This is an exercise I did with a psychotherapist;
Dear Baby Duck,
Do you remember
that trip to the Coromandel in the summer of ’78? Not quite a Bruce Springsteen soundtrack but
certainly memorable! There are some things I’d like to tell you about that
time, looking back as an adult.
It all started
because your Mum and oldest sister were going to the UK. You and your brother and sister were farmed
out to families as Dad was deemed too busy with work to cope and it was summer
time so no school. You were sent to the
Gilmores, a family we had known for a short time through your Dads work. Natalie was a similar age to you. You should
have been happy with the family you got but I know you really wanted to go to
the Browns. They were a family we had
spent a lot of time with growing up.
They were, in a way, our ‘best’ family. You would feel relaxed around
them and they had a swimming pool. But
your sister and brother already ‘assigned’ to them so to the Coromandel you
went.
The Gilmores
had posh brekkie cereals and a boat.
There were less kids, less chaos and lots of Americanised foods (they
spent some time there). You were in for
a treat!
You’ve always
been anxious about travelling haven’t you?
Having seen your brother and sister carsick on many occasion you then
developed a deep-seated fear of travelling for this reason. I remember you would stick your head out the
window of the car as it travelled, like a dog getting air. Your long, golden tresses would be a bird’s
nest by the time you arrived but it didn’t matter. No uh! You could deal with messy hair as long
as you were not sick. I wish I could
have told you not to worry so much. That
you’ll be alright, it’s not the end of the world. That in fact worrying about it was worse than
the actuality. But then you were only
young and couldn’t see the bigger picture.
Instead you focussed all your energy on being OK, much like I do
now. You would go very quiet and inward.
I wish you could have shared your fears with someone as putting them in the
light makes them less scary. So the trip
up in the car was your first obstacle.
It was made more difficult by being with another family. But you survived, you always did. I wish you could have been reassured so that
you could have enjoyed not endured the journey.
You spent happy
days swimming and playing on the beach. Your hair would go white in the sun and
your freckles would almost join there were so many. Your tent was only a stone’s throw from the
sand. The main tent had the parents and
living area. You and Natalie were in a
wee tent on your own. I know you were
scared of the dark. You have been for as
long as I can remember. You would have
bad dreams, call out and sometimes sleepwalk. You were worried about sleeping
in a tent weren’t you? But you thought
you shouldn’t be because Natalie was OK with it.
Maybe she would protect you both from the ‘bogyman’? I feel very sad
that you felt so scared and alone. I
wish I could have held your hand and stroked your head til you fell
asleep. I wish you’d told someone how
scared you were. Do you remember the
night you went sleepwalking along the beach?
When you came to you were standing on the beach with a sea of tents in
front of you. But where was yours? It was so dark with only the faint light of
the moon. You couldn’t tell tent from
tent, you didn’t know how far along the beach you were. Your heart rate quickened, you held back the
tears and your throat went dry with pure fear.
You panicked and looked around desperately for your wee tent. Lost, alone in the dark was so, so
scary. You would have given anything to
be back in your tent. And so the
bargaining in your head began again. ‘I will be -insert (be good/go to
church/do my maths etc) if only I could be back in my tent. You walked further from your tent unwittingly
tripping over guy ropes and stopping to find the wee blue tent. The tears came, fell silently down your freckled
checks, providing no comfort at all.
You’ve never felt so alone in your life.
Desperation is kicking in now and you want more than anything to be back
in that tent. With no torch and no sense
of direction you stumble from tent to tent hoping to find a blue beacon. You give up temporarily and go onto the sand
and lie down. The roar of the black sea
frightens you to your feet. You try and
look from the beach to the camp strip to see where you are but you can make no
sense of it in this dim moonlight. Sheer
terror fills your whole body and somehow ‘survival’ mode kicks in. You keep checking tents, getting up close
only to find it is the wrong one.
Pushing on through hopelessness you keep going until you come across the
‘parent’ tent. You’re not sure but you
go inside and see remnants of tomato sandwiches you had that day for lunch in
the ‘living’ area. (Tomato in sandwiches was another thing you didn’t like but
you swallowed them down anyway). Still
to this day raw tomato in a sarnie reminds you of that time doesn’t it? It elicits such a strong visual. Having confirmed you’re in the ‘parent’ tent you
then navigate on hands and knees round the outside of the big tent until you
come, at last, to the wee blue tent.
From the side canvas you feel your way round to the front, trembling you
reach for the zip. You unzip just enough
to crawl in and fall back on your sleeping bag.
You are aware of how heavy you are breathing. You are still scared even though you are back
in the blue cocoon. You remain on edge
for the rest of the night having fitful sleep and feeling terrified until day
breaks. I wish I could have shone a
light for you or reassured your small heart that you’d be OK, you were always
OK in the end. I wish you could have
found comfort in the tent instead of more fear.
Most of all I wish you had told someone what happened and how you
felt. It may have made you feel
better. You were only so very young and
deserved to be comforted and reassured.
You shouldn’t have had so much worry at such a young age.
I want to take
you in my adult arms and hold you, stroke and kiss your head and tell you
everything will be OK. You will be OK.
Love Mama Duck
xxx
#anxiety #fear #summerholiday
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