in many homes, the cold blue glare of the television has become a poor, substitute hearth. Modern folks have opted for entertainment, rather then the primal satisfaction of day’s end in front of the fire. Do they even know this? Do they ever think about the crackle of kindling, and the random dance of the flames? We certainly don’t miss television, but we yearn for a more fully realized shift of season to help direct our energies away from our now-empty patterns of winter.
I confess that I’m filling some of the void with evenings of baking—tonight, a flourless, almond based chocolate extravaganza. Summer may find us, eventually, garden-ready, but a bit rounder.
And then, there’s the jacket…the not-so-straight-jacket
A.V. Walters
I don’t usually give it much thought, as I walk around—but occasionally I get remarks, and sometimes stares. It’s… about the jacket. From time to time in my life, I have engaged in transformational art. It isn’t capital A art, it’s somewhere in the cracks—between art, craft and therapy. Years ago, during a particularly tough period, I did a self-portrait doll. I was trying to work out just who I’d been, how circumstances had changed my life’s plans, and exactly who it is I wanted to be, going forward. The doll had helped me focus on the rebuilding efforts; it let me crystalize who that doll-person had been and honor her, and her dreams, as I went forward with my life.
When I moved to Two Rock, my life was in tatters. The one thing I had most invested my energies in, and my self-image, was my marriage. And it had proved to be unsustainable. I was, once again, at a crossroads in my life and I needed a project to help me work all that through. Of course, I had taken up writing and I suppose that could’ve been ‘it.’ But the writing was fiction and, intentionally, it wasn’t about me. Even though I believe that you can really only tell the truth, in fiction, I was too fragile at that time for scrutiny, even in make-believe. I’d thought about doing another doll, but it felt too much like a duplication—not enough breaking of new ground. By chance, my sister gave me a hand-me-down jacket—a denim jacket that she’d worn as much as she’d cared to. It was frayed a little and stained and, like me, had seen better days but still had a lot of life left in it. And, that’s how the project started.
I decided it was going to be a symbolic self-portrait. I thought that a hand-decorated jacket could tell a story, my story. It would be a moving target of who I’d been and where it took me. I decided to include even the bad, in symbols that I would wear as badges of courage and survival. I once read that embroidery was the closest form of decoration to tattoos. I have no formal training in sewing or embroidery, so I’ve had to make it up as I go. The jacket is a WIP (a work in progress) and I’ve joked that we’ll know that it’s finished, when I’m dead. In the meantime, I’m not dead yet, and it’s been a cool project that I can pick up from time to time, when the spirit moves me. (Or, for that matter, when the spirits move me.)
It’s also, well, a jacket. In fact, it’s my only real coat. Our Two Rock winters are fairly mild, so a jean jacket is just about right. Sometimes, if it’s really cold, I’ll wear a down vest under the jacket. So, it’s my everyday wear, forgetting that it’s not something people experience everyday. I’m reminded of that when I get a reaction.
Some people love it—they’ll ask me what it’s all about, the meaning of the images and patches. Sometimes they want to know how they’d go about making one for themselves. Did you take a class? Where did you buy that patch? And then, there are those who won’t even look directly at me. They steal a sideways glance, and then quickly look away, as if it might be contagious. Occasionally, I’ll get a really negative comment, almost hissed with scorn. They might suggest, Aren’t you a little old for that? Or, What are you, some kind of hippy? I’ve learned to welcome it, and it’s all become part of the experience. Their reactions reveal as much (if not more) about them, as the jacket does about me. I know, I’m a bit of an odd duck. I stopped fighting that, a long time ago. So, what about you?
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