A Welcome Shift

You know you have a treasured gift when you reveal your dark side to friends and they reach out in love. That’s what happened after I shared my “arrogant/entitled” shadow with Diana, Prema, and Jen on one of our post-lockdown sporadic Saturday morning zoom calls. During the lockdown, we met weekly, often taking a deep dive into the teachings of Caroline Myss.

Offering a Way Out

Because they empathize with my caregiver limitations, they immediately offered me an out. I could put Nicole in a nursing home or extended care facility. Jen, a Hospice volunteer, has visited a number of such facilities. Surprised to find so many disabled young people living in them, she thought Nicole might actually prefer it to living with me.

Diana who has experience with several aging family members, offered to go with me to find a suitable placement. She also offered to walk me through the application process of securing a Medicaid Waver.

My Body Speaks

Listening to them, resistance built inside as though an inflating balloon might burst. I noticed. I told my friends that now (Omicron numbers rising) wasn’t a good time to live in a congregant setting, so maybe these steps could be taken at a later time.

I sat with my discomfort as our conversation moved on.

The message emerging from my body, “I can’t put Nicole in a nursing home. That would be cruel. I can’t hurt her like that just so I have a little more freedom. It would be going against what I came to know as my purpose after she moved in with me in 2016. It would be unloving.”

While we both would prefer that she live independently, Nicole living with me has provided me an opportunity to give her the love and attention I neglected to give her during the years I focused on finding help for her brother. … With the help of a power greater than myself, I am at last the loving mother of my aspirations. Nicole and I are closer than ever … another gift of grace.

~A Long Awakening to Grace, Page 297

Digging Deeper

And still, my body felt unsettled. I needed to dig deeper.

I reached for one of the books with “grace” in the title … my 2022 practice after discovering “grace” as my word for the year. Caroline Myss’ book, Invisible Acts of Power: Channeling Grace in Your Everyday Life led me to her Sacred Contracts: Awakening Your Divine Potential.

Messages emerging from these books and from many other sources spoke powerfully to me. I recorded them all in my prayer journal.

As I read about archetypes, sacred contracts, and the way they work, I saw myself in my daily interactions with Nicole … in my willingness to stretch and let go of my preferences … investing my actions (accommodating her lifestyle, watching TV because it is her way of connecting, preparing nutritious meals) with meaning and purpose. It became clearer and clearer that my sacred contract is serving as a caregiver for Nicole.

I relaxed as I came to acceptance of caregiving as a choice … not an imposed obligation.

And then, a spiritual teacher I respect, thanked me for my service. I felt seen and understood.

Checking: Am I On the Right Track?

I checked with friends who have known me since the 1970s and 80s during scheduled zoom calls… Sharon, Kathryn, Pam, Penny. We have a long history together. They knew me back when I first began searching for answers to my children’s challenges. They travelled with me and supported me on that long road to discovery chronicled in my memoir. They know me well.

I asked for their feedback about the acceptance I was reaching. In different ways, each of them validated my new and deeper awareness.

I felt settled.

And something kept niggling at me. I paid attention.

The Unfolding Process Continues

In Sacred Contracts, Carolyn Myss notes that our life mission or Sacred Contract has to do with the way we work with our personal or spiritual power … how much we are willing to surrender to Divine guidance. It is not the physical details of our lives, but those details can help us see the larger picture in the fragments. Our task is recognize and integrate the details so the greater pattern of our mission can shine forth in its full dimensions.

Jen’s words kept ringing in my ears. Nicole might develop a social life in a nursing facility with other disabled younger people. She might prefer it to living with me.

I faced realities:

• the waiting list is still long for independent living
• by the time Nicole reaches the top, she probably won’t be capable of managing it … I don’t think she’s capable now, but, because she falls through the cracks, this has been the only option available to Nicole
• as the social worker validated, finding resources for the elderly, disabled, and children is difficult in our country
• our situation, especially as I continue to age, is likely unsustainable

Possibilities emerged:

• I could be proactive … accept Diana’s offer to help me do research now
• Doing the footwork now would save Nicole and my friends a lot of trouble after my death
• The transition for Nicole from my home to a nursing home would go a lot smoother

Resistance subsided. l felt inspired and energized.

Then my friend Sharon called. She’d been pondering our situation. She reinforced Jen’s thought … Nicole might not see this as unloving as I envision.

As I shared my current thinking, more possibilities emerged:

• Diana and I could narrow the search to the best options
• I asked the social worker in my Primary Care Physicians office to help us narrow the search. She is sending a list outlining services offered with ratings by a local hospital and Google.
• Then Diana and I could empower Nicole by taking her to check out and weigh in on the best options
• Then, while I take some time for myself, Nicole could stay in the one’s chosen to get an inside look
• We could have fun with this joint research project

Revelations

Four weeks later, the four of us reconnected again. The original four listened intently as I shared this unfolding process.

Diana exclaimed, “And this will resolve your biggest fear … about what will happen to Nicole after you’re gone!”

Yes … we have a plan!

And Prema gave this whole process a larger perspective. She noted that my Sacred Contract is about more than serving as a “caregiver” for Nicole … it is “mothering” her in a way I was not mothered. It is a part of a process of healing generational wounds.

Her words touched me deeply. I have been faithful.

• During these long months of angst, I did not take my anger and resentment out on Nicole. I continued to behave lovingly toward her.
• Taking these proactive steps is another way to extend my love and attention

Jen noted that our ancestors help us from the other side.

We marveled at what opens up when we place ourselves in alignment with higher spiritual forces.

Gratitude

I’m full of gratitude for:

• Friends who care, offer concrete assistance, and verbalize higher and deeper meanings
• Spiritual teachers who guide my deep dives through their writing 
• Being deeply listened to and affirmed
• That social worker who called twice offering ways to help
• My own practice of listening and allowing my body and soul to guide me
• My Ancestral Circle assisting my steps to provide healing for us all

Trust the Process

… a spiritual way of being I seem to need to learn over and over again. 🙂

… the life of the spirit is never static. We’re born on one level, only to find some new struggle toward wholeness gestating within. That’s the sacred intent of life, of God—to move us continuously toward growth, toward recovering all that is lost and orphaned within us and restoring the divine image imprinted on our soul. And rarely do significant shifts come without a sense of our being lost in dark woods, or in what T. S. Eliot called the ‘vacant interstellar spaces.’

~Sue Monk Kidd in When the Heart Waits

It is not lost on me that without those long dark months of struggle, I might never have emerged into this light of new possibilities.