Creative Revival

This fall, I completed my first big sewing project. I had sewn a few masks, but that was it.

I have always been averse to sewing; my mother desperately wanted me to fall in love with it, but our lessons often ended with me in tears. I chose to make my son a winter coat. Not content with making a standard coat, I decided to use a wool blanket and the results are striking.

I decided to share the photos of the final product to a public online group. My friends have witnessed my natural talent for arts and crafting, so they are no longer amazed when I try something new. I wasn’t expecting much response, but the amount of true appreciation for my work was staggering. I was surprised to see that some people reacted negatively. They were upset because I ‘destroyed’ a Pendleton blanket for my first sewing project. Despite the overwhelming compliments, the negative remarks bothered me. Instead of trying to explain my knack for crafting, I decided to explain my material choices.

Three years ago, I made the choice to completely separate myself from my maternal family. It was emotionally draining, but it was the best decision I have ever made. I didn’t know why I needed to step away: I just knew that the negative effect my mother had on me would begin to affect my own parenting.

Time washed away the 'family secrets’, but I needed to get rid of items that I was keeping out of an invisible obligation. It was fairly easy at first. The thing about narcissistic parents is that they tend to not put effort into their strings-attached gifts. I quickly threw away the back-handed gifts (gifts given with an insult), but I could never figure out how to handle 'the blanket'.

It was a high school graduation gift from my mother: it was the nicest gift she had ever given me. After ceasing contact with my mother, I resigned the blanket to a life in a storage bin. I kept coming across it, but I was never even tempted to bring it out of storage.

I finally decided that the negative emotional weight imposed by the blanket needed to go. So...I took my largest pair of steel fabric scissors and I decided it was time to take the blanket out of storage. Cutting through the binding was thrilling. I was never allowed to use my mothers nice materials, and the sound (and feel) of the steel blades cutting through a thick wool blanket is best experienced first-hand.

Growing up with an emotionally abusive mother left me very few avenues to express my anger. When I started creating sellable art (age 6), I would show my anger towards my mother by destroying my own work. It was the only control I had in my world at the time; I couldn’t change my surroundings, but I could take away the beauty I had brought into the world. This year I finally realized that my acts of destruction were no longer a healthy way to deal with my feelings. By destroying my work, I was only hurting myself. The person who triggered the dysfunction was (and is) no longer in the picture.

This project, and the many cuts through the fabric, were an act of defiant anger. It wasn’t the blanket itself that bothered me; it was knowing that I still cherished a gift from my abuser. It was knowing that she still had some form of influence over my actions. This time (through destruction), I was able to transform my negative feelings into a beautiful coat to keep my son warm.

My life has improved in significant ways over the past 2 years. Every single piece of art I create is heavy with symbolism, and is somehow an alliteration of my internal struggles. This coat is my art, it is a transformative piece. I treated the blanket as if it had no value, and just that was freeing.

Perfectly aligning the geometric fabric designs was not an easy feat and it entailed me cutting down the center of the blanket; a sewers sin when working with such an expensive material.

I’m not trying to pretend that it wasn’t a (stupidly) difficult first project. I have been hand-sewing for many years, but I didn’t consider material thickness in relation to my sewing machine's foot height. It took me a week of struggling, but when I finally looked at the final product...it was worth it.

I’m proud of how it turned out, but the pride extends past the coat itself. My son simply thinks I made him a cool coat, but I learned many valuable lessons in the process. The most important lesson I learned?

With creativity, the appropriate tools, and foolish determination; you can achieve anything you set your mind to.