I Hope You Get the Help You Need (Part 3)

"Mom," Younger says as we head out to do some Christmas shopping. "Tell me again what happened to Miss C."

We drove through a neighborhood, past a house of an old acquaintance with whom we lost touch. Except Elder remembered the street and even the house. Thus, triggering a discussion on the ghosts of friendships past, fallen by the wayside by autism and/or divergent paths.  And Elder's train of thought led to younger's question.

My head, as it often does when someone brings up the past, felt wrapped tightly in barbed wire. "G, come on, you know how much I hate talking about this. And it's not like you don't know how the story ends."

G shrugged.  "I forget."

I sighed, rubbed my forehead, negotiated the traffic into the busy shopping mall parking lot.  If I deflect, he'll just keep bringing it up, persistent as a Jehovah's witness. May as well get it out there, again. "She was weak.  She believed people who stole something from me and then called me crazy. And then she kept me hanging on long enough to report back to them, so they could email me and tell me I was crazy and to tell me to kill myself."

I blinked. I never went that far in the story. But they are both old enough to know what happened.

Elder blew out his breath in astonishment and consternation. "MOM.  You were bullied worse than me. Like, your whole adult life."

Longer, I thought. Much, much longer.

I parked the car and gazed at him a moment. "Why do you think I am so good at helping you navigate this?"

That ended the subject for the moment. We had gifts to buy, but not before Elder found a $20 bill.  I put the whole conversation on hiatus until I went to bed, and woke up in the wee small hours, with Elder's voice echoing "You were bullied worse than me."

Reminded me of the conversation with my new supervisor last week, about how my return to corporate came at a time when Elder was experiencing the worst of  the bullying of his school career--and how I, through all my experience to that point, managed to finally convert the lessons to strength, and helped him handle the worst of it.

My last little while has been a coming to terms with all of it.

I hope the effort's not been wasted.