Responsibility

I came across some very self-informed statements on a web journal this morning and I was impressed at the ability the woman had to see herself very clearly; what affected her and what she needed. We have a tendency, I think, to hide from ourselves those things about us that we don't particularly like and I know I tend to do that. I'd like to think that I can handle responsibility and solve problems and so on, and I do my best, but I'm not a natural leader; never have been and never will be.

I've mentioned my childhood before and that I was a natural student. Yes, I enjoyed learning and reading but I just hated taking tests and I suffered more than my fair share of anxiety over tests. Possibly, I am a victim of my own high standards and wanting to achieve.

I don't think that it should be a surprise that a submissive is prone to anxiety if put into an environment very unsuited to her nature and on this score I totally understood when I was not made a Prefect in my senior year. It mattered very little to me but my close friends could not understand my ambivalence. I'd been a good student, obeyed the rules, never did anything wrong and I was not getting my just rewards, they said. But, here's the thing! I didn't really want to be a prefect. I didn't want to tell the other girls to pull up their socks; to put their hats on; to stop talking in assembly. Why would I want to do that?

I like my life ordered; my house under control; things sorted and for there to be a place for everything. I don't have any desire or need to boss anyone around and I certainly don't yearn for more responsibility. Sometimes, the children or my husband tell me of an issue and immediately my mind becomes anxious as I search for the solution to their problem.

"Stop it!" my husband will say. "It is not your problem. You don't need to solve anything."

And, immediately I begin to settle myself. My response all my life has been to feel that I must act responsibly and be a big girl and appear such that responsibility is second nature to me. But, it is not in my nature to take on more responsibility than I need to. I know that now.

Five years ago, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. I travelled to the place where she lives and accompanied her to a consultation where the surgeon told her he wanted to amputate her breast. We signed the papers in shock and when we got home my husband questioned the decision. I sat with it that night and the next day called a cancer specialist friend who put me onto a different surgeon here in the city. The dear woman called me immediately my friend called her that Sunday morning and we arranged for my mother to be seen the next day. With the immediate problem solved and the initial surgery cancelled, I felt the weight start to come off my shoulders and I immediately went to sleep for several hours. The responsibility of saving my mother's life from an incompetent surgeon (he diagnosed her without even a mammogram) had left me completely exhausted. I will rise to the occasion of taking on responsibility but not without huge personal cost. (She had a lumpectomy and is totally cured.)

It has taken me decades to take off my 'girl mask'; that facade of mine where I pretended that I was a totally capable girl who handled responsibility with ease. It is an enormous relief to have a dominant in my life. It fulfils me. It completes me. Finally, I feel at ease.