The Suffocation of Compliance
I’m back in Forna, the little Spanish village in the mountains of Alicante, where I lived with my 3rd husband for five years. I’m here to get some stuff that I still haven’t picked up. There’s almost nothing left.
This was a marriage I entered for the wrong reasons, in my need for an excuse to NOT go to Sweden to take care of my aging mother, in exchange for money, of course. The cracks started showing pretty soon, but I was so cut off from my feelings, so numb, that nothing surfaced for a long time. The screaming despair underneath couldn’t crack the lid open, and I was doing everything I could to push it down and keep it down — eating, Netflix, social media.
My life was a sinking ship, and like the proverbial rats….I just wanted out.
The suffocating compliance I hid beneath for long periods of my life—and my inability to stand up for myself—all but crippled me emotionally and psychologically. I wasn’t able to finish projects, I only just managed to get myself through university, in my endless procrastination.
Looking back at this life of mine, examining it, it slowly dawned on me how extremely little importance I’d given the question of choosing an authentic path for myself, one that could make me feel like I had a sense of purpose. Instead, my life had been all about avoiding absorption by my mother and her expectations of me. Protecting my freedom at all costs was the number one priority…had been for as long as I can remember…and everything else was sacrificed on that altar.
But in my intimate relationships I was unable to maintain boundaries, to establish authority over my circumstances, and even to engage in the give and take of a healthy relationship.
I JUST COMPLIED. And as a result, my life’s trajectory provided an unnerving example of how self abandonment can play out.
But underneath, festering, was the anger, the rage. The rage at not being seen or taken seriously in any shape or form…not being seen as a person who deserved the minimal amount of dignity. Always coldly observed, scrutinized — and found lacking.
That anger could never show, wasn’t allowed to be even acknowledged. If it ever stuck its head up, the reward was shame and guilt. The only approved remedy, the only possible way to garner acceptance, was creeping under the wet blanket of compliance — and suffocate.
They say that grief and anger are siblings. I’m not sure how they are layered, and I think the jury might still be out on the subject, but I do know how they feel. I’ve lived with those feelings all my life…they seem to take turns. The anger, the rage at injustice…at betrayal. The kind of betrayal that means you have been and are being wronged by your own family…by the very people that should nurture you, giving you the strength you need to show up in the world. Instead they cripple you. It’s like being lost in a maze, on a foggy day.
The “doomsday” feeling originates here, where the core of the rage at injustice is being felt. Because if rage can’t be expressed, it means you’re not allowed to stand up for yourself…or to even try to change the outcome of what’s happening. This crippling injustice, and your learned compliance in the face of it, leaves you with that heavily sinking feeling in your stomach…it’s like lead.
Being brought up by a narcissistic parent, means the “gaslighting” mist is everywhere, distorting reality. There's a lot to be angry about, and little to put the finger on…while nothing can really be expressed.
The realization that this is not love, this isn’t nurturing, isn’t caring…it’s abuse, emotional and psychological abuse…opens the door to grief, to real and almost bottomless sadness.
Healing begins when you finally stop mistaking survival for love.
And so, as the grief takes hold, a clear-eyed companion follows in its wake: Reality.