It’s been a very full few weeks since last I posted, with quite a few ups and downs, and I am still integrating all the pieces of that. I’m gonna try to talk about at least the major items in here.
Depression
I had a pretty tough week or so in which depression reared its ugly head in a way it hasn’t in some time. This time around that featured:
- Lethargy
- Feelings of hopelessness
- Negative self-talk (often at the semi-conscious level)
- Futile attempts to self-medicate with food
I’m not positive what factors made the most impact as far as this episode starting. I know stress is a part of it. I was already on the downward slope when I lost my wallet on a bus, and had to cancel my debit card and credit cards, and if that’s not stressful I don’t know what is. I’m still dealing with the fallout from that but have pulled out of the low at least. At some point in there I made a conscious effort to spend any energy I could on self-care. I made myself take walk breaks midday at work, thereby getting sunlight and fresh air… at least as fresh as the air around my office ever is. I made sure my food intake was more nutrient-dense. I drank lots of water. I don’t know that these things were what pulled me out of the abyss, but I’m sure they did not hurt. And as of this writing, I’ve been on an even keel for an extended period. So, yay.
Body Stuff
One thing I’ve been trying to focus a lot of attention on is being present with, and fully aware of, my body. The things it does, what it is, how it changes, and what I do with it are worthy of attention. It may seem like an obvious statement to some, but it felt revolutionary to me just writing it since I’ve spent so much of my life trying to pretend I didn’t have a body at all.
Having said that, I’ve been thinking for years about getting a piercing somewhere, and last weekend I actually did it.
My new ear piercing!
The darker circle-ish line around my ear is an indentation from just having done my morning saline soak; I’ll be doing that twice a day for the next few months while this heals up.
I am really, really happy with how this experience is going so far. This is the specific piercing I’d been wanting for quite a while. I did research on other people’s experiences as far as the piercing itself, healing, good places to get them done, etc. before taking the plunge.
As I was on my way to the studio (Body Manipulations in San Francisco), I was a bit nervous, as I knew it was going to be painful; having a large needle put through the cartilage of your ear in two places is a significant thing. In the studio I was also pretty keyed up, but this was still coming from a place of confronting my own tendency to hide from pain. I had made a decision before leaving the house that I would remain fully present for the whole experience, which I was choosing to have, and that I would accept and face the painful part.
The staff at Body M were very friendly and professional, and took a careful look at both my ears to see whether the piercing I wanted was even feasible – not every ear is shaped right to do such a piercing and have it heal properly, and they wanted to make sure before forging ahead. This, as much as anything else, made me feel I had chosen well in terms of which studio to visit.
The actual piercing was over very quickly, and not nearly as painful as I imagined it might be. Don’t get me wrong, it hurt, but it wasn’t anything like as intense or protracted as a tattoo. About 30 seconds after the jewelry was in, though, I got a little lightheaded. The piercer got me some water and a glucose tablet, and let me lie down for a little bit, and then I was fine after maybe a minute. Once I got up and went to pay, things had changed to an absolutely euphoric state. And then… I stepped outside. And that’s when things got weird.
I became aware of how profoundly my proprioception had changed the moment I felt a breath of wind on my ear. It was hypersensitive to a degree no other part of my body ever is. It felt like my ear was three feet wide and likely to be bumped by passing cars. Breezes were pleasant, yet also slightly worrisome, as I was not in a sylvan glade but instead walking down a filthy city street complete with assorted nasties in dust (and possibly even aerosol) form. After about three days this died down to a more or less normal level of input, but my goodness, that first few hours was a trip.
Adventures in Structural Clothiery
As I have gained weight in my life, one of the places that’s happened in a pronounced way has been my upper body. I have a big Buddha-like belly, but I also have breasts. The fat deposits in my breast area have distributed themselves not only over my pectoral muscles but also in my armpits. And this has been a source of angst for a long time, for several reasons:
Shame
One of the culturally ambient messages I absorbed as a young person was that I wasn’t supposed to have breasts or enjoy any sensations in that part of my body. The thinking went: I have to do “boy” things, and any “girl” things I do will be subject to the severest censure; breasts are a “girl” thing, possibly one of the very most such; thus I must not experience or acknowledge them. When I hit puberty and my nipples became hypersensitive, rather than going with that and celebrating the cool new thing my body could do, I forcibly inverted my nipples and covered them with Band-Aids, for months, until they faded back into being indistinct and ignorable things. When I started really putting on weight in my 20s, and got more tissue in that area, my avoidance field around it grew as well, and it got to the point I didn’t even want to look in the mirror.
Taking Up Space
Having these fat deposits that spread around into my armpits means that my arms don’t hang straight down. They push out to the sides. It feels as though I’m going about my day, arms rudely akimbo, elbowing strangers and friends alike. And I haaaaaaate that. I don’t by this mean that I hate my body, but that I dislike this particular aspect of moving through the world as it’s constructed in the body I have. Things have a characteristic width (aisles, seats, doorways, etc.) and that’s not compatible with having elbows that stick out. Sure, I can clasp my arms in front of me, but I can only do that for so long before it becomes exhausting and causes muscle cramps.
A Solution Begins to Coalesce
So I got to thinking about what I could do mechanically to solve my space problem. It happens that I was thinking these thoughts while also being in a period in my life when I’m defiantly accepting my gender-non-binary self, and ruthlessly weeding out old beliefs about what I am allowed in terms of the experience of my body. When I found my old back brace, and wound it around my chest and armpits to shove my armpit fat out of the way of my arms, I couldn’t help but notice that I had just created… a lot of cleavage. And then it hit me. Oh yeah, I have breasts. I mean, they’ve BEEN there, but it’s fascinating how much one can successfully ignore with enough dedication. It’s like they say, if you put your mind to it you can accomplish anything…
So the back brace was a partial success; it let my arms hang much closer to my body, but the seams and edges sort of chafed, it was really hot, and it made my silhouette look very odd. Then a light bulb went on. Yes… there is this concept of a foundation garment that people wear on their upper bodies, that provides structural support and sort of moves flesh around to where the wearer wants it to be… it’s been around for ages… oh, right, a bra.
So I took my measurements, and got one. And where the back brace was maybe 70% useful, this bra is around 90-95%. All of what it’s doing, it is doing with strategically placed elastic, and to be frank I think I actually want something with underwire and maybe even side boning to get myself to the 99%+ awesomeness range. But it’s way more comfortable than the back brace was in every sense.
A Surprising Bonus
What I wasn’t prepared for, and was really pleasantly surprised by, was how self-affirming it felt to wear a bra in terms of how it feels on my chest. Where in my youth I did painfully self-negating things to my breasts, this garment cradles them softly, giving a nice satiny hug, almost as if to say “it’s okay that you exist, you are valid, and deserve to feel good.”
So I think I’m gonna keep on with explorations in this vein.
I was gonna write more, but I’m really kind of out of momentum after that last bit, so watch this space for more updates soon. Hopefully sooner than “weeks from now”.
Maunderings, Digressions and Faint Chittering Noises 