Sowing Good Seeds

Dearest Genevieve,

Remember early on in my treatment when I told you I wanted to work toward ego-death ultimately to become loving awareness?! (I do, because it was easily the bravest thing I’d ever wished for myself outside my head). I remember bracing myself for any sign of doubt from you—my worry monster desperate to verify my fear that I was so broken that it was crazy for me to even think I’d ever live long enough to get there. But nope. Never. Not you. You let me know you were 100% down for all of it and happy to be along for the ride. I do know for a fact that I will, indeed, NEVER live long enough to fully express my gratitude to you for that moment of solidarity. It was life-giving.

And I did it.

I’m devouring every precious moment as it happens in real-time, determined to live a big, fat, juicy life. I’m meeting each moment (and myself) with grace: fully tapped into the collective consciousness and operating from the soul-level. It’s legit the best goal I’ve ever set for myself. And, as you dang well know, it only happened when I realized it was me who I needed so desperately my whole life.

This past week, I made an offer to purchase a business. All on my own. No Drew. No Sep. No Brandi. Just me. Best part: it wasn’t even listed for sale! I just asked. Read: I used my voice to say what I wanted. We BOTH knew this light was too bright to keep at home, yo! Plus, now that I’m a master co-regulator (my favorite of all my superpowers), I know I can parent the heck out of these kids (at the top of my license like I did when I practiced) and still be the change I want to see in the world. No more black or white thinking for this chick—I’m embracing the grey with reckless abandon. Besides, I followed the rule: I started at home and loved myself and my family. It’s my turn now.

The business in question would be a low-stress way to spread love and light on the daily. On a grander level of manifestation, it will be a springboard for community development leading to opportunities for people to be gainfully employed, empowered, and actively loved. The latter is a reference to Drew’s exasperation with the fuckery being dished out by Genesis back when I worked at Ridgewood. He always said he had never seen a company actively hate their employees to the level that Genesis hated us.

And it wasn’t just Genesis—it was EVERY rehab company that ever employed me and my friends (Brandi). Hell, Concept Rehab took away benefits from me in the time that elapsed between my initial offer and my first day on the job. Ladies and gentlemen: that’s called FORESHADOWING. But, being well-versed in stifling and squelching my intuition (already believing myself to be without worth/deserving of every shit sandwich I’d ever been served), I kept my head down for fifteen years and ate shit sandwich after shit sandwich, until my belly could not hold another bite.

I allowed their greed and evil to wound me so viscerally that I could NOT will myself to renew my license last year. I saw renewal as a gut-punch to the little girl inside me that had spent her whole life surviving the same darkness that ended up awaiting her in SNFs. She had waved the white towel and was desperate to be assured she’d never have to endure that pain again.

Then, I remembered the girl that worked herself to the bone to earn those two degrees and that license. The same drowning girl that had to take an incomplete in honors writing her sophomore year of college because she just could NOT, no matter how hard she tried, balance school, working to pay for school, and her mom’s seemingly-infinite medical appointments and radiation treatments in Fort Wayne (read: a commute that legit felt like driving off the face of the earth—and why I still hate the state of Indiana (well, that and Pence)). And I’m here to tell you, she TRIED.

Was I really going to let them take that from me? Worse yet, was I going to let them negate all the light work I had done for all of the vulnerable grams and gramps I so lovingly served?! Nah. I earned it, lived it, and survived it. It’s mine. I’m going to renew it. Not for work (although, I’m feeling froggy enough to do some OPP/accent reduction work like back in the day), but because it’s mine.

I’m manifesting a scholarship program for the healthcare workers that I’ve loved and fought in the shit with along the way—to give them a way out of the darkness. I want the business I own to be their refuge and give them a second chance to make money and be valued. And it won’t just be healthcare workers, it will be anyone hungry for love and light and a whole lotta worthiness (Misty).

Lastly, because my brain is lightning in a bottle and I’m ravenous for life, I’ve decided to start recording a podcast re: healing with my long-lost bestie Rachel. Based on the beautiful words of encouragement I’ve received from people I’ve known forever, and people I legit met just this week, I think people might be ready to listen 💕

Best,
Jena

By the time Drew entered my orbit, I had spent a hefty portion of my time on earth perfecting the art of hustling, helping, and doing without for love. Operating outside of my body was the norm back then—disassociation having come to my rescue early on as the little ‘t’ traumas (as my counselor refers to them) relentlessly popped up in my life like some possessed whac-a-mole game run by a toothless carney with Poor Jack Amusements. And as a result, I entered my first (and blessedly only) romantic courtship with a hyper-vigilant nervous system and a dogeared playbook for conditional love.


I can still remember Mrs. Cameron busting my chops in the corner of her classroom near the end of the first JCL event that occurred after Drew and I had become ‘companions.’ Glaring at me over her half-rim readers, she chastised me for blatantly avoiding Drew during the soirée—opting instead to stick with the Latin scholars from my own grade (Pink Pets forever). My decision had left Drew (then, by his own admission a goner) looking like a confused Pound Puppy watching longingly from across the classroom. She clearly knew he was the real deal, and didn’t want me doing to his heart what I had done to her lesson plans since Latin 1. Truthfully, I had been a bit of a handful for her—and I realize now it was definitely a classic case of projection stemming from the fact that her husband, Officer Bill, never once picked me to hold Toby the dang D.A.R.E. bear in Mrs. Ashenfelter’s fifth grade class at C.D.


I remember the burning shame that traveled rapidly down my body as she scolded me. As I watched her mouth move, my mind assessed the situation—alarm bells had been ringing off the hook since Drew expressed that he did, indeed, dig me. The sirens became even more deafening when my brain tried to make sense of the fact that he didn’t seem to expect me to jump through hoops to prove myself worthy of his attention and affection. Umm, WTAF?! Danger, Will Robinson!! I was broken and unlovable, yo! Drew was wicked smart—there was no way in heck the same guy that Jeff Heitz would place at the top of the class could actually be stumped by this ‘brain-buster.’ It just didn’t make no good sense.


Instead of heading for the hills, this crazy cat with a baby face and a Corsica hatchback appeared hellbent on offering me a love that was safe, steady, patient, and forgiving—no strings attached. Furthermore, he didn’t seem the least bit concerned about the fact that I believed myself to be utterly undeserving of such devotion. So, when he made the decision to attend BGSU in the fall of 1997, I fully appreciated (and echoed) the confusion and concern expressed by members of his family re: the sudden attractiveness of a school that had never been on his radar. I agreed with them. This was risky business—all for a girl like me. Drew, though, was resolute in his decision and unbothered by the backlash.


Having assessed the dynamics of my enmeshed family sitch, he had used his big brain to infer that I was in it DEEP—and consequently would never travel far from home when my turn came to choose a college the following fall. He decided that positioning himself twenty-five miles to the east of West Barnes was his best bet to keep a good thang going. He was right, obvi—the next county over was about as far as this chick was ever going to stray from her home and responsibilities.


Faithfully, he was there in the fall of 1998, grinning like the cat that got the cream as he helped me move into the fourth floor of Kreisher Darrow. And he was there a year later when my mom’s brain tumor, no longer content to just chill in a dormant state, became large and angry—refusing to be ignored. He was most definitely there in the dark, heavy, scary, and sad days, months, and years that followed as her body, mind, and spirit were decimated. Heck, he was there afterward, as I forfeited another decade of my precious life searching for my worth outside of myself—giving the best parts of my energy and light to those who made me work for it. He’s always been there.


Today, on our nineteenth wedding anniversary—and at the two-year mark of my healing journey, I am here to tell you, on everything, the only thing sweeter and more perfect than being loved and supported by Drew Miller for nearly a quarter of a century, is to FINALLY know deep in my bones that I deserve it all.

My mom’s brain tumor reared its ugly head when I was in the fourth grade at C.D. Brillhart. Near the end of an otherwise uneventful school day, Mr. Grieser summoned me to his desk and handed me a small piece of paper. Even as I write this, I can vividly picture the school secretary Mrs. Steele’s beautiful looping penmanship on the note that simply read: “Grandma Kate will pick you up from school.” 

My stomach dropped instantly. Seppie and I never got picked up from school. In fact, by this age, I had been entrusted to lead a small gaggle of West Barnes misfits to and from school each day. What were they going to do? How were they going to get home? This couldn’t be good.

And it wasn’t. 

Grandma Kate was very tight-lipped as she held the steering wheel at ten and two and headed east on Co. Rd. P. I pressed for details, but she only gave up that Mom had suffered a seizure at home and was currently in the Toledo Hospital. Having not the slightest inkling what a ‘seizure’ was, I fished for reassurance that she was going to be okay. Grandma answered honestly that she really didn’t know but sure hoped so. Her tone indicated that the q and a sesh had ended for the afternoon. 

I remember the pit in my stomach as I sat in Peewee’s for dinner a couple of hours later. I barely touched my hotdog basket and lemon-lime slush, as all I could think about was Dad coming to pick us up. Then, I would finally get the real-deal scoop as to what was going on with Mom. 

By the time Dad arrived at Grandma Kate’s to take us home, Seppie and I had dozed off in front of the television. I can remember sleepily deposing him on the way home in the car. He was skimpy on the deets (like mother, like son) but promised us that he would take us to see her the next day. 

It took me until the ripe old age of forty-one to realize that my childhood and sense of self ended that day. As a ten-year-old, I made it my mission to keep my mom happy and alive. I knew I could do it too. I’d be the most selfless helper ever—an empathetic anticipator of any and all needs. And I wouldn’t fulfill this role just for her but for everyone I came across. I would gladly bear the sadness of her tumultuous childhood, as well as the unjustness of her illness, while simultaneously assigning myself the impossible duty of righting both of those wrongs. I learned to navigate the fear that permeated every aspect of my life by people-pleasing, over-extending, and over-achieving—suffocating and abandoning myself in exchange for safety.

This year, as I trepidatiously approached the holiday season and her birthday (falling just five days before Christmas, it had come to epitomize all the grief, disappointment, anger, and resentment of our collective lives; a trauma-filled thunderhead, if you will), I asked my counselor if she thought that maybe, just maybe, it was possible for me to navigate the holidays without being swallowed whole by grief. I told her that I had been thinking a lot about the emotional baggage I’ve carried for those I love over the years (still tryna stay safe, yo!) and how I didn’t think that was my job anymore. I told her I wanted to be a conduit of love, and love didn’t seem to have much elbow room during the holidays.

What if I didn’t have to resent my mom’s parents for the crummy childhood she had? What if I gave everyone I directly held responsible for the unjustness of her life and death the benefit of the doubt? What if they had all REALLY loved her as much as me…and what if they all really had done the best they could?

It felt like blasphemy at first, not gonna lie. Then, I got really good at it. The weight lifted off these arthritic shoulders was immediate and has been immeasurable. 

What about the ten-year-old that has been living in fear for the past thirty years? Was there any rectifying that sitch? Or was she too far gone?

My counselor encouraged me to extend the same love, understanding, and gentleness to myself. She advised me to connect with the version of me that had felt the most suffocated and defeated.

That was easy—I even had a picture of her for posterity.

That’s me holding an overheated, exhausted six-month-old Xav in the sunroom of Northcrest on my mom’s last birthday. In a feat of emotional and physical strength, that bone-tired chick had somehow managed to pull off a celebration complete with crab legs and gifts—all the while working full time and raising a baby without the help or guidance of her own mom.

Do you know how much it sucks to shop for nursing-home-friendly birthday gifts for your mom? It’s extra crappy when you know in your heart that she’ll likely never live long enough to use them, and you’ll end up tossing them in a pink plastic tub along with her non-skid slipper socks when she’s gone. It’s brutal and soul-crushing.

I could barely look at the version of me captured in the photo because the pain was still too raw—how could I ever hope to help her or give her what she desperately needed but never received? This seemed like a pretty steep hill—even for this climber.

I gave it a go. I began to hold that exhausted twenty-eight-year-old in my heart like she’s holding that overtired baby. I asked her what she needed, and together we worked to find my voice. Boundaries were erected and enforced for the first time in my life. People-pleasing ceased, as did the desire of being liked by others. I’m no longer a freelance Sherpa eager to lighten everyone’s load. Now, I only schlep what is mine to carry. Codependency and enmeshment pitfalls no longer entice me with their promises of safety. 

The best gift and best celebration of her life is me showing up bravely every day and standing in my truth.