11/12/2023
ACCEPT OR NOT TO ACCEPT!
9th December 2023
Acceptance is such a vital part of life.
How do you know when to accept something or when to reject it and go your own way?
When I look at my past, I see that acceptance has certainly played a leading role in the production of Gaynor Young’s life.
For those of you that don’t know, I was an actress.
I was the understudy for Guinevere in Camelot and on the 9th December 1989, my hopes and dreams seemed to come true. The actress playing the lead lost her voice. I was scheduled to go on that Saturday afternoon and evening. I took to the stage without ever having had a dress or a technical rehearsal. Apparently, during the performance, I was brilliant! Then just before interval, I was meant to exit the stage during a black out, have an incredibly quick change and be ready for the next scene. I must have stepped the wrong way because I felt down an unguarded lift shaft,18 metres to the ground below.
I suffered terrible brain damage and was disabled.
I spent seven weeks in hospital and when I left my parents were advised by the specialist to: “Put Gaynor into an institution. She is never going to be able to do anything but lie on her back staring mindlessly at the ceiling.”
This is where “to accept or not to accept” comes in.
My parents could not accept that I was to be institutionalised and so they made plans for me to go home with them to George.
And so my new life began.
But…I could not accept who I now was.
I hated this new, unfamiliar, disabled Gaynor.
I had no hearing in my left ear and in my right I had less than 2% so I wore a hearing aid. I grew my hair to cover it. Perish the thought that people were aware of my deafness. My spasticity was clearly evident when I used my right hand so I became left handed and tried to keep my right hand behind my back or in a pocket. I was desperate to hide the…the uglyness…of the new me.
Eighteen months after my fall, I made my way to the dressing room to see a cast after their performance. I had not been able to hear a thing but that was something I wouldn’t admit to. They greeted me warmly with grease painted hugs. But I was unable to understand much of what they were saying although my lip reading had improved in leaps and bounds. I should have said to them: “I can’t hear you. When you speak to me, let me hold you under your chin because then I can feel your voice vibrations. That’s a big help!”
Instead I acted as if I could hear them and nodded my head smiling brightly.
“So, Gaynor, who bought you here tonight?”
Big laugh from me: “Yes, yes!”
Glory be!
I had acted at that theatre and I looked across at the place where I used to do my makeup. I ached. Dressing rooms have a smell all their own and this one seemed to cry out at me. I left that evening wanting to weep. I didn’t belong anymore.
I found accepting that so difficult.
Two years after my accident, I attended a school for the brain damaged in Johannesburg, Headway. It was brimming with patients who had brain injuries and were disabled.
Like me.
I began to truly look at my compatriots and found myself liking them. I formed friendships. It was as if I had stepped through a door and breathed in this wonderful scent. It was a new and unexpected fragrance. Here I was, the unaccepting Gaynor accepting the friendship of someone who was…gasp…brain damaged and disabled!!! Vee Murphy, my Psychotherapist worked closely with me. She dealt with my anger and oh, so many tears. And for the first time I accepted the fact that I was disabled.
It was at Headway that I learned to accept the new Gaynor.
This new Gaynor is incredibly fortunate to now have Cochlear Implants in her life. When I wear them I can hear amazingly. It is only when something is taken away that you realise it’s true worth. As you all well know, I have my music back once more. I have this amazing little machine called: Alexa. When I say to Alexa: “Alexa, please could you play some Eva Cassidy” instantly she launches into Fields of Gold. I have Alexa connected to my inverter so that whenever we have an outage, Alexa comes into play! With my 40% vision, my sight is incredibly valuable to me. I now ‘see’ so much. I point out the shapes and colours of things to my best friend, B and she sees them as if for the first time.
Walking behind my dog, Leah in the Botanical Gardens, I watch her dart here and there, racing against the air brushing her soft fur. She streaks ahead, around trees, into bushes and inevitably plunges into a little muddy pond. The grass has recently been cut and everything feels fresh and clean. I gaze up at the beauty of the mountains towering in front of me and I give my God a salute for His masterful Creation and thanks for me being me! I usually walk practically up to the top gate and then turn around and walk back. All in all it’s about 2 kilometres that I walk there most days of the week.
I accept that I walk with a limp on my braced leg, but I want to do a Julie Andrews Sound of Music cabriole-like kick to the side at the glory of being able to walk! When I think back over my past, whoever would have thought that I would be doing this walk every day with my gorgeous little dog?
Today, 9th December 2023, it is 34 years since that young woman fell from that stage and like Alice In Wonderland discovered herself in another life. It is totally different life to what I had planned. But I am not a great planner anyway!
I love life!
As I said at the beginning, acceptance and not acceptance are vital parts of life. The secret is to know when to accept and when not to accept.
And that…I accept…makes all the difference!
