Heart Berries: A Memoir

by Terese Marie Mailhot

When I gained the faculty to speak my story, I realized I had given men too much.

My mother brought healers to our home, and I thought she was trying to exorcise me—a little ghost.

I thought I was in trouble, so I told him that I had been good. He said, “You don’t need to be nice.”

What potential there was in being awful. My mindlessness became a gift.

conduit

deficit.

It’s too ugly—to speak this story. It sounds like a beggar. How could misfortune follow me so well, and why did I choose it every time?

Indians froze trying to run away, and many starved. Nuns and priests ran out of places to put bones, so they built us into the walls of new boarding schools.

She transcended resilience and actualized what Indians weren’t taught to know: We are unmovable. Time seems measured by grief and anticipatory grief. I don’t think she even measured time.

You knew to be excited in proximity to my power.

incessant

gratuitous.

He was almost jaundiced—he was so sick in love with me. I wanted as much of the world as I could take, and I didn’t have the conscience to be ashamed.

I wanted to know what I looked like to you. A sin committed and a prayer answered, you said.

Falling in love felt fluid. It snowed when we fell in love. Everything reminded me of warm milk. Everything seemed less real. I thought my cup was overflowing. I found myself caressing my own face.

Safety wasn’t familiar—not with men. Our life felt brighter together.

You didn’t take out your wallet and tell me who I was. Those moments never came.

I told you I go away. You said you’d be on the other side of the door. That’s how perfect love is at first. Solutions are simple, and problems are laid out simply.

profundity

I learned that any power asks you to dedicate your life to its expansion. Things feel continuous when I think of my gifts and heritage. With you, things don’t feel right sometimes. I believe you obstruct my healing.

What I notice with you is that I look outside whenever I’m close to a window, and I wonder how many women feel that way. I feel things I would rather feel alone.

Every time I start to cry, you tell me that you can’t keep me from leaving. I feel abject without your passion....

It’s not torturous to be with you when I consider being without. Instead of feeling the gasping pain of my powerlessness, I straddle it and put your hands on my breasts.

Every door is the same when I kneel in a corner—with a hand over my mouth. Every bathroom floor is different, but no mourning I do feels familiar. It feels brand new.

I regret leaving you, and I’m disappointed you let me go.

I wasn’t stable, but men don’t usually care about that. I didn’t perform. I found myself uncovered and vulnerable, in fabric so thin—I thought of everything I’ve belted against my flesh and unclasped again and again.

I needed to talk to you. The way we operate asks a lot from me before I can ask something of you.

Feel culpable in my insanity because you are partly to blame.

I am not good, but you knew that. Why think less of me in here?

*in behavioral health

acutely

Don’t think less of me for being crazy. Don’t think that I am the only one culpable in my craziness.

I was walking through the house in the dark. I had covered the windows and mirrors. I was just unseeing things, dragging my feet along the wood panels until I found myself in the kitchen. I could not forget the familiarity of the kitchen or its drawers and instruments.

Keep in mind you were once desperate for me. I need help, and I cannot stop thinking that every transgression has brought me closer to a light, a striking beacon that tells me death is absolution. I have ...

I’m not medicine anymore. The words are flaccid, and the things I used to find sacred are torment. I’m stepping into my own undertow. My own valley is closing in on me. I curl into walls, ashamed at my cowardice. I am sick or possessed.

The awareness that our ancestors were watching was vital. I don’t feel the eyes of my grandmother anymore.

I woke up today, confused, inside of something feminine and ancestral in its misery.

So many people said something wasn’t right. I told them you were my savior, and this is what neglect can do. They didn’t believe me—it’s important to be loved back.

Regular to crazy-looking—I was somewhere in the middle, wearing an oversize black petticoat and a too-red lipstick.

Observation is a skill. Observation isn’t easy, and the right eyes can make me feel like a deer, while the wrong ones make me feel like a monster.

The forms made me feel big. My signature mattered. I was signing a new treaty.

gamut

entropy.

Nothing is too ugly for this world, I think. It’s just that people pretend not to see.

It feels like a skill to refrain. The benefit in this place is that I must refrain from you. I can’t physically see you or know what you’re doing.

You loved me until your body failed your will. You said making love was kissing my eyelids. I kept them open once and saw you differently. You rooted against me and forced my eyes closed like little coffins. I wondered how many bitter ghosts it took to create a cold feeling in a room. My face was covered in your sweat. I was all points and sharp corners before I loved you.

You don’t appreciate that you’ve broken me. Lovers want to undo their partners. I feel unveiled and more work than you had bargained for. I was unsure of the currency of men and unaware that losing myself would feel so physical.

My eyes welled, and you looked disgusted. I usually don’t care about that look. What right does a man have to look at me like that? I think it’s justifiable to hurt someone when they look at me like that.

I don’t eat for days so you can run your hands over my ribcage.

The meal I order after being fucked, by you, or anyone, is something earned. Men objectify me, to such a degree that they forget I eat.

That was also my problem: an inability to distinguish you from other men when I am angry. I’m sorry. If only you could see how little I need in this hospital.