First Published in Crows’ Feet publication on Medium.com

What if I told you that life gets better as you age? So I’m talking about myself, right?

My situation is a case in point. For the first half of my life it was tough, tough, tough. I was sensitive, super sensitive, paired with a mother whose skin was as thick as the hides of the dairy cows that roamed the farm where we were brought up. Of course, there were surrogates, like grandmothers and special people who enter your life like magical apparitions sent forth to be your personal guides. And there were my two older brothers.

In my 20s, I followed Bill, the firstborn, to Paris: wonderful France! And Europe! But something was gnawing away at me: lack of confidence, self-hatred, wanting more, yearning for something unseen and much, much deeper.

By the time I turned 30, I had studied Marxism, existentialism, feminism and many other -isms. I had degrees to prove my intelligence. But unsettled emotions were stirring within me and wanting OUT!

The 30s seem like the end for many women. And so it was for me: I knew it was time to change, and that I would have to do so on home soil. So I returned to Sydney and spent a decade doing what Jung called the process of individuation. It was an uphill struggle: a struggle to transcend childhood traumas. Like Sisyphus pushing the stone uphill and seeing it roll back down again and again.

Once started on this inner journey, it was similar to being on a roller-coaster, and there was no pulling back from the brink. Self-development, for me, was a terrifying trip into the deep. Like facing death. Diving into childhood memories, especially those to do with my “warm” brother, Donny, helped by a post-Freudian therapist and using creative writing to explore further into the subconscious mind.

The 40s became the new 30s. Having children later in life and continuing to self-develop. Much of it was a blur: therapy and work and more therapy: supporting my family to ensure that our children would be better off than I was. Pushing to get better, always pushing pushing pushing . . .

But, as I turned 50, something miraculous was happening. I can’t pinpoint exactly when the journey finished or when healing began; I suspect it’s still ongoing.But at some point in the New Millenium, I realised that I was no longer suffering the terrible angst that had been shadowing me like a black dog all of my younger life.

Gradually, bit by bit, I had broken through a dark cloud, like a wall, a hard rock, preventing me from being whole, from being myself.

I was beginning to feel lighter and happier for the firs time in my life. But not before having suffered a final painful nervous breakdown, during which I had to accept help from all those around me and use everything at my disposal for me to climb back up out of the dark waters of forgetfulness.

Our 60s and 70s brought us difficulties: my husband — stronger mentally and 10 years younger, but with greater physical issues than me! We had to face our problems together. These challenges brought us closer together.

Today I am 82 and feeling better than at any other time in my life. One of the side effects of my emotional struggles is that I look younger than my biological age. I don’t know how this works. Is it a gift or a curse? When people don’t know how old I am? I often have to stand in the bus.

Still, our children are showing signs of coping better with life than we could have ever imagined. With lots of help from us, of course.

Life’s good and I’m looking forward to the next decade or so!

Mark Jnr. and Me: Author’s Photo taken by her daughter