Nearly every morning I send friends a snap of me smiling - greeting them for the day - sending out warm thoughts and positivity. Most days, I add a fun filter - hearts encircling my head - teddy bear ears or something else that feels fun. The filter doesn't just add cartoon art - it smooths out my face, trims my jaw line, brightens my eyes, removes uneven skin tone and wrinkles. It's me - but not really. Of course my friends know that I have dark circles under my eyes, the beginning of a double chin and uneven skin tone. But we all enjoy the snap - they accept the airbrushed version, even though they know the truth.
Life is kind of like that with B right now. There's this pseudo-reality in our calls and emails. First - everything is monitored and record and read or overheard by other people - so there is only so open you can be. But more than that, there is an understanding that reality isn't great, but it also can't change anytime soon. So we know the truth, but choose to look through the airbrushed lens of life.
Just two days ago when I spoke to her on the phone I said "Hey Bun!" in my usual excited tone. "Hey Mom", was her response - but it sounded weary and ragged. "What's up? Everything ok? You sound glum." And immediately her voice jumped half an octave, got a jolt of energy and she replied "Nope, I'm chill." We moved on.
There was this understanding that she probably is weary and ragged - but there was nothing she or I could do to change it. We were at the 1 month mark for her time in LaPorte - and we have at least 7 more to go. If she was sitting beside me, I would have thrown my arm around her and pulled her close and told her it was fine to open up; that I was here for her and tried to encourage her in any way possible. That is not an option right now. Right now, we both had this need to sound ok. I don't want her to hear my pain and feel any extra weight of guilt with all that she is going through. She doesn't want me to worry about how she is doing.
I tell her it's ok to feel - to not be fine - to be sad or lonely or angry or disappointed. Just like all my friends tell me it's ok for me to feel all my feelings. But the reality is we are both trying to protect each other from the difficulty. I can't imagine how hard her life is right now - and I don't want to do a single thing that would make it worse. She already feels so guilty for everything we are going through - and she doesn't want to make me worry more than I already do. Right or wrong, we can't help ourselves. We want to protect each other. She knows I'm hurting. I know she's lonely. But we're both "fine" or "great" or "chill'. We keep it light and positive - like someone is drawing teddy bears and hearts around the phone line.
I wonder when we will have the space and time to process this together. I have aspirations of writing a book about this time with her - not that it would be some best seller - or even ever be something ever be published. But as we both love to write and it is something we do together, I have this desire that some day, she and I could put together our experiences - see how we both grew stronger - how we changed - and the things that would always stay the same.
Someday we will be filter free...but for now we keep on the rose colored glasses....
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