Growing Pains

Nothing is more frightening and painful than seeing one's offspring hurt. In the following ten years, I would soon learn emotional pain is harder to watch than physical and about a hundred times harder to heal from.

After the ballroom incident, the girls were separated. I'm not sure whose idea it was, but we were soon aware it was a mistake—one that snowballed out of our control, pardon the expression.

If I thought the sad expression on Anna's face at the separation and Elsa's refusal to play with her was painful, nothing prepared me for Elsa's reaction to everything. At first, I thought once the initial shock and fear over what her powers could do wore off, Elsa would come out of her room and rejoin us. Sadly, that would not be the case.

Elsa's isolation only increased her fears—but not of the wind or the boogeyman of her childhood, but of her powers and herself. My once loving daughter who would stop at nothing to ensure her sister's happiness was pushing that same sister away at an exponential rate. It started simple enough with a straight forward, "Go away, Anna" then graduated to complete cold shoulder silence. With the increase of her fear of hurting anyone, a decrease in her control was the only natural response.

The solution was simple enough. My husband got Elsa gloves. He started working on meditation techniques. "Conceal it, don't feel it, don't let it show." Elsa seemed to take to it well, much like the old Elsa who was a quick study. We were all confident it was working. So much so, that in the evenings, after Anna had gone to bed, Elsa would join us in the study to work on her lessons. I would sit by the fire, working on my needlepoint, while my husband would sit at his desk reading trade agreements, agricultural reports, or going over royal lessons with Elsa. It was looking like things were returning to normal, all things considered.

On one of these particular occasions, Elsa was sitting at my feet, going over the history of our ancestors when I noticed she had moved to lay splayed out in front of the roaring fire, her work abandoned. The light from the flickering flames lit up her glistening eyes. "Elsa, dear, what are you doing?" I asked gently. I wasn't sure she had heard me at first.

I thought I caught a slight sniffle from her. "I…" she hesitated. Elsa never hesitated. "I though maybe I could melt the ice out of me." She wrapped her arms around herself, closing her eyes in shame, a tear escaping. I was immediately on my knees beside her. My husband rose from his chair, but I shook my head at him, staying him for a moment.

"Why would you say that?" She remains in her prone position and points her arm to where she was working. At first, I don't see it. Then, I see something glistening on the carpet. Upon closer inspection, I see it is her quill encased in ice.

I put my arm behind her back and push her up into my arms. "Elsa, honey…" I don't even know where to begin. I just tighten my embrace, rubbing circles on her back. She stiffens at first, then she relaxes and puts her arms around me and I feel her shuddering with tears.

What she says next is muffled by my chest, but one word is clear—"failure".

"No, honey," I raise her chin to look at me. "You're not a failure." This only elicits a sob. "What makes you think that?" At this point, her father has come over and kneels nearby, but not too close to make her uncomfortable.

She sniffles some more, "I was reading about all the past rulers and all the great things they did…what can I ever do that'll be great to help Arendelle?"

I look to my husband for help.

"Sweetheart," he begins. "Greatness doesn't come from big deeds. Greatness comes from within."

That was apparently not what she wanted to hear as she just turns her face back into my chest. A mumbled, "All I have is ice inside me," was heard before her tears begin anew.

I give my husband an exasperated look, as if to say, "Good going."

"What your father is trying to say is that you have a great amount of love in you. Your greatness comes from that, sweetie. What you'll accomplish will be greater than our ancestors. You don't need an act of physical strength to prove it."

It takes a while longer before she's calmed down. She pushes away from me and goes back to her work. I think things are going to be okay. But she only slams her book shut and quietly asks to be excused. Her father silently nods his head. And then to put the nail in the coffin, he says the one phrase I've grown to hate, "Remember, conceal it…"

Elsa groans, but finishes it, "…don't feel it, don't let it show."

"That's my good girl." –the second phrase I've learned to hate.

She curtsies, but before leaving, she throws her frozen quill into the fire. The hissing it makes louder than the large door she shuts, but not louder than the door to her heart.