Protectors and Assailants

When I go out, I start sorting guys into two groups: protectors and assailants. I quickly label everyone in my head in order to navigate my way through the night. Although this strategy keeps me present for a while, it always ends the same way. Slowly and then all at once, I shut off completely. And when I get to this point nothing anyone says can bring me back.

The assailants in a bar are easy to spot. They look at me, my skin crawls, and I know. When they talk to me I feel nothing and everything all at the same time. I've tried to describe this panicked feeling before, but the exact words to explain it are still elusive. I fight to hold conversations with assailants as long as I possibly can, but eventually their every word, every movement pushes my heart to a cliff. As I near the edge, the alarms sound in my head and I have to excuse myself to find my nearest protector.

Protectors are guys I know well and have a level of trust in. Their close proximity to me is never a threat, but not always a comfort either. As they see me start to unravel, they hold me like a fragile piece of porcelain. Cradling me too cautiously, encasing me so I don't shatter. They create a barrier between us and the rest of the world so that no one can touch me. Although I'm grateful for this at first, inevitably I panic again. Not in the heart stopping way that the assailants incite, but instead this panic squeezes my lungs. I lose my ability to breathe, suffocating under the weight of their fierce protection.

And then I'm alone.

Not physically, as my protector won't leave my side, but mentally I've rowed myself to an island of my own making. I sit there as the ocean laps at my oars, trying to coax me back in. But I can't. I won't. I refuse. I've made my choice to disconnect and now I'm lost to the world.

As I shut myself off from this confusing crowd of protectors and assailants, I search inside myself for you. You reassure me that things won't always be like this; I need to be patient. That someday, I'll be ready to stop labeling guys as either protectors or assailants. Little by little, I'll start viewing them as they actually are. Not just there to attack or defend me, but as real people who are searching for connections in the same way I am.

So even though it feels like there's you and then there's everyone else, I'll wait. I'll keep attempting to find my way through the safety and the set backs, the challenges and the comfort, the help and the hurt. Because I know on the other side of it is a world full of love. A world that I'll belong to again if I take my time.

Don't Wipe My Tears (A Poem)

Don't wipe my tears

just let them fall

streak my cheeks

drip and crawl

From my eyes

pooling at my nose

caught on my lips

dampening my clothes

Don't wipe my tears

I like how they feel

they wash my skin

and help me heal

Wouldn't shut them off

even if I could

because with the bad

there's always good

Don't wipe my tears

they serve me well

teach me patience

help me to quell

the piece of me

with doubt and fear

and put in its place

a pride sincere

Don't wipe my tears

they're mine to own

understanding this

shows how I've grown

No longer afraid 

of what tears may say

because I make the rules

and tears are ok

Confidence

I bought a membership to a hot yoga studio when I finally felt ready to start exercising and taking care of myself again. After signing up a couple weeks ago, I made a goal. I saw the beautiful women with perfect yoga bodies coming to class in just a bra and shorts and I decided that I wanted to be one of them. I wanted to have the perfect abs and the confidence to show them off.

Today in class as I was dripping sweat (its hot yoga so the studio is over 90 degrees) I started thinking about the goals that I made. How will I know when my stomach looks good enough? How will I determine when I am ready to let other people see it? Maybe it was the heat that got to me or the fact that my shirt was drenched, but I decided that my stomach looked fine and now was as good a time as any.

Although taking off my shirt and standing in the middle of the classroom in only a bra felt like this monumental moment for me, surprisingly the world didn't stop. In fact, not a single person in my class even looked at me. They were all in deep concentration, working on their own poses and centering their own thoughts. It seemed that the only person who cared about what I was wearing or how I looked was me.

Leaving class, I started thinking about the goals I made for my body. I've made hundreds of similar goals before, but every time I reach a point where I give up on myself. Because there is never a way to determine when you're thin enough or pretty enough or confident enough, creating these kinds of goals always leads you down a path of inevitable failure. Even after learning this lesson over and over again, why did I continue to subject myself to such unfair pressure? Why did I think that goals like the ones I made were even goals worth making?

I decided that the purpose of working out should be to find balance. Whether that means relieving stress, improving the way my body functions, or connecting in a spiritual way, exercising should be an avenue for growth, not punishment. Going into a yoga class with the mindset that I'm not good enough and that I'm doing it to "fix" myself completely contradicts that. I should be doing it to take care of myself, not to push myself to look a certain way.

Even though I met my goal this afternoon of being one of the women in class in just a bra, it felt very empty and anticlimactic. It actually made me feel silly to know that I put the confidence I'd need to do this up on such a high pedestal. It seems that I actually had the confidence to do it anytime I wanted to. Somewhere along the way I must have forgotten that and started looking externally for a sign of this strength. When in reality, I didn't have to go any further than looking within myself.