Childhood Self versus Adult Self

This is an archived post that was originally published at beyond-terminal.com

It’s during college, when I’m trying to sever my childhood self from my adult self, that memories from my illness keep surfacing, again and again. I am angry that this is happening. Hasn’t my illness taken up enough of my life already? I want to forge a new path and form a new identity – I don’t want to be known as “the girl who was sick as a kid and almost died.” I don’t want to have anything to do with her. Nothing at all.

In college, I was too young and naïve to realize that, the harder I tried to pretend like that girl never existed, the more likely it was that unwanted memories popped up. Everywhere I looked there was some professor who reminded me of a doctor – or some object that triggered a traumatic memory.

I thought it was best to suppress, suppress, and then suppress some more, all in the interest of being emancipated from my past.

__________  

The excerpt below is from the chapter “Split Down the Middle.” This chapter starts up after winter break of my freshman year in college at Northwestern University.

When I return to campus after winter break, I meet Mandy in my freshmen writing seminar. Mandy and I are the same height at 5’9”. We both wear our hair similarly, in an easy bob, although her hair is a shade darker than mine, more of a sandy brown. Her face is heart-shaped and radiates warmth. She introduces me to her friends who, like her, are kind and quick to laugh. It’s because of her, and our now mutual friends, that I feel like I can continue to put my body to the test.

So it’s with this mentality that I decide to take General Chemistry at the University of Minnesota during the summer. Mandy and some of our mutual friends have already taken General Chem this past year as part of their pre-med track. I want to be like them. Further, after all the “taking care of” that I needed as a child, I figure it’s time that I start taking care of other people.

This is how I end up where I am right now, walking into my first Organic Chemistry lab class with my friend Luisa. The second we enter the room, we’re overtaken by a gross sweaty-socks smell. But what bothers me more than this is how dark and cavernous the room is. There are exposed pipes on the ceiling that I could touch if I were only a little bit taller. I’m actually left feeling like hospitals are one-up on laboratories like these. I can’t believe it, but I’d actually take white walls, white floors, and the smell of antiseptic over this any day of the week. And that’s saying a lot.

Luisa and I walk to our assigned spot and open our lab notebooks. The title of our lab today is “Synthesis of Acetylsalicylic Acid (Aspirin).”   

“Megan, why don’t you get the reagents?” Luisa says. Through some innate sense, Luisa knows that I’m better off acting as the courier, gathering all the necessary items and delivering them back to our table for her to assemble. I’m better off moving my body, keeping my momentum going.

I walk over to the long rectangular table to our left and weigh the powdery salicylic acid on a metal scale. Once I have the right amount, I transfer the powder to a tube with a shaky hand, worried that I’m not going to get all of it in and potentially impact our yield right away.

Just to the right of the scale are the small bottles containing acetic anhydride. I grab one of these as well and walk back to Luisa. As I do so, I can’t help but notice how the vial fits right in the palm of my hand, how it’s the same size as the ones Dr. Garcia had lining his walls. I swear the bottle is even the same amber color. I shake my head to dismiss all of this. I can’t keep letting my past interfere with my life. Not if I’m going to have any degree of success.

When I return, I see that Luisa has already heated up water on the hot plate. I watch as she takes the reagents from me and adds them to a flask, attaches tongs to the narrow end of this flask, and then submerges this glass container into the boiling water, all while chatting with me. 

I marvel at Luisa’s ability to multitask. Having to relearn pretty much everything means that things take more concerted energy for me than the average person. For instance, when I was learning how to drive, it was initially really distracting for me to have the radio on and other people in the car. That’s how much concentration new tasks require of me. Watching Luisa makes me realize how much work I still have cut out for myself. 

As Luisa and I continue with the lab, we record our measurements and comments in our lab books. I’m grateful that we’re required to transcribe the steps of the experiment into our notebooks ahead of time. True to my promise all those years ago, I do my best not to get caught in the same situation I was in in Mr. Dalson’s classroom, where someone is having to wait for me while I write.

What’s irritating to me is that, despite all this prep work, my body still doesn’t cooperate like I expect it to. Maybe it’s the latex gloves that make the sweat that much more noticeable. But my hands have started sweating so much that the latex has become like another layer of skin. I’m left feeling trapped. In this room. In this body.  

We’re waiting for the mixture to boil when I comment, “You’re good at this stuff.” I gesture to everything in front of us. 

Luisa shrugs her shoulders in response, like it’s no big deal.  

“No, you are.” I think the words that I don’t say out loud. Thank you, thank you for helping me through this.  

We do the next few steps and finally get to the point where we’re ready to recrystallize the aspirin. I grab the additional equipment, and Luisa places a clamp onto the flask and lowers it into the ice water.

“Let’s hope this works!” Luisa says.

We wait several minutes, and, sure enough, little crystals form. 

I wish I could walk away from the lab and leave it at that. But my thoughts travel with me wherever I go. I realize there’s no way I could have done this experiment by myself. It just would have been too overwhelming. All these thoughts spiral in my head making me wonder why I think this is the chosen path for me. It is, I counter. It is, because I need to recapture the person I would have been. If I just work harder and harder, I’ll be able to overcome these deficits and mend these broken parts. I will. I will.

__________  

I believe that we have to contend with the parts that we’d rather suppress in order not to have things show up tangentially in our lives.

Whether we like it or not, the universe has a way of teaching us the same lesson over and over again until we’re willing to listen. And if we never listen, we’ll be taught this same lesson, again and again, in a variety of ways into perpetuity.

A couple of months ago I asked one of my best friends how the telling of my story could potentially benefit others, especially when my illness was so unique. This friend commented that, while my illness was indeed unusual, it was not that much different from people who suffer from chronic illness. And keep in mind, she said, that chronic illness can take many forms, including alcoholism and drug addiction. Think how many people that encompasses, she added.

My friends who are recovering alcoholics have had to contend with their past and make peace with it. Those who are successful have been able to forgive both themselves and others, and also ask forgiveness of others. This is powerful.

I, too, had to learn to forgive my childhood self. I was so mad at her for not having had a more normal childhood, for not being able to experience the same things as my peers. I had to learn and appreciate that she was doing the best that she could in the face of daunting odds and ever-present fear.

I’m sure I have more lessons to learn, but one I’ve learned – and I encourage others to learn – is the importance of embracing both your childhood self and your adult self. In my opinion, it’s the most successful route toward leaning into your whole, authentic self.

*I will be taking off the next two weeks as I enjoy spring break with my family. Hope you’re able to enjoy this time with your family and friends, too.