Estrangement
"The fact of no longer being on friendly terms or part of a social group."
Clinging to my husband 13 years ago, I cried for my father, How He would die a very lonely death. Believing, that his abusive behavior would leave him out in the cold from our family.
Little did I know, the tears I cried were for me.
While writing words for a book I am playing with, I wanted to make sure the word estrangement worked for identifying me.
No longer friendly.
I then pondered when did this unfriendliness happen and who began this energy flow.
As a child was I born Unfriendly into a friendly environment and/or what made me become so "unfriendly"?
Isn't it more true that my father's behavior of abuse was unfriendly. My mother ignoring it unfriendly, as well towards me. So, am I the one who started this estrangement, and why do we see the child (adult child) who leaves the relationship as being the one estranged.
Instead of saying I am estranged, they are really the estranged parents.
What do we call someone who stays with unfriendly folks?
Is there a word for someone who leaves an unfriendly environment?
Curious "refugee" popped up and,
"A displaced person"
That is a much truer statement, since I am not the one who created the unfriendly nature in my childhood home.
As I was writing, I came upon this by Alice Miller.
"Experience has taught me that my own body is the source of all the vital information that has enabled me to achieve greater autonomy and self-confidence. Only when I allowed myself to feel the emotions pent up for so long inside of me did I start extricating myself from my own past. Genuine feelings are never the product of conscious effort. They are quite simply there, and they are there for a very good reason, even if that reason is not always apparent. I cannot force myself to love or honor my parents if my body rebels against such an endeavor for reasons that are well-know to it. But if I still attempt to obey the Forth Commandment, then the upshot will be the kind of stress that is invariably involved when I demand the impossible of myself. This kind of stress has accompanied me almost all of my life. Anxious to stay in line with the system of moral values I had accepted, I did my best to imagine good feelings I did not possess while ignoring the bad feelings I did have. My aim was to be loved as a daughter. But the effort was all in vain. In the end I had to realize that I cannot force love to come if it is not there in the first place. On the other hand, I learned that a feeling of love will establish itself automatically (for example, love for my children or love for my friends) once I stop demanding that I feel such love and stop obeying the moral injunctions imposed on me. But such a sensation can happen only when I feel free and remain open and receptive to all my feelings, including the negative ones." Alice
This could be the whole book on my journey. How I followed my body, stopped obeying the commandment and no longer forced myself to try and feel feelings I did not have; with my parents.
My body was truthful - I couldn't be friendly to those who hurt me.
Love truly arrived in its glorious feelings once I accepted, acknowledge and felt the volumes of negative feelings I had repressed.
Genuine feelings are NOT the effort of a conscious effort.
No matter how hard I tried to be the loving daughter, love didn't flow.
It wasn't a genuine feeling for me.
And, no wonder I was treated unfriendly by them.
I love how my body is magnificently a truth detector; it truly never lies.
Once I was on to my body and its ability to be genuine, so too could I be.
I followed it.
It has never failed me.
I may be the displaced family member, but it is totally authentic for me to be outside the circle.
Displaced is the correct identity for someone like me.
Displaced from my family is a truer definition of me.
