I was raised by my mother because my father died when I was six. As a child I was surrounded by powerful women, hippie earth-loving women who talked about feminine power, equality, education, art, mind-altering substances, and spirituality. These were women who bucked the system, rejected patriarchy, and followed their hearts. I am grateful for their example.
My mother walked that path as well, in her mind and heart, if not always in her actions (as it is with everyone, I think). She was a survivor of abuse at her own mother’s hands and at the hands of a few of her eight husbands. She rationalized sometimes that she had brought on her abuse because she was so hard to live with. She had a lot of hang-ups about sex and her body because her mother had a lot of hang-ups about sex and her body. My mother taught me, because she knew it to be right even as she doubted it in her heart, that a woman’s body is sacred and beautiful, sex is sacred and beautiful, the ability to menstruate and give birth is sacred and beautiful. She taught me this with her words, but with the way she interacted with men and her own self she taught me something entirely different. She pushed so hard against what she felt she was being told to do and be that she never made peace with who she was, and our lives were full of crazy ups and downs because of her inner turmoil.
I relate this history not because I’m angry at her or because I wish to diminish her in any way; we were close up until her death (and still, even) and she was a powerful woman with an enormous heart who taught me what unconditional love really means. I share it because it was the foundation of my own struggle to integrate my intellect with my physical, animal body. Because she couldn’t do it, she inadvertently modeled not being able to do it (though she did far better than her mother did, which makes me hopeful for my own daughter).
I have struggled in my body as long as I can remember (some of which I’m sure is just my personal trip): being a “high-strung” type, I suffered from panic attacks from the time my father died. I was small and I hated being small. I was weird and wore weird clothes. I didn’t feel pretty or graceful the way I was sure I was supposed to be. I was sensitive and cried for the bullies who beat me up because I knew they didn’t truly understand what they were doing to me. I saw things heard things felt things knew things, but could barely speak to anyone.
I became remote (kids at school called me stuck up), tried to be invisible. I had(have) a horror of throwing up which was unfortunate since, because of my nerves, I felt nauseated fairly often. To deal with that conflict, I created rules about how much I could eat and when, I compulsively took digestive enzyme tablets and counted the hours since I’d last eaten (I couldn’t go to sleep less than eight hours after eating because I might wake up and be sick, since that had happened once). Once puberty started to hit I also become compulsively concerned about being fat. I naturally cycled between thin and pudgy (growth patterns and all), but trained myself to eat as little as possible because girls were supposed to be thin, and I got bullied enough by the other kids; I couldn’t give them more ammunition. Also, hunger was a comfort to me, it meant I could reliably predict what my body would do. Part of my compulsive behavior was a clear attempt to exert control over my body since I couldn’t exert much control over my environment, but part of it was also an attempt to force my body to conform to cultural norms (something I’ve always sucked at). I desperately wanted to believe that if I could just be the kind of girl I was supposed to be, then I would fit in and other kids would like me.
Getting my period was, actually, something I looked forward to because it meant I was growing up, and I really didn’t enjoy being a child overall. Of course, once it started it became a source of pain and embarrassment. Cramps sucked and I felt I was dirty and smelly during my moon. I noticed all the commercials for douches and “feminine” sprays and powders to cover my smell. I compulsively cleaned myself. My mom joked about it being “the curse” but I knew she honestly felt that way, even though it didn’t agree with her ideology. My mom talked very openly about all aspects of sex with me though her own sexuality was deeply repressed, so I learned to do the same thing. I had strong desires and even fooled around a little with boys when I was a teenager, but I was so embarrassed by my desire that (coupled with my natural reticence and lack of social skills) I could barely look at them afterward. I felt like such a failure as a woman, as a feminist. Frankly, feeling embarrassed by my desire and being afraid to let go and enjoy myself are things I still struggle with.
I longed to be a boy because I didn’t feel like I was very good at being a girl.
Then, when I was 20, my own female parts betrayed me. I got ovarian cancer. The doctors said it was a fluke; they had no explanation to offer, other than bad luck.
My first indicator that something was wrong was when my periods stopped, then my belly swelled and I felt dizzy and fatigued. Mind you, I had too many hang-ups to be sexually active (no longer a virgin though; I wanted to get the whole virgin stigma over with, not realizing I entered the slut stigma realm) so I knew I wasn’t pregnant. That didn’t stop the doctors from administering pregnancy test after pregnancy test though. For four months they took that tack, until I finally went to the ER in excruciating pain and got an ultrasound which revealed the potentially deadly evil thing in my body: my own ovary grown to the size and shape of a football, filled with cancer-laden fluid. I’ll never forget the way the doctor said those words, “You have a tumor, it’s malignant.” The silence was so loud in that moment I was deafened by it.
Surgery and four months of chemotherapy followed, along with horrible nightmares, countless tears, paralyzing fear, and moments of profound, simple joy at still being alive. And, let me tell you, I have never felt so awful as when I had chemo, a cold, and my period at the same time.
In truth, things got better for me after that because I stopped being quite so fearful of all the small things.
You know what they say, right? It’s pretty much all small things.
My real journey to this place, now, began when I had my daughter. I loved being pregnant. I have never felt so much like the Goddess, so intimately connected to the earth, as when I was pregnant. The birth itself was fairly traumatic, not because the actual physical process was traumatic but because I was treated so dismissively by the hospital staff. They literally ignored what I was telling them about what was happening in my body. They thought I was exaggerating or just plain wrong because how could I possibly know what was happening in my own body? After all, I had no medical training.
I actually was a fucking CHAMP at childbirth. My labor was all of 4 hours (thank you Pitocin. Not.), unmedicated, and incredibly painful and intense. I got through it by diving into the ceaseless waves of contractions, waves of pain, dancing at the edge of the void from which all things arise and surrendering to the process. I let go of mind and freed my animal self to ride it out. But when I couldn’t successfully breastfeed beyond a couple months, I felt like I had failed as a woman, again. I later discovered that both my children have an arched palate which made it impossible for them to latch, but at the time I just assumed it was my own failing.
Then I took a birth doula training workshop and it radically changed my whole understanding of my body, especially in relation to western medicine and patriarchy. It was a revelation! Seeing the videos of women giving birth was so beautiful I just cried and cried. And I learned about how much women’s bodies have been demonized and how birth was treated like an illness to be cured by male doctors with drugs, and I cried some more.
I didn’t become a doula at the time, but I did have another baby and that experience was nothing like the first one because I finally knew better. I don’t regret my difficulties in giving birth to my daughter because it taught me so much about myself, about the process of birth, and how to release fear in the face of darkness, not to mention that it brought forth my daughter. I am filled with pride and love for my children, unconditionally (thank you, Mama).
Not long after that, my husband and I began actively relinquishing our futile attempts to mold ourselves to societal norms. We moved back to California; eventually we found Come As You Are Coven and finally felt like we had found home. I began training with the Amazons and started to learn to believe in myself, not just in others. I started to feel strong. I started to feel beautiful. I found an opportunity to use my doula training with my Amazon sisters and I knew it was holy work because no woman should ever feel like she failed at something her body was designed to do.
I’m no slave to biological determinism, by any means, but the simple fact of the matter is that all people on this planet came from the body of woman, and that deserves respect and awe. We exist because women exist and have babies. Science and technology, art, philosophy, religion…EVERY human endeavor; they all exist because women have babies, because we carry the miraculous blood of life and have the ability to grow new people inside our very bodies. Period. (haha)
You’re welcome.
And every woman, whether she can or can’t, wants to or doesn’t, cis- or trans-, deserves respect and awe because we nurture the world, knowing that the continuation of our species depends on it. Being a woman is complicated, often hard, and as beautiful as a golden sunset over the wine dark sea.
I thank my sisters for that knowledge. Because they saw it in me, I came to see it in myself.
As change is the only constant in this universe, my beloved Amazon sisters and I are now transforming as a tribe. We embrace this change, as we know change means life, even when the road is a bumpy one (c’est la vie!). Releasing the Amazon mantle and embracing a new paradigm, I am now a sister in the Bloodroot Honey Priestess Tribe. Hail Eris!
What remains constant, however, is our passion to create sacred spaces for all women to find the Goddess within, for if that which you seek you find not within, you will never find it without. Indeed.
