Chapter 4 - My Mother Had a Theory
Bernice did not call Elodie a liar at first.
She called her:
“somatic.”
That sounded educated.
More acceptable.
She read articles.
Sent them to me.
Children can develop functional symptoms after trauma.
True.
Attention can reinforce illness behavior.
Sometimes true.
Parental anxiety can intensify symptom focus.
Also true in some circumstances.
Then my mother constructed a theory.
Catherine died.
Elodie feared losing me.
I worked too much.
Whenever Elodie became sick:
I canceled meetings.
Stayed home.
Slept beside her.
Therefore:
Symptoms brought Dad closer.
From there Bernice made one fatal leap.
If symptoms brought attention, the symptoms must be primarily attention-seeking.
Not necessarily conscious.
She used phrases like:
“secondary gain.”
“reinforcement cycle.”
“sick role.”
None of which made her qualified to diagnose a seven-year-old.
I should have stopped it earlier.
Instead sometimes I listened.
Because I was afraid too.
Not afraid Elodie was manipulative.
Afraid I was making grief worse.
A therapist once told me:
“Try not to make every stomachache the center of the family.”
Reasonable.
I repeated that to Bernice.
She turned it into:
See? Professionals agree.
Again.
Translation.
I began questioning myself.
Was I too attentive?
Did I rush to emergency department too often?
Was I teaching Elodie that feeling bad meant Dad belonged entirely to her?
Then she fainted at school.
Then low oxygen.
Then imaging.
Reality became harder to reduce.
Bernice still tried.
Because admitting Elodie had a genuine medical problem would require admitting she had spent months treating fear as manipulation.
People defend theories hardest when identity sits behind them.
Bernice’s identity was:
I see through weakness.
May you like
She had built a life around it.
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