Tracy Rundstrom

Tracing Life Lines and Mending Heart Strings

The sounds of the kitchen wake me up.

Water running. Dishes being put away.

Or maybe a knife being pulled out.

I tense up, terrified she is following through with the violent threats she made earlier about hurting herself while she pantomimed with a knife, screaming about how much she hated herself.

Please don’t die, Mommy, I whispered to myself, pulling the pink blanket up higher around my neck. I shivered, desperately wanting to climb down the stairs and check on my mom, but I worried that might make her even angrier. I willed myself to fall asleep. I squeezed my eyes shut, but the image popped into my head, again: a cube growing and retracting, a tumbling kaleidoscope of shapes and colors spinning out of control. It scared me, made me feel like I was the one tumbling, plummeting into an abyss, alone and unheard.

Make it stop make it stop make it stop make it stop make it stop.

Tears pricked at the back of my eyes. Mommy, please come up and check on me so I know you’re okay. Please give me a hug and tuck me in again.

I laid there terrified and alone, desperate for daylight and the start of first grade.

 

I jolt awake to the sound of dishes clattering in the kitchen.

Mom? I thought groggily.

Somehow through my exhaustion, I knew that didn’t make sense.

It was my 14-year-old son.

Getting a knife?

He screamed at me earlier that he hated his life, that he felt worthless, and that he just wanted to be gone.

Was this it? Was he done?

For months, Jackson had been drowning in a sea of depression, chronically pulled under by social anxiety, self-loathing, and dark thoughts. Recently I’d been finding empty Pringle’s canisters and Chips Ahoy trays shoved down in the trash, droplets of chocolate syrup on the countertop and a literal trail of bread crumbs pointing to the truth I’d been avoiding: he’s binge eating late at night.

I poured all of my love into him. I reminded him of all of his good qualities—his intelligence, his humor, his curiosity, his kindness.

I taught him self-regulation skills, breathing exercises, and visualization activities.

I made him charts listing goals and progress markers, baby steps he could take for physical, emotional, and mental well-being.

Nothing helped.

“Why am I like this, mom?” He would whimper. “Why do I have to suffer?”

He’d sob, curl his big, 6-foot frame into a little ball, and plead with me to let him die.

I’m at a loss of what to say. As always. I don’t know how to make it better.

 

“He’s just manipulating you,” my ex-husband says to me the next day when I call him. “He’s like any 14-year-old boy who hates school. He knows what to say to trigger you so he doesn’t have to go.”

“You didn’t see him! He’s really depressed! He’s miserable. I don’t know what to do.”

“Let me talk to him.”

I walk into his bedroom, taken aback by the stacks of dirty glasses piled in the corner, sheets twisted on the bed, clothes piled on the bean bag. I put his dad on speaker phone.

“Jackson!” He shouts gruffly. “Get up! You’re making your mom upset and she can’t handle it.”

I switch the phone off speaker mode and storm back to my room. “Don’t tell him I can’t handle it! You make me sound like a victim.”

“Well, you are a victim in your mind.”

 

The words tear through my heart, a jagged weapon shredding the softness.

 

“Stop being so sensitive.” The refrain of my life. My mom, my ex-husband, strangers, friends, bosses, reviewers, critics.

“I know!” I screamed back at my ex-husband once, in response to the phrase. “Just tell me HOW! Tell me how to stop being so sensitive! Tell me how to cut it out! I want this sensitivity out! I fucking haaaaate it! Just tell me how to CUT. IT. OUT!” I screech. “Why am I like this?!”

He walked out of our bedroom without a word. Once the “pursuer,” according to our marriage counselor, when he ‘d corner me and verbally outmatch me while I froze, muted, now he seemed to have finally given up trying, which made me angrier. We didn’t burn down our marriage, we simply let it die.

 

Cristal, my therapist, reminds me that anger scares me, understandably, because as a little girl it made me unsafe.

“It triggered your flight or fight response. But you’re not that little girl anymore,” she says. “You have to learn how to separate anger that puts you in danger from anger that is just uncomfortable. You are safe.”

Unless he hurts you,” my boyfriend says later. “Jackson is a full head taller than you, one hundred pounds heavier than you. I’m worried about you.”

“About me?” I ask in wonder. I thought we were talking about Jackson, and how to calm him down.

He pulls me into his arms. “Yes, about you!”

I wrestle with this new idea, that someone is worried about me. Although I’m barely divorced, we’ve already been dating for several months, and despite the voice in my head saying it was too fast, I feel so secure. I wonder if this means that I don’t have to be competent or perfect to be loved.

“I love your heart,” my boyfriend tells me, again and again. “You are so kind. You have such warmth and positivity about you. You are just such a good person. I can’t imagine a better mom for Jackson.”

I feel built up and broken down at the same time. Even if I’m the best that Jackson could have, I’m still not good enough.

 

The text wakes me up at 2 am. Like nearly every night, for months, Jackson texts me when he gets panicky or worried.

“Would you miss me if I was gone?” the message reads.

Exhaustion clouds my brain and I fight to wake up. I’m a terrible mom, I think to myself, for wanting to go back to sleep.

I plod into his room, worried, exhausted, annoyed.

“Jackson, what’s wrong?”

“I’m just so nervous about tomorrow. I don’t know what to do.”

“What exactly is making you nervous?”

“I don’t know. Everything. Waking up on time. Staying awake during school. Listening to the teacher. Getting through the day. Getting my homework done.”

“Well, let’s think through these. I’ll make sure you get up. I’ll add some energy boost to your milk in the morning to help you stay awake. If you’re struggling, you can go to the nurse.”

“I can’t go to the nurse. She’s mad at me. Plus my teacher won’t let me go. And everyone will stare at me. I’m pathetic. I can’t even make it to school.”

“Sweetheart, you’re not pathetic. Depression makes everything hard. It tricks your brain into thinking things that aren’t real. Remember Cristal told you to name these cognitive distortions? Which one do you think this is?”

“Me being a loser.”

“No, honey, you’re not a loser.”

“I am. There’s nothing special about me.”

“Honey, you’re amazing! You’re talented and kind. You’re funny and smart and curious. You take good care of our pets. You help me.”

“But I’m not the smartest.”

My patience is wearing thin. I can barely keep my eyes open.

“You don’t need to be the smartest. What’s more important is that you love to learn. It’s not about being knowledgeable, what’s more important is to be knowledge—“

“ABLE!” He finishes my play on words, my attempt to remind him that the “growth” mindset of being knowledge-ABLE to learn is much more important than thinking you know it all.

“I KNOW!” He screams at me. “I hate it when you say that!”

My pulse quickens, and I feel like my mind is about to explode. I am out of ideas, out of patience. “Jackson! I don’t know what else to tell you! You have to practice thinking in different ways.

“What do you think I’m doing?” He shoots up in bed and lunges towards me.

“Not trying!” I scream back. “Blaming me!” I storm back to my room, hesitate, and lock the door.

 

A few nights later, we’re lying in bed, but the energy is different.

“What’s wrong?” I ask my boyfriend.

“I don’t think I’m up for this,” he says quietly.

My heart catches in my throat. “What do you mean?”

“I think you were right. I pulled you along too fast. And I feel terrible. But I want to slow down.”

There’s a long pause as I absorb what he’s saying.

“You said you wanted to take care of me,” I whisper, hating how needy my voice sounds.

“I just feel like that’s all I do,” he replies, quietly. Then his voice breaks. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know why I’m doing this. I love what we have.”

I reach for his hand; I feel his pain, and tamp mine down. I know he’s on the verge of recanting, and I harden my heart to allow him to go.

“But you’re just getting out of your second marriage,” I finish for him, somehow managing a steady voice. “I get it. You need to figure out what you want. You should figure out what you want. I don’t want to be with you unless you’re happy and healthy and sure.”

“Yeah,” he says, his voice still quiet and shaky.

“You’ve spent your life in relationships. You need a break.”

“Yes,” he chokes out. “It’s just … everything’s just … so heavy.

“I know,” I say quietly. God, do I know.

“I’m so sorry. I’m doing this to you, and you’re the one comforting me. Like always, Tracy’s taking care of everyone else’s emotional needs. I feel terrible. Who’s taking care of you?”

I lay my head on his chest, and let him wrap his arms around me. Let him take care of me for one more night. 

 

I call my dad, but decide not to mention the break-up. He is having open-heart surgery to repair an aortic aneurism.

“Just calling to say hi!” I force my voice to be upbeat.

“Thanks!” There’s nothing forced in his response. He is always cheerful, always kind, always happy to talk to me. “Susan will keep you posted!”

“I know! Susan is better at texting than you, Dad,” I tease. I love his partner, the woman who has been part of his life for nearly a decade, after my mom’s passing.

Hours later, though, there is no update from Susan. I finish teaching my class at 3:30, depleted from being cheerful and entertaining in order to keep sixteen college students engaged with the topic of language revitalization.

I text Susan, but it’s my brother who calls me back. In slow, excruciating detail, he repeats everything that has happened throughout the day.

My mind is screaming. Just tell me! Did he die?

Finally, he says, “The doctor said he has done everything he can. All we can do is pray.”

“Wait, what? He’s alive?”

“He’s alive, but unconscious. The next twenty-four hours will be critical,” he says.

I speed home in tears and find Jackson in his room. He gives me a hug, sweetly pats my hair. “You know Papa loves you,” he says, not quite sure how to reassure me. “I love you. Oreo and Eevee love you,” he gestures to our pets. The flip in our roles leaves me spiraling, but I’m at loss for how to find comfort anywhere else.

For the next two days, my brother and Susan send me occasional updates, but with no real clarity. I’m struggling to determine how serious it is. Should I fly up or wait for more details? I put two, three, four different flights from DFW to Grand Island on hold: fly up after class Thursday, come home Monday? Leave on Friday? Cancel my class and stay through Tuesday? There are cheaper flights into Omaha—should I rent a car? I feel untethered, tired of making decisions, unsure who to ask for advice. Not my ex-husband. Not my ex-boyfriend. Not my dad. I feel like a top spinning in the air—spinning, spinning, spinning—with no surface to land on, so I just keep moving.

Thursday evening, my brother calls with an update, saying, “I don’t think you don’t need to come immediately, but come soon.”

Then, after a pause, he asks, “Can I vent?” He shares his frustrations, his voice becoming impassioned, drudging up memories of the end-of-life decisions we made for my mom. “Who makes these for Dad? Susan is not his wife!”

“But there are no decisions to be made,” I remind him. “Dad has already told us, he doesn’t want extraordinary measures.”

“I know, but who has his Power of Attorney? When do we enforce it?”

I can barely focus. I taught class, then hosted a dinner for upcoming graduates. My mind is foggy, my energy is sapped.

“I don’t know. Are we close to that? I can call his lawyer tomorrow.”

I call my sister, tell her the questions our brother has raised.

“Well, we all know who will make those decisions,” she replies confidently. “He’s too hot-headed. I am too. It will be you. You’re the calm, rational one.”

I sink into bed, too tired to cry, too tired to think, too tired to spin. I fall asleep in the middle of a prayer I have trouble believing will do any good.

 

I wake up at 2 AM, that time when nothing good happens, only this time it’s not noises in the kitchen that wake me, not a text dinging, but a throbbing pain in my left side, under my armpit and my breast. It’s so painful, I writhe in bed. I press on my ribcage, trying to find the source of the pain. I get my heating pad, rub lavender oil on my body, take some Advil. I Google my symptoms, knowing it’s a terrible idea but unsure what else to do. “A sign of stress” screams off every page, along with warnings of “possible death,” which isn’t helpful in the middle of the night, as the pain remains unrelenting. I toss and turn, worrying, but doubtful anything can be done if I go to the hospital. Plus, I can’t leave my boys home alone. It’s nothing serious, I try to convince myself. I eventually fall into a fitful sleep.

The pain is still there in the morning as I drag myself out of bed at 5 AM to make breakfast and lunch for my 16-year-old son Colton before his 6 AM practice. When did he turn into a man? Six-foot tall, muscular, confident, his calm presence reassures me and upends me. I ask so much of him, making him pick up the slack for my focus on Jackson.

I go to Jackson’s room. In sleep, he is still a baby, long dark lashes lying on soft plump cheeks. I sit on his bed, brush his long, unwashed hair off his face, and contemplate the dark circles visible under his eyes, devastated by the visible signs of his depression. I check that his phone’s ringer and his obnoxiously loud alarm clock are both on, and sigh, daunted by the Sisyphean task of trying to wake him. I check my watch. I’m going to be late to work again if I don’t leave.

“Jackson,” I say to the seeming void, “I’ll call you in a little bit. Your ride is coming at noon.” After months of school refusal, I had recently enrolled him in a hybrid in-person / self-paced school that met a few hours each afternoon. At least it’s Friday. Two days of respite from waking him, two days at his father’s house where someone else will be in charge.

I reach for my phone on the drive to work. Even after twelve years, I think of calling my mom, asking for her advice or at least her comfort. I don’t think she’d have answers, but I long for someone to walk beside me, to witness this challenging journey and tell me I’m doing a good job. In her later years, as her symptoms mellowed, she had become a kind and supportive sounding board, full of effusive compliments and fierce protectiveness.

My text dings with an update from my brother—my dad is stirring and showing signs of progress! At the office, I share the update with my colleagues and then tell them about the strange pain, which they urge me to check on.

My doctor’s office seems unfazed and makes me an appointment for the following Monday.

“You don’t think it’s more serious? I’m kind of worried.”

“I’m sorry, she’s fully booked today. Monday’s only a few days away.”

I hang up, and my left arm starts to tingle. I decide to go to Urgent Care, but since I’ve missed so much work lately, I wait until my lunch hour.

The nurse takes my vitals, asks a few questions, and then looks at me with concern. “Your left arm is tingling?”

“Yes, a little.”

“Any chest pain?”

“No. Just this intense pressure under my left breast.”

“Just a moment, please. Let me get the doctor.”

The doctor comes in and immediately asks how I came to the Urgent Care center.

“I drove,” I reply.

She looks back at my chart. “These symptoms are very alarming. You need to have someone drive you to the ER right now. Can someone else pick up your car?”

“What? I don’t want to go to the ER. I don’t want to pay for an ER visit.”

She hesitates, then says, “Let’s do an ECG and see if you are having a heart attack right now.”

I swallow hard, trying to suppress the panic starting to build. I practice my pranayama, controlled breathing, instinctive from years of yoga practice, but my mind is spinning again. A heart attack? That’s ridiculous! She leads me to another room, and the nurse pulls in a machine. They attach a blood pressure cuff to my left arm and put my finger in a small device. Red stark lines jump up and down the page that unfurls from the machine.

“You’re not having a heart attack right now,” the doctor says. “But I’m very worried that you had one, and that you could have another one. We’re going to give you some aspirin. Please call someone to take you to the ER right now.”

Those words again. Heart attack. Really?! There’s no way. I walk dazedly to my car and stare at my phone. I debate about calling my boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend. He lives thirty minutes away. He’s tired of taking care of me.

I finally text my colleague Megan and ask if she could possibly give me a ride to the ER, and if someone could come with her, to pick up my car from the Urgent Care lot.

OMG! I’m at lunch, but let me text Ashley.

I’m not close to Ashley, and I feel embarrassed when her text comes through.

Megan says you need a ride to the ER?

I hesitate before answering, my mind searching. Is there anyone else nearby who I could ask?

Yes, I finally reply.

OK, John and I will be right over.

Great. My boss too. I’m horrified. I’m falling apart and now everybody knows.

 

Thirty minutes later, I walk up to the desk at the ER. I recoil at a memory: fourteen years ago, I brought my mom to this ER when she seemed to be having a stroke while watching my boys. With one-week-old Jackson swaddled up in my baby sling, two-year-old Colton holding my hand, I half-dragged my mom in while she shot me glares, unable to speak but clearly angry.

“What are you doing, bringing a newborn into a hospital full of germs?” A nurse had shrilled at me.

Trying to take care of my mom, who was supposed to be taking care of me, popped into my head.

I pushed the memory away.

“Are you having chest pains?” The nurse at the desk asks.

“I guess, sort of?” I say with uncertainty. “I went to the Urgent Care for this pain on my left side and they sent me here.”

I’m whisked back, where they reassure me with a second ECG that I am not having a heart attack.

“I know,” I mutter, thinking of the $250 co-pay.

“But you might have had one. We’re going to run some tests.” A nurse takes me back to a stark room, where I lie on a slick vinyl bed lined with a paper sheet. I’m hooked up to monitors, blood is drawn, a chest x-ray is taken. I’m wheeled down for a CCT—a cardiac computed tomography. I mentally calculate how expensive this will be, how tight money is in the aftermath of the divorce.

A few hours later, a doctor comes in.

“The tests show that your troponin is elevated, which indicates you had a heart attack.”

My mind tries to piece together what he is saying. I feel certain I misunderstood him. Did he say I had a heart attack? This makes no sense.

“Have you been under stress lately?”

“Yes …”

“I believe you’ve had a cardiac event called a takotsubo cardiomyopathy, or broken heart syndrome. What happens is the stress wraps around your heart and tightens it like a rubber band. You are a classic case: women over 50 with high levels of stress.”

I zone out for a minute. Over 50? I just turned 50 a month ago. I do yoga regularly. I work out. I’ve never had a serious medical issue in my entire life.

“Do you have a history of heart conditions in your family?”

I start to cry. “My mom died of a stroke. My dad nearly died this week of an aortic aneurism.”

“OK. We’re going to admit you to the hospital to monitor you. We’ll run a heart catheter to see if you have any blockages. But you should plan to be here a few days.”

I search the doctor’s face for more information, silently begging him to tell me what I’m supposed to do next. I wait for the nurse to step in, but she is busy logging information on the computer. Isn’t this the part where they ask if they can call someone to help me? I decide I don’t want to call my brother or sister and add to their worries. I have friends, but they are not who I want to see, not who I think will help my heart mend. My fingers find my ex-boyfriend’s number and text him, and he immediately says he will come after work.

He’s kind and appropriate, but it’s awkward, and I eventually tell him to go home. My boys come up on Saturday, quickly become bored, and Colton leaves to hang out with friends. Jackson crawls into bed with me to cuddle and watch Tik Tok videos.

“I don’t know what I’d do without you, Mom,” he says to me. “You’re the only person who understands me.” I squeeze him tight, relieved we are so close and that he confides in me, but unable to stop the cascade of tears and the tightening of my heart. This cannot be humanly possible, I think, to have to gather up the dust from crumpling myself and somehow use it to build his foundation. I am going to fail us both. I need rescuing too. But I can’t reach the nurse call button, and the “favorites” in my contacts list seems unbearably short.

 

Cristal asks how I’m doing at my next therapy appointment. I burst into tears, unable to speak. I feel like I’m a big, gaping wound. Raw and jagged, desperate for affection and relief, for something to fill the void of my heart, which I feel has so deeply let me down.

“I want someone, anyone, to care about me,” I sob. “My heart is so broken. Literally and figuratively.”

She reminds me that many people care about me. But only I can prioritize me.

“You are circling the drain. You are going to be right back in the hospital if you don’t figure out how to take care of yourself.”

“What does that mean?” I wail. “I stop responding to Jackson in distress? I stop feeding Colton? I stop showing up to work? Tell me, what is it that I can STOP doing?”

“You can put up boundaries.”

I sob harder. “I know. I’ve messed up Jackson. I’ve messed up Colton.”

“Whoa, whoa, that is NOT what I said. You have poured into both of them and they are wonderful boys.”

“My ex-husband always says I’m not strict enough with them. He’s right, isn’t he?” I whine.

“No. You’ve had done an amazing job of raising them. They know they are deeply loved and cared for. You have provided safety and attachment for them, the things you didn’t have.”

“Your job now, as a parent, is to teach them how to take care of themselves. Anything they can do for themselves, they need to do for themselves. You can let them make mistakes, now, while they are safe. What’s the worst that can happen? They have dirty clothes. They have to eat lunch at school. It might be hard at first. They might be mad at you, and you don’t like people being mad at you. But THIS is how you love them as teenagers.

“Jackson has the knowledge and tools to calm himself, but he’s gotten used to passing that off on you. You can make him do his own self-work.”

Then she reminds me that I have another child to tend to. “You,” she says. “Your inner child.”

I erupt in a fit of laughter, the crazy release of emotions as I try to make sense of what seems to be a ridiculous idea—figuring out and articulating my needs.

 

I pick up Jackson from school. Cristal has encouraged me to make Jackson stay at his dad’s house, something he usually does not do on a school night, so that I can get some rest. I watch him surreptitiously as he is preoccupied with his phone, wondering at what point he’ll realize where we are going. We are one block away when he looks up.

“Mommmmm. Why are we going to Dad’s house?”

“So that Dad can help you tonight, and I can get some rest.”

“WHY? WHY?!?” He curls up and begins to sob. “Why? I hate Dad’s house.”

He pulls his shirt up over his face and chokes on his tears. He doesn’t even fight, just sobs. The space where my heart was clenches. His dad comes out, calls to Jackson. “C’mon! We’ll have fun. Let mom rest.”

Jackson continues to sob.

Finally, my ex-husband looks at me. “I guess he can stay with you.”

I blink back my own tears. I am pulled between taking care of myself and Jackson, at a loss of how to apply Cristal’s advice. I have no idea how to set a boundary.

On the way to my house, I start pushing. “Jackson, tell me what you’re thinking. What is causing this reaction?”

“Nobody wants me. And you! You’re the worst! You make everything about you!”

I slam the car into park and yell, “YES! For once, I AM making it about me. I just had a heart attack! And I’m going to have another one if I don’t take care of myself!”

He shrinks back, and I fight for control, reeling myself in instead of continuing to lash out like my mom would. We finish the drive in silence; he storms to his room and I sit alone in silence in mine. But after an hour, he comes out.

“Mom. My whole life, I’ve been told the way I feel is a problem. My reactions are defiant and difficult. I keep getting tested and moved to different schools and put on medicine like I’m a lab rat. I’m not trying to be bad! I just feel sad and I don’t know how to explain it.”

My breath catches, stunned by his calmness and poise and intelligence. He is a brilliant kid. I suddenly see his life unfolding in a different way, using his insight and tenderness to impact people and the world in amazing ways.

 

It’s 2 am, again, and I hear my phone ping; I’m working on boundaries, but I can’t yet bring myself turn off notifications from family members. It’s a text from Jackson.

“Mom, please come here.”

I plod to his room.

“What’s wrong, honey?”

“I’m so worried about tomorrow. I’m so nervous. I don’t know what to do.”

“Well, you need to—“

Then I cut myself off. I’m not supposed to tell him what to do.

“What are some ways you could relax?”

“I don’t know. Off myself.”

I sigh.

“I know Mom, I know! You don’t want to deal with me.”

“Jackson, that’s not it. I want to help you. I want you to see all the good in you.”

“I can’t.”

“Jackson, you just did a wonderful job of being kind to me after I was unkind. Can you do that for yourself?”

“I don’t know.”

“OK, can you try thinking nice things about yourself, but in my voice?”              

Silence.

“Maybe,” he finally says quietly. “Can you lay with me?”

“Of course.” I lie down next to him, and take his hand. I resist the urge to give him advice about what to say to himself, or how to calm his mind. I fight to not take on his emotions. “Good job, baby girl,” I whisper to myself, to my inner child.

“I’m ok, mom,” he says after a few minutes. “You can go.”

“Are you sure? I can sleep here with you.”

“No, I want to sleep alone. But can you bring Oreo to me?”

I find the dog, pick him up gently and take him to Jackson’s bed.

“Good night, honey.”

“Good night, mom. I love you.”

The void begins to fill. I fall into a deep sleep.

 

 

At my three-week follow-up, the cardiologist says there was no permanent damage to my heart. “There was one small tear on your heart, but it has healed on its own.”

It seemed laughable to think my heart had healed. How in the world did he not see the crack and bruises? I feel like a walking, open wound, desperate to be wrapped up, comforted, embraced.

But I begin to seek out love in new ways: My best friend comes over from England to visit me, and later I go to visit her. Over cups of tea, she gives advice and comfort, wisdom and laughs. I spend time with my aunt and my cousins in Nebraska and Colorado, telling stories and playing cards over shots of Tequila Rose. I go to concerts and shows, have lunches with friends, and text people just to say ‘hi.’

And I spend time alone. In the early morning hours, I burn incense and meditate. I journal and write and work on projects I’ve let linger for too long. I sit on my porch in the evenings and watch the sunset.

Cristal and I talk about my deepest need: to be seen and valued for my competence and hard work, while fearing any show of weakness.

“Tracy, even at your lowest, you project confidence and competence. You’ve worked so hard to cultivate this, because ‘Baby girl’ deeply worried that to keep her mom, and herself, alive, she needed to be perfect, but also not get in anyone’s way.

“You desperately want attention for that hard work. But if you rely on others to give you that validation, you won’t ever be whole.”

 

I go to visit my dad, who is staying in an assisted living center where he has regular rehab. At his house, alone, I sort through some of my mom’s things that have been boxed up for years. I come across notes and cards from her, dozens of love letters, so to speak, seeing me for what I thought was unseen, validating and supporting my deepest dreams for meaningful work and a loving family of my own. Oh, how I missed this version of my mom.

I read and reread a note dated 8/9/94. I was twenty years old, likely home for summer break. Her loopy handwriting with random capitalizations and lots of underlining for emphasis embodies the deeply loving, compassionate woman who too often was cloaked in depression.

 

Goodnight, Dear Tracy –

I can’t begin to tell you how Very Proud of You we are honey nor how much Joy and Happiness you’ve brought to us. It’s all the little Loving things you do Sweetheart that cannot be measured or weighed but are such good qualities and assets of yours. Those qualities, honey, are your strong suit and your talents—many of them hidden talents to the naked eye of most people (very unfortunately). I know without a doubt that God has a wonderful plan for you and he’s weaving it so very, very carefully and neatly. Continue to be strong and loving and unselfish as you always are and have been! Someday it will all pay off and your dreams and prayers will be finally answered and the wait will be worthwhile. J

I love you with all my heart

Mom J

 

I begin to think of her more often, inviting her presence when my heart twinges in loneliness or exhaustion. At a wellness retreat, I write her name on a rose colored piece of paper, acknowledge her as a fellow mother and before that a child with her own hurts and sadness, and release her with my forgiveness. I light the slip of paper and drop it onto burning sage in a chiminea, watching it curl and dance until the gray wisps rise into the night sky.

I whisper to myself, regularly, Baby girl, you are doing a good job. You are “up and not crying,” as they might say in Norway. One step at a time.

And eventually, I am more than just “up and not crying.” I am grateful. I am joyful.

I slowly edge back into the dating pool. Over margaritas at an upscale Mexican restaurant, my date says to me, “I’ve never been on a date with someone who looks even better in person than they do in their pictures. You are just the perfect woman, tied up in a bow.” I consider sharing the many ways I am not, my emotional and physical struggles and insecurities, but I hold myself back from the need to overshare, to seek validation. He seems to sense something, and continues, “I think people look at you and think everything comes easily to you, but you work hard at it.”

His kindness and insight brush my heart warmly, but do not melt it. I think this is a good thing, that my heart has become strong enough to already know this, to not need words from others to make it true.

Jackson’s self-work is inconsistent, arduous, painful to watch, but I try to find my place as an observer, an encourager. We have incorporated new techniques, including neurofeedback, with promising results, and now at fifteen, ever closer to legal independence, I realize that maybe my most important impact on him is normalizing conversations on mental health. I hope his life get easier, I hope he finds contentment and confidence and opportunities to use his brilliance and compassion to contribute to the world. I will walk beside him as best I can, shine a light for him when he feels enveloped in darkness, but ultimately I know it is his journey.

I have to trust him to tend to his heart.

I am working on mine.

 

 

 

 

Tracy Rundstrom is a university director and emerging author from Fort Worth, Texas. Based in the Honors College at Texas Christian University, she teaches and mentors students to tell their stories, apply for prestigious scholarships, and step into their roles as global change-makers. A lifelong academic dedicated to fostering global learning and cultural engagement, she believes empathy is her superpower. She has led transformative study abroad programs, developed internationally renowned frameworks for intercultural understanding, and has walked alongside hundreds of students as they discovered their voice, purpose, and power to make a difference. At mid life, she is learning to offer the same curiosity, care, and compassion to herself. Tracy aspires to use her writing to promote introspection, self-growth, and compassion, encouraging everyone to be a little more “human kind.”