Backslide
Photos/Kay Leigh Farley.
By Kay Leigh Farley
I have no idea what I am doing. My at-risk grandmother has COVID-19. My husband has been diagnosed with a debilitating chronic illness and might lose his job due to budget cuts. My sister lost a job that she loved. My brother is entering a labor market even worse than the one I had to grapple with upon graduation. The world feels heavy and I don’t know how to fix it. In the midst of the fear and uncertainty there is a cold nostalgia. I have felt this way before.
Accepting the things that you cannot control is a central tenant to growing up in an abusive household. As a child I felt like a rock trapped in a river; water raged around me, a fixed point in chaos rubbed smooth and small. After giving up on having any power to prevent the shouting and the venom I created a list of hopes. Hope One: leave home and never come back. Hope Two: that my siblings would survive. Hope Three: find happiness.
For most of my life these hopes seemed likely wildly unattainable fantasies. I clung to them because I needed something to buoy me, but I never believed they would come to pass. Still, I pursued them with a fervor. I enrolled in a degree that I thought would give me a sustainable income so I wouldn’t need the support of my parents. I started going to therapy and performed all of my self-help homework. I posted notes of self affirmation around my apartment. I slowly accumulated a support network. I started meditating. Despite the circumstances of my life spiraling ever downward, I had an easier time coping. When my dog drowned on Christmas, I had a friend who comforted me as I cried. After talking with CPS, I calmed myself with a breathing exercise. Every time my mom tried to gaslight me, I set clear boundaries or walked away from the conversation. The progress was slow and gruelling, but I held steadfast.
On a hot and humid summer day in June I looked down on my wedding from a balcony above and realized that all of my hopes had come to pass. I saw my friends, my family, and my husband and felt a deep joy. I saw my brother and sister in the same room for the first time in years, both alive and healthy. I had an exciting, burgeoning relationship with my extended family and had found a new, chosen family with my friends. Within myself, I had dislodged the wall that had protected me from abuse and opened myself up to love. I loved everyone in attendance, even myself. I cried for the unlikely miracle that I could be happy, that I was happy. I still can’t believe it.
Part of me is resentful that this trajectory was interrupted. I had a five-year plan that involved getting a promotion, buying a house, and having kids while my grandparents could still be a part of their lives. I am mad at the world for taking that away from me. I am mad at myself for expecting good things just because I work hard for them. I am just so mad and upset and a little bit numb. That last bit scares me the most. It took me years to erode the lack of feeling my mom had placed inside me. Helplessness mixed with acceptance is a dangerous cocktail.
One nugget of wisdom my mom enjoyed reciting was that abuse makes you tough, prepares you for a tough world with tough people. Her lessons would make me successful and one day I would be grateful for what she did to me. This may have been true for my mom and her own abuse, but for me it just made me insecure and self-critical. Someone pushes me down, I apologize for ever being vertical and call the dirt my new home (quite nice dirt, thank you for introducing me to it). These are not qualities that make you successful in a tough world, and boy is the world currently tough. I am loath to admit that abuse gave me anything positive because it feels like handing abusers an excuse or justification. What I will give credit to is my own work that helped me overcome the debilitating anxiety abuse gifted me and the people who supported my recovery along the way. Those tools and people are what I’m depending on to get me though my early 30’s rough patch.
Here’s the work I am doing now: I exercise aggressive, radical kindness. Your hair looks great today, I grumble to myself after forgetting my dog’s leash and have already driven all the way to the park. You make the best breakfast burritos, I announce to the kitchen after getting another astronomical bill. I have changed my therapy visits from once a month to twice a month. When my therapist tells me I am doing a great job, I actively try to believe her. I am relying on my friends and family for emotional support instead of stubbornly insisting I’m fine. I frequently complement my husband for being an amazing person - that one's really easy because it’s true. I aggressively pet my dog for that sweet, sweet serotonin fix. While there are circumstances outside of my control I do have agency over how it affects me. I can weather this and still be a good artist, wife, sister, friend, and dog mom. I can still be good to myself.
I have no idea what I am doing but I have felt that way before. I once had no road to happiness, and I found it anyway. I once had no power, yet I was able to shape my future for the better. I once had no help but found unwavering support. There is no excuse for abuse, but it did teach me to have hope for the future even when the present is absolute crud. Without a plan, or a path, or a light at the end of the tunnel, I know things will be better because that’s been true before. One day I’ll look down on all the gifts my life has given me and marvel at my good fortune. Until then, here’s hoping.
Kay Leigh Farley is a new media artist based out of Las Vegas, Nevada, who uses art to understand and communicate her experience with emotional abuse. Her work utilizes video, 3D modeling, and narrative to explore her childhood and her ability to recover in its wake. Born in Houston, Texas, Farley earned her Bachelor of Science from Texas A&M University and her MFA from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Farley has exhibited and screened work at venues including The Wrong Biennale, The Knoxville Museum of Art, and Co-Prosperity Sphere, and her work is in collections in the United States and Brazil.
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