Magicplum's Blog

Woman 82, begins self-harming….. Guilt, Regrets and Peace.

23 Jun 2010 10 Comments

by magicplum in Encounters That Stay With Me Tags: emotional distress, guilt, is it too late?, later years, mixed emotions, regret, self-harm

I’ve been volunteering for a local mental health trust for nine years.  On this day in the summer of 2007, I was helping out on a stall at a local community event.  Lots of organizations and charities had stalls, and there were entertainments.  Our stall had tables laid out with information about various aspects of mental health -leaflets, booklets, contacts for advice etc.  Volunteers were on hand to answer any questions members of the public might have.  Another role was to carry out short surveys about public perceptions of mental health.  I had a clipboard, a pen and a bundle of questionnaires and I was very nervous at the thought of having to walk around outside our tent and approach complete strangers to answer them. I walked around for a while, my mind going blank, thinking that I would have to apologize and bail out of the day, but then the thought of how embarrassed I would feel at doing that propelled me to just jump in and approach someone before I could change my mind.  I kind of approached the first few people from a place outside of myself, a temporary dissociation to cope with the anxiety, but then I began to feel more comfortable and started to enjoy it.  I can’t remember how many people I had interviewed before I met the woman.

She was pushing one of those shopping baskets that are on four wheels, doubling as a walking aid.  A blue faintly patterned nylon scarf covered her hair, knotted under her chin.  I stepped into her path smiling and greeted her with the introductory explanation I had been using and asked if she would mind spending five minutes answering some questions.  She didn’t mind, and seemed a little nervous but pleased to help.  After the survey was finished we chatted for a while and then she asked her suprising question.

“Have you got any information about self-harm?”

Maybe I should have ticked myself off for feeling suprised, after all- I was there asking questions about perceptions and stereotypes of mental health difficulties.  But I was thrown, I didn’t expect a woman of her age to ask about it.  I thought perhaps that she had a teenage grandson or grandaughter who was having difficulties.  I wasn’t exactly sure what to say to her, whether I should ask directly who the leaflets were for so that I could advise her of where they could go to for help.  Either a young persons or an adult service?  I suggested we go inside the tent so I could find some information for her.  I helped her through with her shopping basket and I began to look through some leaflets on a table. 

“I’ve been doing it for two months.”

I turned to face her.  She pushed the left sleeve of her grey raincoat a little way up and turned her arm over to show the underside.  From her wrist, five horizontal cuts made their way up her thin skin to where the cloth of her coat was bunched up.  They were scabbed over, about two or three days old.  She looked at me.  “I’m eighty-two.”  As if she had read my mind or seen my suprise.  I was suprised, and very struck.  That someone had got through their whole life and then in their late years had begun to self-harm.  I had never heard of anyone starting to do this so late in life.  I felt overwhelmed.  What to say to her?  What could I say?  Here on a public street, and afterwards she would be going on her way.  I was scared of saying something that would somehow make things feel worse for her and how she might deal with that afterwards.  She raised her head and looked directly at me.  Her eyes were full, tears were about to spill.  The pain there was so visible I felt myself choke up.  She said something but I couldn’t hear her, the tent was full of people and the chatter very loud.  I leant closer to listen but I still couldn’t hear.  I suggested we go back outside.  She pulled down her sleeve and followed me.

“I’m so sorry, but I couldn’t hear you very well in there.”  I said as we stood a few feet away from the tent.  “What was it you were saying?” 

“My daughter self-harmed for a long time.”  She looked around her. ”I don’t know why I’m doing it.”  

I was about to ask what kind of feelings lead her to self-harm but she spoke again.  “My daughter died this year.” 
I put my hand on her arm and told her that I was sorry.  And then she began to spill out the whole story.  She explained that her daughter had been difficult and had caused trouble for a long time - drinking heavily, self-harming and overdosing.  She had tried but she didn’t understand why she was always doing these things and it made her angry much of the time.  She thought her daughter was selfish and attention seeking and they argued a lot.  Earlier this same year her daughter had been suicidal and had said that she wanted to kill herself.  The woman described how she had had enough of all the trouble and suicidal threats and that she had shouted at her – “Oh just bloody well go ahead and kill yourself then.”  I realised that I’d been holding my breath and I suddenly felt sick.  Please don’t tell me she killed herself after you said that to her.  She was quiet for a moment and I asked “..and then what happened?”  She told me that her daughter had taken an overdose and that she had survived, but afterwards she refused to speak to her because of what she had said to her.  Then three months ago she had self-harmed very severely and the wound had become infected and she died of blood poisoning.  She had been in her late forties.

I can’t remember my exact words to her initially after she finished telling me this.  I remember standing there feeling stunned, and frozen – because my mind was so flooded with thoughts and emotions at what I had heard.  Completely conflicting emotions and thoughts, all racing so fast.  I didn’t consciously think them in this orderly linear way I will describe here.  It took some time to process.  This account is a mixture of conversation from that day and of the thoughts and feelings I had after she left that day and since then.  I felt I wanted to comfort her, yet I was also repelled by what she had said to her own daughter.  How could she have said that?  It could have been said in an angry moment and regretted, but it still felt so awful.  So awful for her daughter.  But here, now, this old woman was living with the guilt of saying that.  Did she play it over and over in her mind, clutching at a futile wish to have it taken back, changed, mended?  I felt like I badly wanted it undone for her so that she wouldn’t have to be feeling so much pain.  I also had niggles in my head –  if her daughter had been self-harming and overdosing and drinking – could it be that she didn’t have such a great time as a child?  Had this old woman treated her badly?  Every compassionate feeling in me towards this woman was clashing against a question, an accusation, a blaming – and a hurt anger and defensiveness on the part of her dead daughter.  Yet despite the suspicions, I felt it wasn’t my place to judge her as she stood here now, what use would that be?

She asked me what I thought about what she had told me.  I didn’t tell her that I felt conflicted, hurt and angry.  She didn’t need that.  I told her the other part of how I felt, which was true also.  That what had happened was tragic and very very sad, and that no wonder she was in so much pain.  That her self-harming could be a symptom of all that pain and an outlet also.  It struck me that maybe her self harming was a self-inflicted punishment for what she had said to her daughter.  And perhaps she could be doing it as a way of trying to identify with how her daughter had felt.  Trying to understand her now, something she had failed at whilst she was living.  An attempt at understanding and some kind of closeness even though it was now so sadly after her death, too late.  But I didn’t voice these ideas, they were my own speculations and I was hardly qualified to stand there and analyse her.  Her story was much more than she had told me, her whole life time and the lifetime of her daughter weaved together, I had barely seen the surface. 

She told me that she wanted to get some help and asked my advice.  I suggested that she either go to her G.P and ask to be referred to a counsellor or to go to the local mental health assessment team and arrange an appointment to be seen.  I gave her their address and telephone number.  She thanked me and then she asked “Do you think it’s too late for me to get help?”
I told her absolutely not, that I didn’t think it was too late.  That it was worth going to see someone, that she really needed someone to talk to.  Tears began to fall onto her cheeks and she told me that she wanted to find peace.  She asked me if I thought it was too late for her to find peace?  At this point it all felt too much, the question felt so painful.  I felt like I was going to start crying too.  I told her emphatically that I didn’t think it was too late, that she should try, that it was worth trying to get help.  It was worth trying to come to terms with all of this, worth seeking peace.  Her tears started falling faster.  I didn’t know what else to say, there was nothing more I could say.  I put my arms around her and hugged her.  She clutched at me and I could feel her sobbing, silently…

I wanted to believe that she could find peace.  I try to hold on to hope, but as I stood there I couldn’t imagine myself finding peace with something like this.  Could I ever feel anything other than guilt and turmoil and regret if I had treated a daughter in that way, had said such a thing to her?  If that daughter had not been speaking to me when she died, could I ever get over that?  Could I ever forgive myself for the past?  And where this old woman was concerned – there may be people who feel that she should rightly feel bad to the end of her days for how she treated her daughter.  Does she deserve to find peace if she did something like that?  Those are questions that everyone will have a different opinion on.  Her daughter didn’t deserve to be treated that way by her own mother.  Yet her own mother by her very actions demonstrated that she didn’t know how to handle her daughter’s emotions, her daughter’s pain.  And very often when people can’t handle the pain of another it’s because their own wasn’t handled well and understood in their own childhood, wasn’t responded to compassionately.  It goes on and on, cycles of hurt.  Who’s fault is it?  Who is the monster? Is there a monster?  Who is the one to decide who is and isn’t entitled to peace? 

I hope that she somehow found it, or got as close to it as she could.  It’s possible she’s still alive, she would be eighty-five now.  It’s possible also that she has died.  I hope that she managed to get some help.  I hope that she wasn’t seen just as a depressed old lady and prescribed anti-depressants – although I wince at the thought that this is quite likely.  It is hard enough for people who are younger to get the right kind of help, but the elderly are left even further behind.  Maybe it’s seen that their problems aren’t quite so pressing -as they will be dying relatively soon anyway?  That sounds cruel and I wish it wasn’t so.  To me, I feel that makes it all the more pressing, they have less time, it is all the more urgent that they get help. 

 The idea of a person not being at peace with themselves at the time of their death - This is something that haunts and disturbs me more than imagining any grim physical death that someone might have the misfortune to suffer.  It is not from any religious belief, I don’t believe in heaven and hell, but I simply feel it is a tragedy in itself for someone to die in that state of mind.  Somebody dying in a state of turmoil and regret and guilt.  Or full of anger, bitterness or hated.  Feeling unloved, or even worse feeling self-hatred.  I want for people to be at peace with themselves and others when they die.  Of course that’s highly idealistic, and probably quite childish of me.  This doesn’t always happen – people die suddenly, unexpectedly, young.  And we are all busy living our lives, not constantly preparing for death - putting our practical and emotional houses in order.  We don’t get around to making up with so and so, we don’t want to admit that we were wrong about something and apologize.  We don’t want to risk rocking the boat by standing up for ourselves and telling somebody else that they have treated us unkindly, or even abusively.  We are afraid they will deny it, maybe mock us.  People die feeling they were never true to themselves.  We have regrets for things we wanted to say to someone but didn’t.  This is how life sometimes is, but an inner peace is still something I want for people.  Perhaps this theme haunts me so much because a very significant person in my life died with their mind in a terribly anguished and lonely state and I know that cannot be changed no matter how hard I wish. 

I guess I’m scared for myself too.  Regarding conflicts with certain people in my life - I’ve come to a place where I honestly feel that I’ve done all I can, and tried my best, and I have left doors open.  But there is the future – what if I make more mistakes, have other difficult situations with people I know now or with people I haven’t even met yet and don’t get to resolve them?  I have my own regrets, things I wish I had not done, that may still have an impact in future, on myself and others.  I want also for myself to die with no bad feelings and to have not caused anyone else any intentional hurts.  I hope that it’s not an impossibility. 

…We stood like that for a few minutes, her holding onto me, as passers-by glanced at us curiously.  My supervisor saw us and she mouthed ‘Are you alright?’  I nodded yes.  The woman’s sobs slowed and stopped.  I stepped back.  She wiped her face and gathered herself together.  I told her that I wished her the best, that I really hoped she would find someone to talk to, and that I hoped she could find the peace she wanted.  I felt an enormous impulse to arrange to meet her another time – for a cup of tea somewhere.  I felt so bad that she was going off alone, and I would never know what happened to her.  But I think I was right to resist that impulse.  Maybe sometimes impulses like that are more selfish than altruistic.  You have to consider that as much as you feel you want to help, to do something, you may not be the right person to do it.  You have to be careful – are there things in this persons story that touch a nerve in you, stirring up incidents in your own past, triggering emotions that aren’t resolved quite as you would like?  Do we sometimes try to ‘solve’ someone elses pain as a way to alleviate our own?  Can your own story and ‘mess’ get tangled up with theirs, and if you are unable to separate the two could it end up being unhelpful or even harmful to you both?  I knew at that point in my life I wasn’t equipped to take that on as much as I felt I wanted to.  Perhaps now, but not then.  I said goodbye and she replied “Goodbye dear.”  She walked away holding onto her shopping basket, pushing it ahead of her. 

May you find peace, may you rest in peace.