A Disco Light to Reach My Mother

August 29th — The songs she never danced to, and the healing I found by imagining she did. 

Madonna as my soundtrack

Lately I've been listening to Madonna more than ever. Not long ago, I wrote about Ray of Light — the album that was my first portal into her music when I was younger. It opened up a whole new universe for me back then. You can read the full reflection here if you'd like. 

Now, for reasons I can't fully explain, Confessions on a Dance Floor has found its way onto my playlist again and again. And this week in therapy, we've been returning to my mother — her memory, her absence, the complicated weight she left behind.

The heaviness of loss

My mother died several years ago. Toward the end, our relationship was not easy. That has left me with guilt and heaviness to carry. Yet deep down I know she forgives me. I know she loves me still, without conditions, wherever she is.

Yesterday, driving home with Sorry playing through the car speakers, out of nowhere I began talking to her through the tears. "I'm so sorry you're not here. You can't listen or dance to this song, the one I know you would love. You can't meet my soul dog, or my soulmate, or see all the things I've become. You'd be so proud. I know you would… but I hope you're in a better place now, wherever you are."

ABBA and childhood light

My mother loved ABBA. As little girls, she and her sister would pretend to be Agnetha and Anni-Frid, singing and dancing in their childhood living room. ABBA often played in our home, and those melodies are woven into my earliest memories. I can almost picture them back then — wide-legged pants swaying, curls bouncing, glittering makeup catching the light — two little girls stepping into their own disco dream.

I know my mother went through traumatic experiences in her own childhood. Perhaps music saved her too. Just as Madonna became my refuge years later, ABBA may have been hers. In the end, it was music that saved us both — the thread that helped us survive our childhoods in different ways. 

Disco as inner repair

In truth, my mother's life was heavy. She was deeply depressed, rarely able to feel the joy she longed for. With a child's loyalty, I carried her sorrow inside me too. But now, when I listen to Madonna's disco anthems — Hung Up, Sorry, Jump — I can imagine my mother smiling again. Dancing again. Laughing again.

Maybe she never really danced to these songs. Maybe these memories only exist in my heart. But that doesn't matter. Because this imagined joy is healing. Confessions on a Dance Floor has given me a new, softer connection to her — one that feels lighter than the reality we lived.

It is my inner repair. A gift to myself, and to her memory.

Your own portal

Has music ever been a doorway for you — into healing, into remembering, or into love? Sometimes a song, a scent, or even a fragment of melody can carry us somewhere we thought was lost.

What matters is not whether the memory is precise or even real. What matters is the truth it awakens in us — the tenderness, the longing, the love.

Because sometimes healing doesn't need to be factual. It only needs to be true for us.

If this reflection touched you, you can find more gentle thoughts and soft moments on Instagram @selflavie. 🪩 

Soft hugs,
Selflavie