Unapologetic Inquiry #2: The Comparison

Aleathia says:

Can you recall an occasion when you compared yourself to someone? How did the comparison impact your self-esteem and self-confidence? How did it impact your ideas about the other person?

     I have to admit that I snickered when I read this question. I can’t remember when I started comparing myself to others, but I know I was very young. I compared myself to every woman I met, especially if I found them attractive physically or mentally. Each time I was in the room with someone I felt was the prettiest girl in the room, I would start down a head to toe comparison list. Each line on that list I’d find myself inadequate. To be honest, I thought I was never pretty enough, smart enough, or interesting enough to be in the same room as them.


(Image by Laura Callaghan. I do not own this image.)

     As I got older, I knew I had some desirable qualities and I could manifest understanding of them, but only if I wasn’t in the presence of other women. I didn’t have any confidence about my gifts and abilities. I was always overweight and I narrowly believed this excluded me from being truly loved and desired. It caused me to have bulimia in high school and though after high school I did not partake in that practice exactly, it did give me an aversion to dieting. Restrictions were never safe and threw me into an obsessive nature. A year ago I tried to “just watch calories” and my child told me to stop because he couldn’t stand the person I was when I counted calories.

     Sadly, the woman across from me became an enemy of the state with her beauty and talents which I didn’t think I measured up to. I have spent a lifetime without very many close female friends and these relationships require a significant amount of energy from me. I have to fight myself to be nice and kind and not think the other woman is out to get me. It sounds insane and on some level, it is. I’m sure these reactions developed out of my relationship with my mother, but that is another story for another time, I’m sure.

Thanks for reading. Be kind to each other.
Aleathia

The Body Is Not An Apology: Unapologetic Inquiry #1

Aleathia says:

     Here I am again, random, as always with a topic that falls from out of the blue. I’ve had a week off from work and instead of going places like originally planned, I stayed home. This was no lazy week off. I have been cleaning out my house of the remnants of my toxic boyfriend. I have been cleaning out my soul. Personally, I am still reeling from the Philadelphia trip and it is hard for me to shake the feeling that even when I thought I was being still enough to unpack my lifelong luggage, I was still running. I am definitely afraid of the ugly I will find and have to claim with a flag of my country. No one wants ugly.

     I took the rare Sunday off to take my son to the Ithaca Market. When I had weekends off we would go all the time. It was a nice little trip to share coffee and a pastry, conversation, and sometimes a walk. We’d soak up the sights and smells of an open air market and feel good about life for a little while. Our usual bakery wasn’t there and it gave me a little panic because things would not be “like they always are”. I scoured the market three times for them each time hoping they would appear until Kai pointed out that a place we passed three times had perfectly beautiful pastry. This meant I had to step out of my comfort and try something new. I’m not opposed to this concept at all because I love new things, but I had been testing my mettle all week and looked forward to the comfort of sameness. The pastry was delightful. The time was not spoiled.

     We went to the Commons and walked around. It was hot and we were overdressed with the hope of fall. We were sweaty and getting cranky. We stopped in the DeWitt Mall because Kai wanted to go to the guitar shop. He is dropping chorus this year in favor of guitar lessons. He wanted an instruction booklet to help him along at home. I picked up one for my Ukulele that sits sad and underplayed. I took a cue from his playbook. I need to dust off my life and make time for all things. We stopped in the Buffalo Street Books. I don’t go there often and I’m not sure why. It’s a very lovely shop. I also have been trying to not buy too many books since I have shelves of unread wonders already.

     A book immediately caught my eye: “The Body is Not An Apology” by Sonya Renee Taylor. It’s colorful and flashy but something in me made me tiptoe to reach it from the top shelf. I opened it and saw things in myself that made me cringe and I put it back on the shelf. I walked around looking at other things. I found a pencil sharpener for my specific pencils I found in Philadelphia. I found a poetry book. And then, I was standing in front of this book again with a feeling of dread and panic. Then I was at the register buying it.

     In the quiet of my house, I read the prologue and sobbed. Do you know that kind of sorrow that is mixed with the realization that you have been so cruel to yourself for a lifetime? Yes, it was that sort of sobbing. I recognized myself. I had forgotten what I looked like underneath the shame.

     I’m in chapter one and Sonya professes that she is not going to fix my problems with self-esteem or self-assurance, but she is waking me up to myself. She calls it radical self-love and maybe this is what I need after 40 years of putting myself down, hiding who I am, being something for someone else, harboring abuses not meant for me, and being quiet when inside there was screaming. There are “Unapologetic Inquiry” bubbles in this book. Questions to be answered honestly without worry of shame. Normally, I would keep such things to myself, but I feel like this process needs a wider opening. My average post gets 30-40 visits. That is wide enough. So without further ado, here is Unapologetic Inquiry #1:

“We all live in multiple intersections of identity. What are your intersections? How do your multiple identities affect each other?”

     I am a middle aged white woman, divorced, and single. I am a product of childhood trauma. I am a mother of a transgender son. I am an emergency room nurse, an artist, a writer, and a Buddhist. I do all these things living with a thyroid and an ovarian condition, arthritis, depression, anxiety, and adult onset ADD.

     The childhood trauma informs all my other identity intersections. It was the base of my life. It was how I learned to do everything. It steered me to choose a career that is filled with trauma everyday from strangers. These traumas change the way I look at the world as an artist and a writer. These traumas give me something to meditate over. The combination of my health issues help me with my self shame for being overweight. There are wheels that spin so fast I can’t get off without feeling like it will send me into a depression, so, I stay on the wheel. The childhood trauma made me strong and allowed me to stay alive and achieve, but it made me go about it in the wrong way. I have achieved goals without letting people in my life, without sharing the best parts of me because I don’t trust them to not break them and walk away.

***

      In the last month, I have started to see how these intersections behave with each other and this might be the key to recovery if I can be brave enough to keep looking. I am not going to profess that I will be any less random on this blog, but my hope is to share these Unapologetic Inquiries in case you can’t find the book or you don’t have access to it. Ask yourself the same questions and see what comes up. I’m tired of living in a world that is defined by others who don’t know me or care about me, and who think I should look, act, feel like something that pleases them. I’m not sure how many years I have left in the world, but I would like to know at least some of the time I staked claim to them.

Thanks for reading. This was a long one. Be Kind. Love each other.

Aleathia

I'm No Architect, or How I Looked Myself in the Mirror and Cried

Aleathia says:

     This week I returned from the Trans Wellness Conference in Philadelphia. My first inclination was to write a blog about the happenings there, and this may still happen. There is some great information to share and thoughts about Philadelphia in general. Since drifting back to this sleepy town I live in, I've had time to decompress the city from my bones and try to get back to "normal" living, but the emotions that were dredged up during the trip continue to haunt me.

     Tuesday, I awoke with the distinct need to do yoga and meditate. I'd done neither of these things in a long while, at least not with great intention. Afterwards, I got dressed and gathered some books to stroll and read on Market Street. One of the books I chose was Molly Bashaw's poetry collection "The Whole Field Still Moving Inside It." There were a few lines in the poem "Who Will Remember What This Looked Like From Above?" that staggered me into falling down a rabbit hole:

Had she ever, on a Sunday afternoon after the matinee, I wonder, run with the antique dealer up this hill and looked down, too?/And were they standing underneath the same tree?/ Did they kiss, or did he whisper to her earring first, words that made her soften in her dress?

     My rabbit hole started by asking myself questions like "Is this the sensation I've hoped for all my life and does it happen in real, consistent relationships? Is this reserved for chance happenings and literature, but is always unexpected?" From there I thought about the Tarot Card spreads I had been doing each month that were filled with signs of love. There has been none in sight, or at least none that I have let myself see.

     This is a barrier of my own doing most of the time. Individuals are not generally attracted to someone who is not comfortable in their own skin and this has been my state of being for most of my life. Ply me with alcohol and you would never know that part of me existed, but in my natural state, you get an armored version of me. I have always been curious as to how to legitimately shed this wall I've built around me. I have seen therapists. I have done self-help books. I have meditated. The barrier has remained stronger than the bullets I throw at it.

     How does this have anything to do with the Trans Wellness Conference? I knew you were wondering. I did say it was a rabbit hole. My first workshop on the first day of the conference was in the general track and it was about how bullying affects transgender kids at home and at school. What I didn't expect from this workshop was for them to review the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study. I had read this years ago after watching a TED talk on the subject. I cried then and I cried again in front of all these people. It was how I started my weekend. My ACE score is 8 out of 10. I am a product of childhood trauma, this is a fact. I have lived with it, meaning I generally stuff it way down where no one can see it and move on with life. But have I really moved on? On the outside, I look successful. I have an amazing job, a nice house, comfortable living, and a few wonderful friends. I have the means to be creative and travel. What I don't have is the capability to have a meaningful, lasting relationship.

     The conference was like watching the barn I built around the armor, burn to the ground in the face of the poverty and oppression I saw on the streets, observed gender phobia, the re-emergence of childhood trauma, and the notion of my CIS, white privilege. I took in all the information from these workshops and felt it change how I looked at gender and healthcare. For a few days I understood what it was like to be a minority in both race and gender. The conference was 95% transgender/LGBTQ people and professionals. I strangely felt like I didn't belong or even, that I was an enemy spy. It's possible my writer's imagination gets away from me at times.

     I felt out of my body almost the entire trip. I cried several times to strangers, sometimes in the bathroom, and sometimes with myself in a corner. I felt existent and non-existent at the same time. I'm not sure if this is what is meant by "living in the moment," but it was frightening. I don't do well with the loss of control on any level. I felt raw and exposed and I longed for the comfort of my small town despite not feeling like I belonged there either. At home, I at least know the streets and recognize faces, which provide some comfort.

     In the past, I have been to many cities: New York City, Ottawa, Toronto, Atlanta, Seattle, Phoenix, Kansas City and so on. I have never felt afraid like I did walking down the street in Philadelphia. It was unnerving. I have worked in the ER for over 10 years. Not much phases me, but I was literally shaking afraid. I was overcome with the sense that I didn't belong anywhere in the world. I knew then that something had to change. There were a lot of things to face, so many things that had never seen the light.

     Once home, I felt the need to deep clean everything in the house in order to deal with my personal chaos. This isn't the answer, but what I saw while cleaning is that I let things go and called it being "too busy." In the past, I used food to build my armor and decided a few years ago that it would be the quickest way to kill myself adding to obesity and a family history of diabetes. So instead of dealing with the problem that caused the armor in the first place, I threw myself in to "projects" which ranged from sewing and fabric art to writing a novel. Add about 50 more side projects to fill up the spaces in between and you have my life. If I keep busy and keep moving, I never have to stop and take a true stock of my pain and suffering. I am intelligent and I know this isn't the way, but it is what I do.

     What I have robbed myself of are the most important things: sitting still, meditation, yoga, blogging, reading, and honesty. Avoiding all of these things keep me from making friends and falling in love because I am unwilling to let go and open up. This is what childhood trauma does to you. It makes you trust no one. It makes you a builder of armors. It makes you lonely. It makes you never able to ask for help because of what you might owe in return.

     The Philadelphia Trans Wellness Conference showed me that I need to be alive. I need to peel back the layers and trust that someone will love me for who I am, not what I look like. It showed me that I am lovable, kind, smart, and funny. It showed me a passion for social justice I didn't know lived in me. I have a lot of work to do at age 46. I have to stop telling myself soft lies and believing them. It's time.

     As always, thank you for taking the time to read. My only hope in sharing these things is to let you know that if you've suffered in these ways, you aren't alone. We have to stop thinking of ourselves as islands with contained damage. It is what keeps us apart as a society. The human condition is a shared thing. We all have a part in it and a responsibility to stand up, speak up, and be heard. The world is constantly changing and if we want to survive, we have to change with it. Have an amazing day. Do something nice for someone without the need for return.

Love,
Aleathia