Best Kept Secret

In my world, people can be broken down into two main groups: those who are content with who they are and what they have accomplished, and those who feel as if they should be more, do more, accomplish more. I have always fallen into the second group. I don’t say this lightly. My earliest memories are tinged with guilt. I won’t go as far as to say shame, but if I were to examine myself more closely than I am currently comfortable with, I assume that I would come to embrace shame as well.

Why is it easier to say guilt over shame? I don’t know, offhand. I know that I hate the word. I know that for me, it bears more negative connotation than guilt. Shame feels stronger, in my mind. It says that I actually have done something wrong, which my rational brain decries, even if my emotional brain professes it. I can’t even begin to estimate how others may perceive this.

Granted, you could break these two large groups into much smaller subgroups, and while I can think of a half-dozen smaller subgroups right off (like those who are content, but do not know it; those who are guided by their guilt and do not realize it), my bet is that if we all put our heads together on this issue for ten minutes, we could have as many subgroups as there are people in this nation.

Arguing semantics over which word should be used, or if the subgroups outweigh the main groups—these things are nothing more than a feeble excuse to not look at the larger problem. They are distractions. It doesn’t matter how we order it, how we label it, or even the ways we try to make sense of it. It only comes down to those who are content, or well on their way to being content, and those who are not content, and are guilt-ridden.

My earliest memories are of doing things wrong, of being scared of doing things wrong, of being caught doing things that are wrong. When I was little, it was sneaking into the kitchen while my parents were asleep to eat snack cakes (yes, I even had insomnia as a child). When I was a bit older, I felt guilt for being scared of the lurking, intangible evil presence I felt outside my window. When I was older still, I felt guilt over not being the right kind of friend, the right kind of nice girl, the right kind of daughter, or even being what I would consider to be right with God. As an adult, I’m still not content, not good enough. I never work hard enough, have my house clean enough, interact with my children enough, or support my husband enough. I should have done so many things that it would be impractical to try to rattle off examples to you now.

I seem to only see the bad within me. I am constantly vigilant of the fact that I do not measure up, and I continuously compare myself—not only to others who I assume are content and successful, but to an unhealthy, and completely unrealizable schema of who I should be. It doesn’t matter that my children are healthy, fed, and relatively polite. It doesn’t matter that my work awarded me the highest staff award possible in our department. It doesn’t matter that my marriage is solid. I should have always tried harder. I only can see the failings.

I could list off several reasons as to how and why I got to this place, but it doesn’t really matter. No matter the road I took to reach this place, here I am, and the route back is blocked. I can only continue going forward. The question is where forward will take me.

These are the things I muse over, after having finished Amy Hatvany’s new novel in less than two days. Given that these are things I try my damnedest to not deal with on a daily basis (and I will admit it here, for the first time ever, that I actually think self-deprecating thoughts every single day), I am impressed that 1) I actually made it through her book without throwing it down in disgust, and 2) that it resonated with me. Her story is of a mother who is trying to regain custody of her child while dealing with her alcoholism. While I’m not an alcoholic, I do see many similarities in the guilt, in the shame, in the grief of wanting to be more, to be better, to be content in the roles which one has been assigned, and always seeming to fail.

Alcoholism. I can see where that had been, at one point in time, I suppose, an option for me. I could have fallen down that rabbit hole. I have enough feelings of inadequacy. I don’t exactly know why it didn’t happen, just that it didn’t.

My best kept secret, as the book is so aptly titled, is my guilt. In the novel, it fueled her addiction. In my life, it fuels my insecurities and anxiety, my feelings of inadequacy, my unrealistic strivings for perfection, and my subsequent drawing back from the world. But—and although not grammatically correct, this is a big but—I have a weapon against all of this. I have words, and I have a blog, and I have a voice. Laying bare these feelings relieves the burden that they place on me. If you have experienced similar feelings, I can only hope that reading these words will ease the burden that is placed on you.