The beauty of a life well lived...

Before I begin with what I really came here to rant write about, let me first say that life is starting to take shape out here. I have officially opened up a private practice (as you can see below) which is the largest piece to the puzzle of my life in Colorado thus far. To help subsidize my income in these beginning stages of growing a practice, I am currently doing some very part-time work for TCON, the nonprofit I traveled to Uganda with years ago. Lastly, I am also developing a relationship with a local nonprofit called Pomegranate Place and am discovering new ways to be involved in their mission to offer resources and connection to women throughout the Denver area.  Having my hands in so many different pots on top of keeping up with my three active little ladies has left me feeling a bit discombobulated. So I'm trying to establish some sense of rhythm and routine...not rigidity and the death of spontaneity...but rather, establish just enough of a sense of ritual to not feel like I'm crazy. Setting aside specific time to blog will be part of the establishment of rhythm, and considering I will now be blogging on my Emerge Counseling website as well, I have decided to blog once weekly in this space...and Fridays seem like the best day to do just that!  Who knows...the quality of my writing and thoughts might even be better after taking the time to really ponder on things throughout the week.

And now, on to what I really came here to address.  I was listening to a popular radio station yesterday where every weekday afternoon two of the radio show personalities host a "mate-debate."  In these debates they have a couple call-in to the show to each deliver their respective sides to an on-going argument they have grappled with in their relationship. On this particular show the couple were fighting over whether or not the wife should breastfeed their soon-to-be-born infant.  The wife indicated that she did not want to breastfeed because she had already sacrificed so much of her body in just being pregnant and she didn't want to "ruin her boobs" as well.  The husband said that he would love her boobs no matter what and that he thought she should stop being selfish and breastfeed because it is what's best for the child. The main issue in the debate was whether or not the decision should solely be the wife's simply because it was her body, or if the man had any right to be a part of the decision.

It was a painful conversation for me to listen to as caller after caller utilized their few minutes of airtime to berate the wife for her selfishness or to berate the two male radio personalities for even suggesting that a man had a right to have any say in the decision.  Aside from my own opinions on a woman's right to make choices for her own body, or on the benefits of breastfeeding both physically and psychologically (for both the mom and the baby), ultimately where my mind wandered to was how sad it is that we allow arbitrary and culturally-bound definitions of beauty to so significantly influence such weighty decisions in our lives. Who decided that the impact on the female body of developing, carrying, birthing and sustaining a life is anything less than beautiful?

art

A friend posted this find on facebook and I just had to share it here!  The beauty of connection portrayed in an absolutely breath-taking way.


Nuit Blanche from Spy Films on Vimeo.

BOOBS

Yup. That's actually what I want to write about this morning. Some people go to church on Sunday mornings, but I sip coffee and ponder upon such things as breast augmentation while listening to music (over the background noise which consists of little girl giggles and occasional arguments over whose turn it is on the wii - yes we are a house full of heathens). I've actually been wanting to write about this subject matter for a little while, but the discovery of a magazine article that outlined the history of this form of female mutilation engorged my desire to take to the keyboard(pun intended).

I should start by admitting that I am a small-busted woman. Making peace with this reality is a struggle - I won't lie. I'm just over 5'8", big-boned, and athletically built (when I'm at my best). Having a small bust has never felt very proportionate, but it is how I've been made and I'm committed to learning to love my own unique form. This is quite the task when we live in a world that has constructed an illusory ideal female form and named it beauty. What we have claimed as beauty is actually not even real. It's fake. It's unattainable in actuality. It requires face and body paint, hair extensions, starvation, injections, multiple surgeries and an airbrush to achieve.

I was recently spending some time with a couple of girlfriends and we stumbled right into a discussion on breast augmentation. One of my friends confessed that after she was finished bearing and nursing children that she was planning on having at least a lift, but that she would also consider just going slightly larger in size. This was coming out of the mouth of a petite and lean woman who naturally fills a size C cup easily. I read today that this is the longing of 70% of all women (assuming Allure magazine's statistics are accurate). This particular conversation carried a tone of casualness that made it difficult for me to offer my own thoughts on the matter. But the conversation has replayed over and over again in my mind in the past month. The tale of Hollywood's latest plastic surgery poster child, Heidi Montag, has equally implanted itself into my mind.

So I've taken to this space to say what I wish I would have said in that conversation. I'm so saddened by how this mythyical picture of beauty has robbed men and women from experiencing and identifying true beauty. Are we so blinded by the lies that we're bombarded with daily that we can no longer recognize how distorted our understanding of beauty is? We call what occurs to a woman's body after she has birthed and nurtured the life of another UGLY or DEFORMED. I have nursed three babies - I know personally what happens to a woman's body afterwards. I struggle to look into the mirror and declare BEAUTY where beauty is not seen in this world. I struggle because I don't feel the truth at all times. But I refuse to live my life in honor of the lie. I refuse to give into the distortion on behalf of myself and on behalf of my three beautiful daughters. I want them to know always that how they were created inside and outside is a gift to this world. I want them to know that their mother embraces the ways in which her body has evolved as a result of bringing them into this world - they are the marks of a life truly lived! I can only hope that I continue to wrestle the lies as I encounter them through the natural process of aging.

But even as I feel the tears well up as I'm typing so passionately about this subject, I'm aware of the ways in which I succumb to the cultural construction of feminine beauty nearly every day of my life. I will likely shave and pluck hair that grows in various places on my female body and paint my face before walking out the door today. I too am a part of the perpetuation of these myths. We all are.

Beauty By Faith Gauthier (age 9)

Beauty is the flowers
in the
Meadow
The water
in the
Brook
A person
in the
World
A face
in a thousand
faces
The life
that you
deserve
That is
the
Beauty
Of
Life

Be forewarned squeamish readers: this is a gross one

I think I have a rare disease of some sort. I'm pretty sure I've suffered from it since shortly after birth (or perhaps I contracted it in utero). My meager attempts at self-medicating haven't really worked out so well and I'm trying desperately to make peace with the persistence of this illness. So instead of dissociating with an episode of the Bachelor where I can get lost in analyzing the messiness and pathologies of another, I'm attempting to work out some sort of peace treaty with my personal plague here in this space tonight.

For as long as I can remember, I have struggled with parts of me oozing out all over the place. Almost every place I've travelled to, every person I have met, every situation I have encountered - has been stained with the presence of my own personal form of ooze. The actual oozing isn't even what irks me the most -- it's that I feel like I have little control over when it oozes, where it oozes, how pungent the smell of the ooze is or how others respond to what oozes out. It manifests itself in the form of anxiety most frequently - rapid speaking and breathing, shakiness and unease. At other times it's demonstrated in a quickness to anger or tears. I honestly think I could live with the oozing if it only happened in the comfort of my own home - the place I love to hide and find rest in.

Today was a day where I felt like I oozed all over the place (and surprise surprise - I'm still oozing right here right now). And I hate days like today. I think part of the self-contempt comes from a deep place of shame because I often feel as though so many of my peers are better at controlling their oozing. I've at least come to believe that no one is free from ooze entirely, yet some exhibit a greater capacity to contain and prevent leakage. If only I could learn this skill.

But I haven't thus far. I haven't learned how to completely self-soothe in every situation. Maybe I'm not supposed to be able to accomplish such a task. If I knew how to control my oozing entirely I swear I'd never let it out in public. It never feels very safe. But if I did that then I may never be able to find someone who knows what to do with the substance that desperately needs to get out from inside of me. If I could control it, it would be left unattended deep inside of me - eating me from the inside out. It would turn into an even more deadly infection.

Yes, my oozing can seem obnoxious or annoying to some (especially when it leads to an inability to focus in class and a need to talk out of desperation to one of the few friends I feel understands me). It can create awkward moments of certain exhibitionistic behaviors. But there are times when my ooze temporarily loses it's stench and the sulfuric shades of green fade long enough to see the beauty amidst the nastiness. Do I really believe that? It feels a bit like I'm trying to convince myself that there is beauty in my own desperation, my own neediness that manifests itself in anxiety, anger and sometimes sorrow. But I do long to believe such a thing. It's easier to believe it on behalf of the other than it is to believe it for myself. Maybe someday. Maybe someday I'll make peace with my oozing all over the place.