The Healing Balm of Forgiveness

(Last of the Breast Cancer as Messenger Series)

Once I accepted my breast cancer “event” as a messenger from my own psyche, it began to speak to me in signs, signals, people and books—all repeating the same message: it is time to forgive. I spent more than a year in psychotherapy first identifying my rage and then learning how to let it go; how to forgive my mother. I determined to make a clean sweep of the anger and unforgiveness still lingering within my heart before these emotions once again manifested in my body as disease—most likely as a cancer in the left breast.

This Great Mystery we call the Divine does indeed work in very mysterious ways. And so it was that no sooner had I “withdrawn” from chemotherapy—after only the fifth treatment—and was poised to return to my old life—my mother’s Alzheimer’s disease became so severe, she could no longer handle her own affairs. I now found myself in charge of both my mother and the money for which she had sacrificed our relationship. “The Divine” certainly had one grand sense of humor.

I took on my new responsibilities with renewed anger and resentment. Apparently I hadn’t forgiven a thing. I raged at this “God/dess” to whom I’d been praying for guidance in how to serve. Was this some kind of sick cosmic humor? I now had to serve the woman who had thrown me away for money? Ultimately, however, like it or not, I had to accept that this, indeed, was my reality. I could fight it—or I could submit to what I was powerless to change. The choice was mine. So instead of once again making myself ill with futile resistance, I decided to be the kind of mother to this woman (now frail and childlike), that I would have wanted as my own mother. Life was definitely challenging me to put my money where my spiritual mouth was; to “walk the talk.”

From 2009 to the summer of 2012, when I finally had to place my mother in a nursing home, I worked diligently and conscientiously on changing my attitude. The anger and resentment slowly dissipated, eventually evolving into a sense of simple, uncomplicated caring for another human being. I gained a sense of inner peace and acceptance of my life as it was. I began to sense a relationship with my mother that felt as if it extended beyond this lifetime. As if she and I were working out some ancient conflict. I made a conscious decision at that point to do whatever I was called upon to do in order to free us both from ancient ties that bound us together in this dance of anger.

I remember that last visit to the nursing home the winter of 2014—exactly four days before my mother quietly slipped from her body. I patted her shoulder gently as I left her; something I had never done.  I somehow intuited that this was the last time we would see each other. There were no gushing confessions of love exchanged between us. She turned at my touch and looked up into my eyes. I saw my own peace reflected in my mother’s eyes. Her deer caught in the headlights stare was gone; in its place, for the first time in our lives together, I saw pure, unadulterated peace. She smiled up at me. I smiled down at her, gave her shoulder another gentle pat and said jokingly, “You be good now. Don’t go getting into any trouble.” “Oh, Toni, she answered with a chuckle, “What kind of trouble can I get into in this place?” And that was our last exchange—as close to being a loving one as either of us could achieve.

Funny, it took my mother’s complete departure from this realm for us to finally become friends. I speak to her almost daily now and although I cannot hear her responses with my human ears, something happens in my heart. First it grows still and then it is filled with a flood of emotion that pours down my cheeks in an avalanche of tears. I sense that we are now O.K. with each other. She’s joined my Team of Ancestors who are “on the other side” cheering for me and ours.

So, to you, my mother and the rest of our clan which art in “Heaven,” I say, thank you. I am now wide awake, listening intently within and following your wise guidance in all that I think, say and do.

Rest in peace, my mother. Rest in peace. All is forgiven. We are finally free.

Do watch for next week’s Blog!  In the meantime…allow…let…permit your life to flow in, as and through you...from the inside out…