1/ Still life of precious objects 2/ Rainy stroller dance off
3/ Heart explosion 4/ Batard Boulangerie aka Paris on Fraser st
5/ Spring! 6/ Ro Ro
7/ I love dating my husband 8/ Checking tacos off the list
9/ My favourite season 10/ Walks in any weather
11/ School: not glamourous, but satisfying 12/ Fuel
Of late...
February and March were//
A. a long, long time ago
B. super significant
C. worthy of a much belated pen pal letter
The last time you heard from me in January, I was struggling under the weight of school, and my body was taking a toll under all that strain. It was hard for me to heed her call to slow down, and everything around me felt like heaviness.
Things changed.
That is to say, I changed.
Stress continued to be present, I continued to be underslept and overworked-- but I stopped resisting.
I stopped trying to make everything easier, better.
I dared myself to feel All the Feelings. Even the shitty ones. Especially the shitty ones.
I told the truth. I stopped answering, "Fine" when people asked, "How are you?"
And the result? Everything was easier, and everything was better.
Huh.
Be More Specific, Please (You're so cryptic sometimes)//
What! Alright.
I did something that was a big deal for me, in early Feb. It started a snowball effect of healing that continues to this very moment of typing. I decided to tell the truth. A couple of wise and loving little birdies in my life encouraged me to take this risk, when I was very unsure that it was the right move to take.
Because I was struggling and not necessarily listening to my body in the ways it needed, my skin was hit hard in January. I was having a hard time adjusting to school, and felt sad, and angry, and lonely, and overwhelmed, but didn't know how to love myself in spite of feeling these things, so my skin absorbed those painful mouthfuls on my behalf, to show me things needed to change.
(Thank you. You are so strong and brave.)
My eczema flared badly on my face and body, I became reacquainted with insomnia, and all the while, I worked and went to school, keeping silent and stoic. I started flushing bright red again. The colour would come and stay for minutes or hours. I turned red because I was hot, then because I was flustered, and then: angry, excited, neutral. I was alternately pink, or crimson. Sometimes, in the darkness of my living room, all by myself, instigated by nothing, I would suddenly feel my face on fire, simply while I was watching TV.
You could say that I started to shrink a little.
I made myself smaller. Made less eye contact in my classes. Kept my head down. Didn't want anyone to notice the rash, or the dryness, and especially the redness. Avoided mirrors.
I felt the most exposed in my Group Counselling class, where we sat in a big circle facing one another, taking turns talking. A group of near strangers in a grad program that emanates a feeling of professionalism; not so conducive to soul-baring. There in the circle, I willed the ground to swallow me whole when my face began to flush. I walked a confusing line of drawing as little attention to myself as possible, and pretending I was cool, breezy, unaffected. Every time I came to campus, each and every cell asked each other anxiously, "Will we flush today? Will they see all our imperfections?"
By February, I was exhausted. Frustrated, because I didn't want to turtle myself in school: I wanted to be engaged. Sad, too, because the only place I felt like I could be authentic and lost was in my own home with all my messy feelings safe to see the light of day. Being real only when you're on your own is a lonely prospect.
Then one day, I flirted with a thought.
What if I don't have to keep this struggle to myself?
What if I name what is going on for me?
What if it doesn't matter what colour my skin is?
How smooth?
After all, the power of a secret is in the shame of not telling. There really is nothing left if it gets expelled into the clean air.
I gathered some plucked courage from somewhere deep inside. And after four weeks of class in Group, where I contemplated opening my mouth, but then would scurry back into my heart. . . one night, I took a deep breath and said my truths. It was at the very beginning of class, after my instructor posed the familiar question: Is there any leftover business to discuss?
Oh yes. I had a lot of leftover business. They tumbled out of me like frogs seeking rain. My limbs shook a little, and then a lot. My voice croaked like a young boy. I told them most of what I told you, keeping my eye- line near the crowns of their heads, afraid to see expressions of rejection and awkwardness on their faces. Being vulnerable is like walking off a ledge and free falling.
But.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw nods and felt knee squeezes, and sensed moon beams of compassion and respect. What I thought would be Too Much Information, especially for such a professional setting, was actually Just Enough Realness. Afterwards, people came up to me and said "I'm struggling too. Thank you."
My heart smiled and smiled.
Since that moment, I have learned that crumbling the mask of distance and perfection is my soul's journey to becoming brighter, fuller, free. When I am authentic with you (especially with the things that are fragile in my life, things you have to hold as delicately as blown glass), the risk is scary but the reward is magnificent.
In saying that to my classroom of people, in saying this to you, I am actually saying to me:
I love myself exactly as I am.
And that has made all the difference.
What Did You Love?//
♥ Witnessing the miracle that is our bodies: since my admission to my colleagues, my skin has gotten exponentially better every day. I stopped turning red that same evening. It is simultaneously astonishing and as it should be. Heal your mind, heal your body.
♥ Having our best friends come visit us from the Yukon, and being reunited with pals that know us as a unit. That knowing is very special stuff. Especially if you can survive a mouldy ceiling collapsing in your rental cabin, and still be friends.
♥ Being asked to be the godparents to the cutest (and biggest) baby in the world, Rowan William Evans! I don't know a lot of babies, so I may be biased.
♥ Beef dip sandwiches at Batard Boulangerie on Fraser. Oh mannnnnn.
♥ Amidst the nuttiness that is school, writing down a list of dates for my love and I to do together, as a beacon of hope and something to look forward to once things calm down.
♥ Getting to check the first date off the list: getting massages + eating tacos
♥ Going to a workshop where I learned how to embrace, rather than reject my body symptoms. I learned that Slug is my unlikely protector animal, and that being Serene (calm, composed, collected) 100% of the time is unrealistic, and too much of that is when Mr. Inferno (anger, passion, redness) comes out
♥ Kicking ass at school. I mean, I have a hunchback as a result of living permanently in front of my computer, but in March, I kicked. Serious. Ass.
♥ Friends and family that were so understanding that I had very little time to be social. Miss you.
♥ Spring arriving. It is the most peaceful season. Hope is in every bud, every petal, every bee.
On Friendships in your 30's//
During these last few months of not talking to you, I made new friends. Good friends.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This may not be paparazzi worthy to anyone else, but I feel like I haven't made new, good friends in years. Years! I keep trying to tell people about this amazing feat, but they just look at me like I'm cray.
But I assure you, friendship in this stage of life is different than in other ones: everyone usually already has their nuclear circle, are coupled up and therefore occupied, and generally caught up in responsibilities of the Adulting world. Honestly, making friends at this life stage sometimes feels like courtship to me. People are busy. You can get rejected! It's not like the halcyon days of youth when just being in the same homeroom or Intro to Psych class can land you a bestie.
The point is: I made friends in my program, they get me and I get them, and I think I'm going to keep them around.
Yay!
Current fantasy occupation//
Florist.
Current wardrobe thoughts//
Undergarments costs too much money.
I've been wearing skinny jeans for a decade.
I wish it was socially acceptable to wear head to toe denim, Monday thru Sunday.
Upcoming//
I recount how Portland felt like an oasis, and try to catch up with my travelogues from Europe. I make more of an intention to write to you, as it always helps to calm me.
I try to soak up every morsel of time I get with my real flesh and blood friends and family, before I dive back into the whirlwind of summer semester.
I bike, and feel the sun on tanned limbs.
How have you been, these months of my absence? Have you been taking care of your baby heart? I hope so. You deserve so much good.
With all my love,
Your pen pal
<3 Lovely post. Even though I'm not shy about sharing my skin story with friends and strangers, it's a helluva lot harder to talk about it when it's happening in real time. You got cahones sis.
ReplyDeleteYou made friends in Intro to Psych class? That's impressive. Also undergarments take as much effort to make as a T-shirt...that's why the local handmade stuff is the same price