Trauma, Anger, Sadness, and Oh! Happy Mother’s Day!

Ah…..Happy Mother’s Day dear tribe. If you have followed me through the years, you know that Mother’s Day is somewhat problematic for me.

In fact I kinda hate it.

But I am happy to report that (so far) this Mother’s Day has been with love, laughter and sans tears.

For me.

But I think my whole tribe of Mama’s might be somewhat distraught by the goings-on of this last week. Roe v. Wade is a tinder box of emotions and the implications of what could happen in the next month are far reaching and catastrophic for women.

I do not say that lightly.

I have buried two very wanted, very loved babies. I gave birth to a full term stillborn son. I understand that life is really, truly is a miracle; a lovely, messy complex miracle.

After Samantha’s second Flight for Life trip to Children’s, I got an IUD. The thought of having another baby was absolutely terrifying to me.

“But you would be a great mom,” friends and family said.

Heeeeeellllll yeah! I would rock Motherhood. But if you carry an asshole genetic condition like we do, the chances of having another Little like Jack and Samantha is 25%.

1 in 4.

“Those are good odds in Vegas.”

Seriously, someone said that to me. 1 and 4…..after losing two kids, you should go for another because 1 and 4 odds are good in Vegas. I asked said person if they would get on a plane that had a 1 and 4 chance of crashing.

“Maybe not.”

But it wasn’t just the odds of having another medically complex child. It was me. I was a mess. I was traumatized, I was sad, I was angry, and I knew, I knew, I was not in a good place to have another child, or adopt, or foster, or focus on anything else other than healing my traumatized brain.

Trauma makes us do crazy things.

A couple weeks ago, the world watched Will Smith smack Chris Rock. We analyzed, we cancel cultured, we talked, we said “Will has anger issues.”

I made a note of this when I marched into my therapists office a couple weeks ago. “Was that Anger, or was that Violence? I get angry about things in my life but I don’t hit people.”

My lovely therapist pulled out the Anger doll from the movie Inside Out:

“Look at him!” I said, “Nothing about him says healthy Anger! Anger is a red, enflamed man in a tie. THIS is why we hit people, because a movie about all of our emotions says Anger is really bad, out of control, Anger is chaos.

This clearly is not a healthy representation of Anger.

For fun, she pulled out the Sadness Doll from the movie…..

Hmmmmm……I see gender stereotypes here. Poor Sadness, a young woman in her wooly sweater, round glasses and bob haircut. It is easier to console Sadness than confront Anger.

No wonder we fear getting ANGRY about what is going on. No wonder we choose to be quiet and frowny. A recent movie about our emotions says this is what we should be.

I may have given my therapist a complex about the Inside Out Dolls.

What is my point? Lordy, I am all over the place here. My point (and I do have one), is that it is easier to shame, to quick fix (you lost a baby, get another one), to try and solve, to vilify Anger and to succumb to Sadness.

And Trauma? That crazy outlier, just ignore it until it jumps up on stage and smacks you, shame it and then call it Anger.

We can be Angry my friends. We can tell our daughters, our nieces, our friends, our Granddaughters, that Anger is appropriate, healthy and necessary at this time.

Anger is not a man in tie.

Anger is Woman being told how she will live her life.

Oh and yeah, Happy Mother’s Day. I love you tribe. I love you fiercely.