Ascent Healing

My parents had 6 kids and I am the youngest by a big gap in years. In other words, they had my sister, 4 brothers and then a 7 year gap and then had me. It was in the decade of the Osmonds and the Jackson 5 and I’m not sure, but I think my mom really wanted a child who could be like them; someone she could show off. She had all my siblings take piano lessons and they all quit until she came to me. She made it known she was going to have at least one child who could play the piano and I was the last one so I wasn’t allowed to quit. She would set the oven timer for an hour a day and I had to sit at the piano and wasn’t allowed to leave until the timer went off.

The first few years of my piano training were rocky. I didn’t learn to sight read right away. I played by ear and listened to what my teacher played and then figured out how to play that at home. It took awhile for my teacher to discover that I really didn’t know how to read music and she was able to turn that around. My next older brother and I took lessons around the same time and my brother quit but my mom wouldn’t let me quit. For a few years, I felt miserable because I hated it. I started taking lessons when I was 7 and around 9 or 10 years old, I had an epiphany. One day I was sitting at the piano with the timer turned on, of course, and I realized my mom was not going to let this go. She was not going to let me quit. I realized I was miserable and this was no longer a choice I could make. I could not choose to not play the piano, but I could choose to change my attitude. I decided then that if I had to play the piano, I might as well learn to like it since I had no choice. I don’t really know how I came to this conclusion, but once I changed my attitude, I started to really learn to play the piano and take it seriously. I wanted to make my parents proud.

By the time I was 12 years old, I was started taking lessons from a well- respected college professor, Carol Hurst. My mom told me on a daily basis how lucky I was to have this opportunity and to NOT MESS THIS UP. She told me if I didn’t “toe the line” Carol would drop me as a student and it would be all my fault and there would be consequences I didn’t want. As a result, for the first year or so, I was terrified of Carol even though she was a very nice lady. I wrote down my minutes of practice in a notebook and got it signed by my mom every week as Carol instructed me. She required I practice 8 hours a week which was a little more than an hour per day. I never missed a day of practice for those first few years with Carol because I was so scared. I remember the first time I missed a day and I went to my lesson in tears thinking she was going to yell at me and Carol smiled and said, “Jamille, I ask all my students to keep track of their practice minutes. You are the only one who actually does it.” I was shocked. I thought for sure I was going to get kicked out and she just laughed. That was the start of me really building trust with her and feeling safe there. I still practiced hard but I no longer feared her dropping me. She became like a second mother to me and I miss her very much since she has passed away.

But back to my story, I was becoming very good at my piano talent. I won competitions, participated in many contests for composition and solo ensemble at school. I played for the school choirs and was called as organist for my church by the time I was 15 years old. My mom was happy to show me off every chance she could for talent shows or visitors at the house. I felt very much like a performing monkey. Many people told me I was very talented but their words fell on deaf ears. When no one was around, my mother made sure I knew I was not dedicated enough, was making too many mistakes and I would never be that good. Despite winning the Weber State College piano competition multiple years in a row, my father said my piano recordings (he gladly gave to all his friends) were an embarrassment. I was broken hearted. I was playing piano for everyone who asked to be accompanied for any event and burning myself out in the process. I just didn’t know how to say no. I also had come to believe my piano talent was not mine…. It belonged to whomever wanted to use my talent for their own purposes.

Secretly, I craved to play other instruments, namely, the violin. But my mother and father wouldn’t have it. I was a pianist and in their eyes, despite the emotional abuse they heaped on, the expectation was that I would become a concert pianist. I think at the time, I really thought I loved the piano. I had to. I was forced to from that day back at 9 years old that I decided “I am going to like this or love it no matter what because I don’t have a choice.”

No one knew about the abuse. That was another secret I kept hidden behind my piano talent and nearly perfect grades. My knowledge of trauma has taught me that people go one of two directions to deal with abuse: destruction or perfection and I was the latter. Besides the emotional abuse, there was sexual, physical and other abuse going on this entire time but that is a blog for another day, or maybe even a future book…. Hint hint. But I digress. Once I became an adult, I was free. I didn’t have to play the piano anymore. I picked up the violin I so craved and started to learn that instead and played in the University orchestra. I wasn’t very good, but I loved it. I was finally doing what I really wanted to do.

The piano slowly fizzled out of my life. I played for some college choirs but slowly the piano was no longer the center of my life to the dismay of my family and community. I faced a lot of backlash from a lot of people for not continuing to be the concert pianist they expected I would become. I eventually changed my degree to psychology and announced my intention to become a mental health therapist and the “shit hit the fan”. Not only had my parent raised me to hate therapists and psychology, they literally told me if I ever went in that direction, I would be excommunicated from my church and go to hell. Personally, I think they were terrified of me telling the “family secrets” and that is what was behind all this literal programming against therapy and mental health. Not only was I NOT becoming the concert pianist everyone expected, I was going against the family by becoming a therapist and my family was in an uproar. But I stood my ground and learned to stand up for myself.

I continued to teach piano lessons for years but I had a complicated relationship with the piano and didn’t know if I loved or hated it. In more recent years, I haven’t played it much except when asked to for church meetings. It is triggering to play and although my parents are both dead now, I can see them in the back of my head watching me from the couch like they used to when I play even though realistically, I know they aren’t really there. That is just the nature of trauma. But I realize the time has come to reclaim the piano as my gift. It isn’t something I necessarily chose to do but nevertheless, it is a gift and talent I have. For those out there reading this, you may have talents and gifts you attained through survival. Do not be ashamed of those gifts. They kept you alive just like learning to play the piano helped me to survive. I can grieve the parts of it that hurt, and embrace the beauty that it is now. My parents can’t control me anymore. It’s my gift and my choice to use it how I see fit and I’m finally learning that is ok.