Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

Lisa

A book that stands alone: The Complicated Heart by Sarah Mae

This is a book about a mother-daughter relationship, one where the mother is drunk a lot and emotionally and verbally abuses her daughter for a significant portion of her life. But it’s also about the hard work it takes to heal from and in that kind of relationship. It’s a wildly gracious and generous story of love and forgiveness, but don’t mistake that description for “happily-ever-after.” It’s a story of redemption in the midst of hurt.

In The Complicated Heart, Sarah Mae takes readers along as she revisits her relationship with her mother at a variety of ages and pivotal moments in her life. It is not always easy to read because it is a raw and vulnerable story of a relationship full of hurt.

I can’t say I’ve read another book like this one. What sets this book apart is the inclusion of Sarah’s mother’s journals, sometimes written when these events occurred. Giving her mother a voice in this story changes the feel of it because readers realize, like Sarah did, that her mother had a lot of stuff to deal with, too.

“Maybe He saw what I couldn’t see, what I can’t see–all the ways her brokenness led her to breaking others.”

I don’t know if everyone in a complicated close relationship is ready for this book, and the author acknowledges in the beginning that readers need to be honest with themselves about their readiness to delve into the issues and memories of the past. But there’s such an air of hope about this book that I hope it finds its way to those who need it most.

My favorite line in the entire book sums up its intention:

I read an advance copy of the book. Review reflects my honest opinion.

You can read the first three chapters for free here. (I’m not sure how long that offer will last, so click while you can to get a feel for the story!)

And even though this is story is about a specific mother and a daughter, the principles apply to other complicated relationships and mother-daughter circumstances. Maybe your mother wasn’t an emotionally abusive alcoholic. This book is still for you.

What I’m Not Going To Do

I was sitting at the table minding my own business in the pre-dawn hours of today when I saw a small shadowy creature dart along the wall I was facing.

I cursed, a lament, because it’s been almost two years since we’ve had an uninvited rodent in our home. (To be clear, we don’t invite them, either.)

My husband was at the gym and the kids hadn’t wakened yet, and we did not have work or school because of a teacher collaboration day, so there was no rush to get the day started. But this was not how I wanted to start the day. The creature’s presence in our home was the final bit of convincing I needed to go for a run, something I haven’t done in weeks, and as soon as my husband came home, I told him the mouse news (I’d already informed the children) and went out for my run.

As the morning progressed, I thought less and less of the mouse, even as I nagged my husband to set out the traps to resolve this disturbance to my peace. The kids and I did errands and came home to empty traps and went about our afternoon as if nothing was amiss.

If none of this sounds groundbreaking or earth-shattering, then you’ve probably not read any of my mouse-capades in the past. (Here’s another one.) I’ll be here when you get back if you want to read up on that.

See, in the past, I would have let the presence of a mouse in my house paralyze me. I would curl up in bed to avoid any chance of a rodent sighting. Or I’d demand we stay out of the house until the thing was caught. I would tiptoe through the kitchen or avoid the area where I’d last seen the mouse because surely it was hiding just waiting to run across my path.

Photo by Melanie Wasser on Unsplash

This afternoon, I realized that it would come out when it was good and ready, and I could go about my day. (Also, as my son sits in the living room playing notes on his baritone this evening, I wonder why this mouse even wants to live in this house in the first place. It is noisy and busy. Find some other place to live!)

See, I decided that I wasn’t going to let a little mouse run my life.

—

This is how I’ve changed these past two years. Where I would avoid the things that overwhelm me, now I face them. (Not every time and certainly not perfectly.)

Take this anxiety journey I’m on. It’s only been a couple of weeks since I had a wake-up call and was given medication to help me through it, but right now, today, I’ve realized that I’m not going to let anxiety run my life. I’ll take the medicine when I need to, and I’ll take other appropriate measures when they’re necessary to manage my body’s responses to my circumstances. But anxiety’s not going to call the shots anymore.

Photo by Icons8 team on Unsplash

Same with fear, shame, and the past.

Living with any of those things is no picnic, and each of them limits the decisions I make in my present life.

I know they aren’t going to disappear. (Except the mouse; it is going to wherever mice go when they die, as soon as it finds one of the traps.) I may never completely rid my life of anxiety, fear or shame, and I can’t undo the past, but they don’t have to be the starters on the field. 

They can sit on the sidelines and watch me live a full life.

—

Will this always work out perfectly? Not a chance.

But knowing it’s possible because I’ve experienced it is all the hope I need when the anxiety, fear or shame start to whisper their lies.

They’re not the boss of me.

And they’re not the boss of you, either.

Photo by David Werbrouck on Unsplash

I refuse to be held captive by something I can’t see, whether it’s a mouse scurrying in the shadows or something more sinister like shame casting a shadow on my days. There’s too much good work to do and too few days to do it, too many memories to make and too many ordinary days to live.

I hope you can hear the hope in this. It’s not meant to heap further shame. It’s meant to lead you into freedom. The kind that says, “There is something in the shadows but it’s not going to have control over me.”

Take your meds, sit with your fears, acknowledge your shame. 

In other words, set the mousetraps. 

AND

Live the life you mean to live.