I can see them in my  mind’s eye – the glint of silver, light flashing off their smooth lines, deadly barbs curving innocently back on themselves. They’ve been in me so long, I barely notice their presence. But I know that something is not right. There is a dull ache in a certain spot, a sharp pain when I twist the wrong way. A fleeting thought sends me hurtling into despair.

Fish hooks.

They have found homes in different places in my body. Thoughts make themselves comfy in my stomach. I am not good enough. I do not deserve to be happy, loved, successful, healthy. Shameful memories in my low back, my spleen, or that spot under my shoulder blade. The time I was 5 and flashed my underwear to the school as I gave my friend a piggyback ride; 13 and bled through my pad and my pants at school; 22 and realized my roommates hated me because I got a puppy/had a friend stay/got a boyfriend. Years of feeling slapped by a relationship lie just under my breastbone. Invisible, unimportant, and disposable are hanging out drinking whisky under my left arm.

I am learning these thoughts and feelings are not true. They are habits. I am hooked. Like a lifelong smoker and her cigarettes, they are so much a part of me that I believe them to be me. I am beginning to take them out, look at them in the light, and allow them to transform.

I still have to contend with the fish hooks.

Ben’s death ripped a few out like a chainsaw ripping a band aid from a hairy arm. Removing the rest is turning out to be a slower process. I grab hold, spinning the hook, watching the barbs catch my flesh. I wonder if I have the strength to keep pulling. I wiggle gently. I yank, screaming like a Ninja warrior, ready to staunch the bleeding. I give up and let it slide back in. Not today.

Last night anger pulled a hook – or ten – into the light for me to look at. They’re still attached, oozing remnants of heartbreak, broken coffee mugs and smudged mascara. Today in yoga, as the cells of my body vibrated blissfully to the sound of the gong, my mind whispered sweet nasties in my ear.

I want them out.

I wonder if it’s possible to ignore them and continue growing, like the majestic oak we were married under, a long section of pipe running through its trunk 12 feet above ground. I wonder if they’ll dissolve like my surgical stitches if I smother them in compassion and love. I imagine how good it will feel when I shrug my shoulders and laugh at another slight instead of reeling backward, clutching my chest. I imagine the lightness when the flashing neon FAIL sign in my head no longer comes to life at the slightest provocation.

I wonder, as I hold the mirror up to last night’s damage, what life will feel like when I don’t have to remind myself to trust – it’s who I am, it’s what I do.

I’ve had a pain in my chest the last few days. I figured it was the coffee. I get scary heart palpitations from too much caffeine (too much being more than a cup a day). I saw a cardiologist years ago, who told me to cut back on coffee and stress because there was nothing wrong with my heart. I have been intermittently successful at both. Four or five days ago, I sat bolted to the couch, waiting for the terror to pass. I’ve learned to talk myself through these little dramatic episodes, but as I pressed my hand to my chest, breathing deeply and waiting for a return to thump-thump, thump-thump, I knew it was time to say good bye to coffee again.

My chest hasn’t felt quite right since but I had a feeling it wasn’t about my heart. Not the physical one anyway. The tears haven’t come as frequently – or as easily – lately. The emotional hits have been piling up but my body seemed unwilling to release. I meditated. I did Reiki. I stretched my chest open and breathed. Nothing helped.

A friend called. One of my dearest, closest, soul-sister friends. She is a powerful, connected woman, an artist, a single mama with a difficult ex-husband and she was feeling the pain of another broken heart. As we spoke, she shed tears and I suddenly realized what I was hearing underneath her sadness. I think you need to get angry.

As a woman committed to spiritual growth, expressing anger can be seen as a failure. If we are adequately evolved – ahem – we should not need to feel angry. As little girls we are taught that anger is not pretty, not nice, and clearly not lovable. As women we hear talk of the crazy ex-girlfriends and ex-wives of the men we fall in love with. Some actually are unwell. Most just got angry.

I’ve been that woman. I’ve been hit sideways by rage after being lied to, disrespected, cheated on. Because I was unaccustomed to the feelings, because they were strong and I had no map for that terrain, I felt out of control, swallowed up. I took my anger out on others. My monkey mind blew it out of proportion and my ego took control. Then I grew. I read the books and talked the talk. It’s okay to be angry. It’s what we do with the anger that makes the difference. Anger is simply the sign that my boundaries have been crossed. Yes. Yes it is. It still doesn’t feel pretty, or nice, or lovable. I still don’t like it.

When Ben died, I didn’t get angry. I wasn’t mad at anyone – okay maybe secretly at myself. There wasn’t a lot of why me? and this isn’t fair. As I moved more deeply into grief though, I would get hit with moments of rage, triggered by something insignificant. My body shook and all I wanted to do was hurl dishes at a wall.

If anger doesn’t come out somehow, it lives on in our cells. It causes pain, suffering, even illness. If it comes out in a way that destroys others, it is even more dangerous.  An ego attached to its anger can be deadly. I asked my friend to find a way to rage – to let her anger burn in its purity, to turn it into a creative outlet, to leave her mind out of it and let her body release, release, release. As Richard Bach wrote in Illusions, one of the first books I read that echoed my own budding beliefs, we teach best what we most need to learn.

I called the magician yesterday because I wasn’t feeling any better. He waved his magic wand  – also known as intuitive muscle testing – and said, Ah. You’re angry at yourself. You’re angry at yourself because you’re doing better. You miss your grief.

?????

The mind is a trickster. I can’t fully grasp what’s happened, but here’s my best guess. Ben died. I wanted my grief to open me up, to be the impetus for me to grow into the woman I want to be – believe I can be. If the grief is less intense then several things must be true. First I’m losing my connection with my son. Second I’m going to mess up, return to old habits and feel like a failure again. Third, I won’t have anything to hang my story on. I’ll simply be me.

Ah. That’s almost as scary as being angry.

Last night the anger surfaced. Not fully. Not honestly. But enough for me to beat myself into a state of release. I’m not done. I know I will circle back to this again, digging deeper, letting go more completely. I am learning to trust the process and the support I have on the journey.

I am learning to trust.

Not surprisingly, my heart feels better today.

Steve has a lovely childhood friend that I’ve met a couple of times. She’s single, a teacher, with a huge heart, and she wanted to be a mom. After caring for her father  as he died, she began the process of becoming a foster parent. When asked what kind of child she wanted, she answered that when she closed her eyes, she saw a 7 year old girl. As the story goes, the case worker cried and told her she had a little girl for her to meet. Fast forward to the present and that little girl is a teenager. Steve’s friend adopted her, and then her younger brother. They are a beautiful family. The kids did not have easy childhoods and I know there have been challenges, but when I was recently reminded of this story, I cried.

There is a part of my soul that believes this is the direction we are to go. Not yet. And perhaps not ever. But when I close my eyes and picture my house five or ten years down the road, it is filled with the voices of children – children who have found a home.