Not the chosen

Monday, November 17, 2008

“There is a spider out there”, she said pointing toward the bathroom, “with only three legs.“ She is almost cracking up in a wicked laughter as she tells me, matter-of-factly.

“Okay”, I think. “What?“, I say.

“She pulled them off!“, she says with a smile on her face that says this is interesting, very interesting indeed. “At least I think so.“

“Uh..“ is all I can think of saying. “Oh! Oh, that would explain the spiders in the basement with some of their legs missing! I bet Carlita totally crawls her way down the stairs, you know, exorcist style, licking the stair railing on the way down, back arched the wrong way, fingertips and curled toes defying gravity. No matter that we have a lock on the door leading downstairs. The latch should be no problem for her and her demon ways!“ is what I’m thinking.

I feel like that time when my grandmother was absolutely positive that I had been sexually molested by my step dad. I am not even kidding. For all I know she still thinks so, and the worst part is I just don’t know what to say to that other than what has been said already. What more can I say? There is a sickness deeply rooted in my family. We all love each other, but we are crippled with dysfunction.

It gets kind of old.

THAT or the OTHER

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

The other day I nearly started crying, that is how much I was laughing. The image inside my head that got me laughing was of me showing up to school and no one being there because everyone else was on the scheduled field trip that I knew about but plain forgot. How many times this happened during my childhood I’m not sure, but enough to imprint that feeling of walking into an empty school, knowing that something is really.. off. Like, where are all my classmates? kinda wrong.

At the time, of course, it was highly upsetting. I was THAT kid. The one who forgot to bring running shoes or indoor shoes to gym, their swimsuit or perhaps their towel on the one of two days a year we’d go swimming. I spent countless hours sitting outside our apartment because I forgot the key, tucking my jacket under my ass because the stone stairs were cold, pressing myself far into a corner so our neighbors wouldn’t see my shame.

I relayed this to Jelly Man the other day in between howls of laughter. Why I thought of it I don’t know, and why it struck me as funny is still a mystery, but it turns out he was THAT kid too. And if 15 years is not enough to put things in perspective then I don’t know what is, and still… I really hope that if Carlita ever has some weird revelation about her childhood once she is grown, it won’t be that life goes on even if you are THAT kid. Hopefully she’ll be that OTHER kid.

Doing the deed, planting that seed

Saturday, October 11, 2008

The economy is in the shitter, we just had our bought-used-less-than-half-a-year-ago car fixed to the tune of all that we had in our pocket + lint, and now it has come to light that the boiler in the basement, the one that makes sure we don’t turn into icicles in the winter, is leaking badly and may have been leaking badly for years - that, at least, would explain a whole lot about the porch which crumbled this summer and certain walls with cracks that looks like they have blood poisoned veins running through them.

And we are currently waiting for one of my eggs to ripen so we can fertilize it.

As difficult a situation it was to have to choose between keeping the pregnancy with Carlita or terminating it (and dude, it was fucking hard) it was also a little easier than the situation I find myself in currently (although if you were to go back in time and tell me that when I was still holding that positive test in my hand I would probably have laughed hard and then punched you in the face.) She was there, already growing in my belly and when we did decide to keep her it was easier to see what we needed to do to accommodate our new “situation”.

Now, planning - it’s not as easy as it looks. I feel slightly crazy for wanting another baby/child/sibling for Carlita in times like these, and yet I have that ever burning desire. I’m also starting to see just how much of ME has been eaten up by the day to day upkeep of the household* and caring for Carlita, and how little parts of ME are being found again every time Carlita gains pieces of her own independence. I’ve been so wrapped up in being the mother to a baby for the past two years that I forgot that I am a person too, and just as I’m starting to remember things that I enjoy doing for my own sake we decide to have another child.

*Which, yes, I only started doing regularly recently - but trust me, it has always, ALWAYS been a subject of great agony to me, whether I actually did it or not. Probably more when I didn’t keep it up than now when I pick up everyone’s mess.

I am crazy, aren’t I?

But this time it IS a decision from start to finish. I really DO want another baby, and Jelly Man says that his general feelings on babies and family is “let them grow like weeds” which sounds vulgar but is Jelly Man’s way of saying; “Dude! I’ll have as many babies with you as it takes!“ So as far as hard decisions go, this is one of the easier ones.

So yes, maybe “planning” means “looking at the facts and deciding to have a baby anyway”, which in my opinion makes planning totally overrated.

Fat

Sunday, September 14, 2008

When I started on my quest a couple of years ago to accept the fact that I have incurable hair loss because of my trichotillomania, I didn’t know it would lead me down a different, yet so very similar, path of fat acceptance, via the rocky road that is body acceptance.

My body, it is fat. I accept that. Now.

For as long as I can remember diets and dieting have been present in my day to day life. My mother is diabetic, so her need to watch her eating could not be avoided, but it was less about the superficial and more about health*. My grandmother, on the other hand, has always been dieting, and she is no closer to reaching her goal weight today than she was twenty years ago. Sure, she has dropped in weight from time to time, but what good it has done her I’m not really sure, as she is still, to this day, body-fat obsessed and more or less just as plump as I remember her being most of my life. Yo-yo dieting, ahoy!

*She was also not fat by any means when she was diagnosed, some year or so after my birth.

I think I was 13 when my mum took me to the school nurse to discuss my possible weight problem. It was humiliating, most of all, but also gleeful because the nurse measured my height and put me on the scale and made no big fuss about the results. Heavy boned, I think was the term she used to describe me. My mum, however, was not convinced. “She said that just to be nice, you know“, she told me in an agitated voice once we left the office.

The mixed messages did absolutely nothing for my 13 year old self esteem. But nor did it result in the body I have today - which is to say - the fat body I have today. I’m sure feeling worth less than my thinner peers and my mother’s concern (be it for my health or my appearance - both are probably true) could have made my transition from regular teenage chunky to nearly 30-year-old obese that much faster, but overall the damage done was not physical nor visible.

My first boyfriend was very body conscious and the three years I spent with him were years of frustration at failed diets and fitness craze. At 19 I was bicycling everywhere, watching what I was eating (albeit having regular pitfalls, because when you tell me I can not have something, of course I MUST. HAVE. IT!) When nothing worked, indeed when things just seemed to get “worse” and I kept putting on the kilos, I went to a test trial for a new diet pill in a last ditch effort to lose weight, but was turned down because my blood pressure and blood sugar was normal and so I didn’t qualify for the study, which was to help pre-diabetics to lose weight and gain control of their illness.

Seven years of self loathing took seven years of unconditional love (in terms of outer appearance, not in the way I treat the people I come into regular contact with) to get back to a place where I can now separate the person I am from the body I inhabit. My body, it is lumpy. And my hair, it is patchy. Me? I am so much more than the sum of my parts - and they are not small parts to begin with. There is the option of weight loss surgery, and I won’t minimize the grounds on which people choose to have these surgeries, but I know it’s not for me. I am also not willing to starve my body of necessary calories just to conform to some kind of standard - and more likely than not gain back the weight I might have spent many grueling months or years to lose. Now that I am past the hurdle that is self acceptance, I see what I need to do to live my life to the fullest.

Be healthy. Screw the rest. And I guess that is where we have to start separating health and fat - not because we need to separate ourselves from the fat, but because we need to see the difference between being unhealthy and being fat.

I’ve started taking interest in my appearance again. I’ve begun wearing jewelry just for the fun of it. I should definitely exercise more, but it’s no longer for a purpose that cannot be fulfilled. Instead it’s to achieve something I never considered before - to live healthily in a fat body. To love myself just the way I am, even if what I am is also fat (among so many other things.)

There is so much more to say about fat. The disposition to be fat vs. being fat because of how much you eat (exercise and keeping an eye on my diet did absolutely nothing for my weight, while someone naturally skinny might eat whatever they wish without gaining weight - it works both ways), and that is absolutely what I needed to start my self-acceptance journey - but I needed to tell this part first. Of how I got back the courage to love myself. And to give thanks.

Thank you, Jelly Man, for showing me the way.