Several years ago, I read an article by my friend Christine H. Lee, an extraordinary writer, human, mother, and beekeeper. A trauma survivor and expert, she wrote an article about bees and bears, and how bears are natural enemies of bees, so much so that beekeepers don’t dare wear fur or brown, or even wool socks, lest they be mistaken for bears. Bears cause trauma to the entire bee hive. The bees fly out and attack and sting, and then die. Defending the hive costs them their lives.

Today, the quote that meant something to me is this one:

I am not the actual bear. But I resemble the bear in my diction, my anecdotes, the people we have in common, all the things that take them back to childhood and pain. Or, in other ways, they were themselves lit with alarm—and already on high alert—and there was nothing I could have done.

I’ve experienced being reacted to when a traumatized bee I love deeply mistook me for a bear. I understand. I admire those who defend themselves and fight for their lives, even if they make mistakes doing it. As a traumatized person myself, I understand that sometimes we make decisions that look bad or wrong or crazy, but are necessary for our survival. Staying around for those who love and are beloved to us is essential–but we’re likely to be judged for some of the decisions we made to ensure our own survival. It’s a great irony when a person motivated by the same instincts, but who has judged you for your desperate acts of self-preservation, does the selfsame deeds.

The solution to such problems, Lee writes, is communication. If the bee and the bear can tolerate dialogue, they’re more than halfway home. If they can’t communicate, one is stuck in a bear suit and wool socks, and the bees are stinging the hell out of them. And dying.

There’s no winner in that scenario.

Mothers are by far the most common projective target in analytic theory. Experienced and trained at being a projective object, I identify with Maurice Sendak’s view of the world and am willing to be a quite obvious human wearing a bear (or wolf) suit. I can handle a lot of projections–but my, do they sting.

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^{Image from Where the Wild Things Are, © 1963 Maurice Sendak. Source: Tom Scocca, “Maurice Sendak: No backstory required,” in The Boston Globe.}