Category Archives: childhood trauma

Gloria Has Three Eyes

Gloria Rising pgs. 62-64

AUTOMATIC LETTER 48

Sunday night

Dear Adam,

I’d better put down dreams just had before I forget the whole thing.
One was a weird experience – a child is looking for his mother and she
is nowhere to be found but while she walks around searching, she meets
several other people and each of these people ask for directions – the child
points to different streets and they go along but always leave before she has
a chance to ask where his mother is.
Then something strange happens, the child sees a volcano and coming
from there is what looks like an angel. He’s running toward the child, he
approaches and tells her not to be worried and put his hand out toward the child’s forehead and tells her, “Well look at you! Now you have three eyes.”
I am looking at the child, I see Gloria and she really has three eyes – one
in the middle of her forehead. The volcano erupts and we’re running but
the fire doesn’t seem to come our way – I see a house and I grab Gloria
and head for it – there’s a golden key in the door and it turns easily but
slowly – it is filled with a family – I look at them, children, parents, and
others and Gloria starts to talk to someone she calls “mother” – her mother
tells her, “I have always loved you, I still do,” and Gloria answers, “Do you
know I love you too?” The mother says, “Yes, my child, you have proved it
always.” – there the dream focuses on others in the family – I try to come
to understand the specific needs of each member of this family and to
accommodate the need as well as it is possible – Gloria is helping me and
others start to help us – when a child cries someone is there to hold his
hand, to hug him or talk with him; when a child stumbles someone always
comes to help him up – when he mourns someone mourns with him –
there is immense comfort in this group of people – a social order and we
know that this caring is helping them to survive – it’s a good feeling – till
we hear footsteps approaching the house – everyone is saying things like,
“Don’t worry,” – “Don’t be afraid,” – hammering fists against the door –
kicking – shouting – the door stays closed. I see Gloria – she still has her
three eyes and strangely there is fear in two eyes only – I am petrified with
fear – the door opens and someone walks up to Gloria, yanks her to her
feet and drags her into the yard, saying, “Next time you’ll remember not to
put ideas into children’s heads – cry, mourn, laugh – well I’ll teach you,” –
he’s carrying Gloria (who is never a little child herself) under his arm like
a sack of grain. He’s striding across the dark yard to the pigeon house – he
fumbles with the lock, opens the door and yells, “Inside, you can stay with
the birds until you learn to obey me.”
The strangest thing happens all I can see of Gloria are her eyes flashing
and there’s fear in two eyes but one (the third eye) is twinkling and
winks at me – this is where I start to feel “it’s all over” – and then I’m in that
pigeon house – hammering my fists against the door – frantically shouting and screaming and suddenly the shack is filled with the sound of frightened
birds slamming against me.
I don’t want to remember any more of this dream- too many emotions
that I’m not sure of are going on in me – will talk to you later – help, please.

Gloria’s Helper 

 

MANUSCRIPT POSTSCRIPT GLORIA RISING

Gloria Rising pp. xii-xiv

I struggled to keep my writing hand steady. It trembled as if detached from my body. I frantically scribbled down this note after finishing Gloria’s manuscript out of fear of a terrifying premonition that I would not awaken to see the dawn. This whole experience has been as if I had awoken from a nightmare, but it wasn’t my nightmare—it was real—too real to have imagined, let alone lived through and survived. I am Dr. Adam Jaxon, and if by chance you are reading this, I am already dead. I was a renowned and distinguished hypnotherapist and treated thousands of people in my lifetime, but Gloria B’s electrifying hypnotherapy captivated and stunned me. Unfortunately, I was reluctant to share her terrifying and heart-wrenching story for fear no one would believe the otherworldly powers that literally came to guide and help me heal her. I feared my old associates would think I had gone senile or worse mad. Now I feel ashamed for being such a coward, for allowing myself to be controlled by the homogenized expectations of my profession and being paralyzed by irrational fears that I would be scorned and rejected, if I spoke my mind. I now feel shame and guilt that my arrogance and fear got the best of me and nearly bankrupted my morals and destroyed me. After all Gloria and I had been through, I could not live with the thought that, in the end, I had betrayed her trust and let her down. But thanks to her endearing memory and loving spirit, I came to my senses while gazing at my image in a mirror. I flew into a rage and smashed the pathetic image with my wine glass into a million pieces; blood trickled down my wrist, but I didn’t care. I shouted, “To hell with my ego and reputation,” over and over again, until my voice grew too hoarse to scream anymore. I yielded to my guilty conscience to write her story that I had promised her. Besides, my health was failing, and Gloria’s story was too momentous and meaningful to be forgotten and buried in my cold grave. So, I feverishly wrote over the past year, and finally finished the manuscript this very night—just days before my 100th birthday. But alas, this morning, I sensed a chilling premonition that I would not be here to celebrate it. So, I left the precious manuscript, and this postscript, on my oak writing desk with a poignant note and scrupulous instructions for its publication, for my daughter to find. It would be my last fond gesture and chance to share my lifeworks with her, albeit, beyond the grave. I know if I died tonight, I would die a happy man at peace with myself knowing Gloria’s story would finally be told—a mysterious and astonishing story that defies the timeworn precepts of modern psychology and psychiatry—where insanity, genius, the metaphysical, and the mystery of life come together to beguile and confound our contemporary understanding of the mind and its limitless powers to heal.

Dr. Adam Jaxon