Me and the Page by Caitlin Wright
- Caitlin Wright
- Apr 2
- 5 min read
The death of my mother has made me who I am today. I would not be as independent, as mentally strong, as empathetic, or as worn. I would not strive to be a writer, a poet, an artist, or a mother myself. I would not be scared of vulnerability, have OCD, or cry at the thought of my friends dying on a Monday afternoon in the bath. I wouldn’t appreciate custard tarts or the colourful iridescence of a blackbird or force myself to get some fresh air when I’m sick. I wouldn’t be me. I used to think I would trade myself and all that I am for one more day in her arms.
I ran from grief for a long time. After losing my mum, Michaela, when I was eight to a brain tumour, I had a child therapist called Doreen. The most memorable part of these therapy sessions was seeing a spider crawl around in Doreen’s nest of wiry, grey hair, and being too worried about her reaction to tell her. She made me draw where my emotions were on a stick figure. There were lots of blues and reds, for sadness and anger. No yellow for happiness. She gave me a leaflet that explained the stages of grief in a palatable way, and I pinned it to my bedroom wall. It seemed like each stage was a checkpoint, just like in Sonic, and that when I got to the seventh level, I’d finally feel normal again.
Within a year, everything had been crossed off with a blue felt tip, and I was confused because I felt absolutely no different from day one. In fact, I felt worse. Life continued around me as though her absence was as normal as the bins being put out every Thursday. I assumed that I was the anomaly. Having always been a shy child, I sucked my bottom lip in whenever the tears began to well and nodded that I was fine.
This attitude continued well into my teens, and I developed severe mental health issues that I felt I couldn’t approach anyone about. I’d been praised since her death for my unwavering independence. I couldn’t reveal that it was all an act when everyone was so proud of me for it. I became a master of disguises and threw myself headfirst into whatever personality I constructed for myself. The mask would, inevitably, begin to slip, and this is when I’d reinvent myself, glue together another costume to slip on top of my old one. I fluctuated from a shy social outcast to a mean popular bully to a party animal bordering on addiction and back again, multiple times. Beneath it all, I desperately needed help. I just didn’t know that I could ask for it.
I drunkenly confessed these feelings to a friend at a party once, and within an hour we were staggering along the cliff path in the pitch black to my sister's house. We arrived with half-smoked cigarettes between blue fingers and masses of windswept hair. My sister held me while I cried with the force of someone vomiting on her kitchen floor. I didn’t know why I was crying, or how I was suddenly permitted to let these emotions flow freely, but I knew I was crying for every past version of myself and, above all, for my mum, who I hadn’t cried for since I was a child. Tucking me into bed, knowing that the possibility of sleep was slim, she handed me a blank sketchbook and pen in a last-ditch attempt to sway my thoughts from the darkness. By the orange glow of her desk light, I feverishly captured every essence of emotion that had passed through me. I wrote for so long that my hand cramped and I heard the birds awaken along with the bruised, winter sky. My fingers were blotched with black ink stains for days. While translating the scrawling hieroglyphics after a much-needed sleep, I realised I had created a collection of haunting poems that perfectly encapsulated my current experience. I was in complete awe that I had the power to transform the most horrific events of my life into something alluring, even beautiful.
I have wanted to be a writer since I was a child. Only now do I realise the impact that writing has on my daily life. I can’t express myself authentically in any other way. When it’s just me and the page, there is no harsh judgement, no expectation of strength or stoicism. I can be honest, vulnerable and frightened, and the results are profoundly raw. Finding this power was integral to my recovery, and now, although the process is in no way linear, I am comfortable with who I am. I don’t feel a need for disguises. I’m proud that I am most content when making things with my hands. I don’t need to hide that I hate drinking and would much rather be in bed reading a book before midnight. It’s not boring that my favourite sandwich is cheese and pickle, and I don’t have to slouch my shoulders because I’m too tall to be attractive. Through my stacks and stacks of leatherbound journals, I have concluded that I am perfectly fine being who I am.
There will always be an emptiness inside of me because no one ever loves you like a mother does. There is no form as pure or unconditional, and although my responses to grief may lengthen in time, my longing will never disappear. The feeling is always on the precipice of surfacing in any place, often in the least expected ways: when I hear a child scream in happiness on a swing set, when the tulips begin to bloom, when I’ve had a difficult day and my hairbrush snags in a tangle. But I know that I can hold myself. Some days, I still feel like I could give it all up, but that’s between me and the blank page. I have grown to realise that who I am now is worth a lot more than just one more day with her.
Caitlin Wright (@hwedhla) is a Cornish author who specialises in writing contemporary realism and poetry. Her upbringing in rural isolation underpins much of her work, both stylistically and thematically through themes of social, economic and cultural disparity. She holds a BA Honours degree in Creative and Professional Writing and is currently aspiring to publish her novel. In the future, Caitlin is planning to travel to enrich her experiences of the world and therefore her writing.
