"when life gets broken, you fix it"
Apr. 19th, 2012 05:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
omnia_mutanturSometimes, it's still the old Haven music that really evokes muscle memory, and I start doing the come-have-sex-with-me dance in the kitchen and I am so very, very pleased with myself when I realize that was ten years ago. And now I'm here, with rainbows from the prisms I've hung, a bookcase full of cookbooks, laundry thumping away upstairs.
I've stopped drinking, I've stopped smoking, I've stopped cutting, I've stopped eating meat, I've stopped sleeping with mostly-strangers just to get someone to look at me. I'm not lost, I'm not self-destructing, I'm actually managing to pull off the exact opposite of that. I have so many more tattoos and grey hair and smile lines and so much more love in my life.
I had a defiant moment in the mirror today, when I started to freak out about how much work I'm skipping, the red veins in my nose, my frizzy hair. And I told myself, fuck this noise, Omnia. You had a fucking mastectomy eight months ago, and reconstructive surgery four months ago. You're a fucking rockstar. You're on your feet. And it doesn't matter if I think it was a long time ago, it doesn't (necessarily) make it not an accomplishment because other people are doing more. (even typing that out made my stomach turn)
It's seductive to me to always having something wrong, in part because it means I don't have to try to figure out the long-term, or even the medium-term. It's a conversation topic, it's an excuse, it's a skillset that I've already got. It doesn't require confronting my belief in an afterlife, or determining what mark I want to leave, now that I've shaken off the speeches of being smart means I'm going to save the world.
I know I talk about being childless all the time, and I think from the outside, the frequency of topic might look like indecision (though that topic is closed, at least biologically), but I just don't see the other side of the coin. I know that story, I've read the books, seen the movies, watched the tv shows, I know that it's another way to make sense of the world, that growing new human beings is a little bit like having a god, it's a purpose-driven life. So there's this huge why? I'm leaving unanswered, and when I look beyond the confines of coping, I don't know what comes next.
And maybe this is all the shrill cry of my low self-esteem. I'm talking a lot about definitions in therapy these days, breaking things down into baffling components. I only seem to know one reason why people leave, and that's because I wasn't worth staying. But I'm not certain what worth means in that context, I only know I wasn't. And I don't think that making myself happy is a worthwhile goal, but if I'm trying to uncover the meaning of worth, that statement ceases to make any sense.
There's a lot of pure joy in my life, and I need to refocus the microscope on that. Not what I've lost, but what I've kept, what I've yet to find.
I've stopped drinking, I've stopped smoking, I've stopped cutting, I've stopped eating meat, I've stopped sleeping with mostly-strangers just to get someone to look at me. I'm not lost, I'm not self-destructing, I'm actually managing to pull off the exact opposite of that. I have so many more tattoos and grey hair and smile lines and so much more love in my life.
I had a defiant moment in the mirror today, when I started to freak out about how much work I'm skipping, the red veins in my nose, my frizzy hair. And I told myself, fuck this noise, Omnia. You had a fucking mastectomy eight months ago, and reconstructive surgery four months ago. You're a fucking rockstar. You're on your feet. And it doesn't matter if I think it was a long time ago, it doesn't (necessarily) make it not an accomplishment because other people are doing more. (even typing that out made my stomach turn)
It's seductive to me to always having something wrong, in part because it means I don't have to try to figure out the long-term, or even the medium-term. It's a conversation topic, it's an excuse, it's a skillset that I've already got. It doesn't require confronting my belief in an afterlife, or determining what mark I want to leave, now that I've shaken off the speeches of being smart means I'm going to save the world.
I know I talk about being childless all the time, and I think from the outside, the frequency of topic might look like indecision (though that topic is closed, at least biologically), but I just don't see the other side of the coin. I know that story, I've read the books, seen the movies, watched the tv shows, I know that it's another way to make sense of the world, that growing new human beings is a little bit like having a god, it's a purpose-driven life. So there's this huge why? I'm leaving unanswered, and when I look beyond the confines of coping, I don't know what comes next.
And maybe this is all the shrill cry of my low self-esteem. I'm talking a lot about definitions in therapy these days, breaking things down into baffling components. I only seem to know one reason why people leave, and that's because I wasn't worth staying. But I'm not certain what worth means in that context, I only know I wasn't. And I don't think that making myself happy is a worthwhile goal, but if I'm trying to uncover the meaning of worth, that statement ceases to make any sense.
There's a lot of pure joy in my life, and I need to refocus the microscope on that. Not what I've lost, but what I've kept, what I've yet to find.
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no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 12:10 am (UTC)Yeah, that. What you said there. Lemme go write that down.
I'm glad you recognize the joy in your life. Really, that's pretty damned awesome. Own it and congratulate yourself for it. :-)
no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 03:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 12:27 pm (UTC)I've stopped drinking, I've stopped smoking, I've stopped cutting, I've stopped eating meat, I've stopped sleeping with mostly-strangers just to get someone to look at me. I'm not lost, I'm not self-destructing, I'm actually managing to pull off the exact opposite of that. I have so many more tattoos and grey hair and smile lines and so much more love in my life.
This, especially.
no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 01:57 pm (UTC)We should skype sometime or you should come visit Texas, cause we are awesome. :)