It started with the insight that I may have once been a twin, and that was why so many tiny details about my life that had always puzzled me were always on my mind. I was very concerned with the life of the unborn child, thought a lot about death and dying and was never happier than when I was with one other person engaged in deep intense conversation at an empathetic level.
I came to Claire over the Internet because I knew that talking therapies could not access the areas of my life that were pre-verbal, and indeed pre-birth. A drama approach it had to be. And it proved to be very helpful. I was able to re-experience being small, being angry and very powerful in my anger, and finally after much planning to create a special ritual about my lost twin. This was not at the end of the course but in the middle of it, for after this ritual I had some important growing and healing activities to engage in. However there has never been a more intensely emotional, cathartic and cleansing experience in my whole life than that day, which I will describe for you in detail now.
I was unwell, and unable to function normally for some days, as I planned this ritual. I lay in bed thinking and planning every detail until I had it clear in my mind. For two weeks before the day I wore every day round my neck a chiffon turquoise scarf that I loved and had bought for myself. (Turquoise for me is the colour of dreams.) It felt warm and cosy around my neck and I began to develop a strong attachment to it. I also took up a wide indian cotton scarf, much larger and plain beige and made that ready. I made some white card labels with " ideas," " strength," dreams" and" creativity" written on them, to hang about the necks of the other group members. I thought for a long time about music, until I realised ( with some laughter) that my favourite piece of music was part of the Bach Double Violin concerto! I found a blindfold that I had once been given on a plane trip. I found a shallow meat tin and some matches. I was ready.
When it was time, (and the waiting was hard) I knew that this was a ritual I would do alone. I did involve the other group members a little, but it was a very personal experience. The group respected this.
I began with a "womb" shape on the floor made with cloth, in which I sat, barefoot and blindfolded with the two scarves. One of the group members was nominated by the group silently to touch me gently from time to time. There I was in the darkness of the womb with the tiny companion I knew only by touch. The strains of the violin concerto played as I reacted with great pleasure to the touches made by my little "companion."
Then the group had percussion instruments and they made a terrible noise with them at an unexpected moment. This was the catastrophe that took my brother away. I reached out, taking control, and touched them one by one to make them quiet. They played on until they were touched. This was to heal within me a certain sense of helplessness that had haunted me all my life.
In the silence the violin concerto played on.
I stepped out of the womb and took off the blindfold. I put the labels on the rest of the group, to represent the gifts that my little companion had left me, but it didn't work very well. I had to do this alone. So to the strains of the music I danced a dance of two scarves, intertwining them and playing with them, brushing them about my body.
Finally as the music faded to silence I came to the meat tin I had placed on the floor. There was a picture that I had painted the previous day of Kali, representing my own negative anger, vengefulness and destructive power. I tore the picture into pieces but kissed every piece, forgiving and accepting all the negative qualities. I laid the pieces with reverence and care into the meat tin, and folded the scarf on top of it ready for cremation. It was forbidden to light a fire in the room so we left the room in procession with me barefoot, carrying the tin. Outside we watched the paper and the scarf burn in silence.
I left the ashes outside as we returned to the room in silence and when it was time to go I tipped them into the dustbin: they held no power for me now.
I got home somehow, stunned by this experience and knew then what I must do as a final act of letting go. In a cleansing ritual in my own home I gathered up the piles of papers I had accumulated in the previous twenty years about the unborn child, and put then into a black sack for recycling.
After over fifty years, I have found peace, and also my life's work. I am building a website to reach out to other womb twins throughout the world, so that they may experience the same peace that I now have.
The website is almost ready, and it can be found at www.wombtwins.com if you want to pay a visit and learn more about womb twins.
Tish
