A Lesson In Reframing I Learnt From My Mother

In October 1964, at six years of age we immigrated to the US from Haiti which was under the brutal dictatorship of “Papa Doc” Duvalier. After my Grandfather was assassinated in the Spring of that year my parents made plans to settle in Worcester, MA where my father Dr Raymond Borno had been invited by Dr Gregory Pincus (developer of birth-control pill) to join his team at The Worcester Foundation.

Clearly our social and economic situation would change drastically from being very privileged and surrounded by friends and family within the small elite, to being in a foreign land where my father had to re-qualify as a surgeon Obstetrician and Gynaecologist.

To prepare her four children for a more modest Christmas than what we were accustomed to, my mother shared with us the story by O’Henry, The Gift of the Magi. It is a story about a married couple who have no money to buy Christmas presents for one another. She had beautiful long hair that she sold to buy a gold chain for her husband’s pocket watch, and he sold his watch to buy combs for her hair. Instead of feeling deprived at Christmas, I felt enriched by this powerful and loving story that I never get tired of sharing with others.