Description

Do you ever have those moments where you’re perhaps in school listening to a professor ramble on or you’re at work minding your own business when you remember something funny. You may try to stifle it, but it’s too powerful? You let out a snort and try to gain control by swallowing your laughter by thinking of something sad or perhaps you tell yourself how much it’s going to suck when later when you’re explaining to your boss why his presentation on the company’s performance made you just burst out laughing?

This hasn’t happened to me in awhile, it used to happen rather frequently that I would find myself laughing hysterically at the worst possible time.  but it happened the other day. I was just sitting next to my husband when all of a sudden, I remembered a hilarious moment from my past. 

The reason I wanted to share this story with you is actually well, for two reasons.

1. When I went no contact, one question I had was will I ever laugh again? It was a genuine concern because I felt so much pain, so much sadness and grief. But I do laugh, I laugh often and I laugh hard. Is it the same? Maybe not, but the point is that you will experience joy if you allow yourself the chance.
   
2. The other reason I wanted to share this story is when you become estranged from your family of origin, so parents, siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles, one of the side effects of estrangement is the loss of shared stories, shared history. All of these inside jokes, silly memories that we remember, and those that we don’t remember, all seem to vanish.
   

I wasn’t expecting this, but when I saw my husband repeatedly had friends and family members saying things to him like ‘hey do you remember when…” or “this one time we…” and it really made me nostalgic for someone I could talk about my past with you know?

So when this memory popped into my head I was so happy that even though no one brought up this time in my life, somehow my brain brought it up. And while I would love to laugh at this memory with the people who were there when it happened, it’s just not in the cards for me and that’s ok.

Because the truth is, I forgot how the story ended, which is, when I went home that night, like most scapegoats, I shared everything that happened with my parents. In my mind I believed that if they saw how honest I was about everything then they would see that I’m not lying, I could be trustworthy, etc.

So when I shared what happened, instead of just laughing about it, they actually questioned my sanity. One of my mom’s sisters called me and was like I’m going to take time off of work and come watch you and make sure you get to work on time and that you don’t mix this up. And honestly that really scared me. Because I went from feeling like this was just a silly little mix up that made for a hilarious story to share at barbecues. But my family was telling me that I should stop telling this story because it doesn’t make me look mentally stable - like they had me so nervous about my mental state that I thought I was going to lose my job.

I didn’t lose my job - my boss actually thought this was hilarious. And so do I even a decade later.

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