winter rainbow

I used to be skinny. I also used to hate myself.

I was a US size 4-6 for most of my teen/young adult life. I always had big tits and a big ass/hips relative to my frame, which is a tiny one (I'm somewhere between 4'9" and 4'10". The rest of my family is also that short). My body was sexualized from a very young age, a site of shame, and as I went through puberty I also learned that it was an easy way to get attention (both negative and positive - it took me a long time how to figure out how to separate the two).

I can remember being 11 years old (the year, interestingly enough, that I became socially involved with the boys that would sexually assault me two years later). I weighed less than 90 lbs. I'd lie in bed pinching the skin on my sides and belly. I was so disgusted with myself, so depressed, so suicidal, that I'd seized on my weight as the thing to focus on (having been bombarded with messages about weight and attractiveness and self-worth from every conceivable angle). I ate nothing but yogurt for a week. I starved myself sometimes, and then I'd binge. I hated myself so much. I wished to disappear. I wished myself out of my skin, away from the frame and flesh I found so repugnant.

And so I developed body dysmorphia.

That stuck around as I developed healthier eating habits, as I stopped doing insane amounts of drugs, as I started coping with the fallout from that assault at 13 and both earlier and later issues, as I started putting myself together slowly and carefully, as I worked on my mental and physical health in fits and starts. I never saw other fatter women as anything other than beautiful, though I'd compare myself to skinnier women and wish that I could look like them, wished that I could benefit from whatever I perceived them to benefit from (the more I unpack it, the more absurd and irrational it's revealed to be). All of my bodily self-hatred was focused toward the things that deviated from the standard - my hair, my nose, my height, my shape. Fat was a strange phantom, a psychic location for my inner self-hatred.

When I went on anti-depressants I gained weight, and a few years ago I was diagnosed with PCOS, and both the PCOS and the hormonal birth control I went on as an attempt to deal with it were contributing factors to my gaining even more weight. I am now a US size 10-12 (still smaller than average, but on my frame that means something different than it might for someone taller than me). At first I was really unhappy with how I looked (as I always had been), but as I began to talk to friends of mine and women in my community who were larger than I am I started realizing a few things:
1) That it's incredibly insulting to other larger women for a smaller woman like myself to speak in the way that I was speaking about my body, regardless of my intention (I feel terrible about this on a daily basis);
2) That I benefited from thin privilege for a very long time, and that I still do to some extent (I can shop in straight size stores, etc);
3) That the weight loss industry is horrifying, misogynistic, manipulative and nothing more than the hand of capital in my pocket;
4) That my health is my own business and that nobody has the right to judge anyone else based on their weight;
5) That I am personally a thousand times healthier and happier in all respects than I was when I was skinny.

Without movements like Fat Acceptance and Health at Every Size, without the words of wise women out there (both friends and strangers), I doubt I would have come to these conclusions. I owe these women a debt of gratitude far larger than I can ever repay. I am proud of my belly, my big thighs, my big hips, my ass. I no longer find shame in my hair, my nose, my short neck. My cleavage is my business, and I can choose to reveal it or not as I please. These aspects of my body are all part of me, and my body is beautiful because it is MINE and because I love being alive. The phantoms no longer haunt me.

I never thought I'd get here, much like I never thought I'd shake the constant cloak of depression and PTSD that I was hiding and suffocating in (that I wrote about in December). But I have, and I write about it here to flout the myth that skinny is necessarily better or more desirable. I feel more loved, more comfortable, more proud and beautiful than I ever have.

We all have different bodies, and we have to learn what's comfortable and what's right for us. Sometimes what's right and comfortable and natural for us aligns with socially acceptable standards, and sometimes it doesn't. I'd love to live in a world that celebrates the beauty and power of all sorts of different bodies, but as long as there is money to be made off of shame and pain the fight for that utopia will be a tough uphill battle. I'm inspired to fight, though. I am full of fire.

the common-sense guide to being a survivors' advocate

1. If there's a story in the news about rape charges or a survivor brings a story to you, don't dismiss that story. Listen. Don't assume automatically that the charges are false or could be false. The chances of it being false are extremely low.

Don't make excuses for the person who is being charged or the person you're being told the story about ("Wow, but he's always been cool to me!" is the most obvious example of the kind of dismissive language/excuse I'm talking about here). No matter your intentions, this is rape-apologist language, and it's one of the many factors that contribute toward survivors not speaking up - a cultural atmosphere in which we we as survivors have historically had our experiences scrutinized, minimized and dismissed.

2. If a survivor comes to you with a story and would like advice as to how to proceed, let the survivor direct the course of action (as long as that course of action isn't dangerous to anyone). Remember that there are survivors' organizations and crisis centers in your area that can help and have the resources to do more than you can alone; that's always my first suggestion. Those organizations will also in many cases help the survivor through criminal, legal and medical filing if that's what the survivor chooses to do.

3. Donate your time and/or money to a worthwhile organization that supports survivors' services in your area. There are local and national shelters, hotlines, and other nonprofit organizations that are always in need of your energy.

4. If the person being accused of assault is an artist or musician (or producer of goods, so on and so forth), step back and question why you're supporting this person's work, if you are. There are enough artists and musicians out there that you're not losing anything significant by not focusing on, supporting or choosing not to associate yourself with that person's work. If that person is a member of your community, help figure out community strategies to deal with the resultant issues. Keep in mind that safety within the community comes first.

5. Take the time to educate yourself. Start here:
Yes Means Yes
Rape Victim Advocates
Support New York
Men Can Stop Rape

organs

Stretch your arm out. Point your finger.
A to B. Nebula. There is no connection.
There are a thousand possible links.

We chew on ourselves. Our mouths are full
of flesh and dead words, cells sloughed off.
The newsday sets when we stop the noise,
screaming silenced beneath the fold.

Ourobouros. Nothing left. Seize the immediate.
Nothing left. There's a narrative. There is no connection.
There are a thousand possible links.

Each of us an empire, collapsing. The dust from
our abandoned cities clouds the sun.
Lay the blame: a new foundation.

mississippi kite

There aren't distinct points demarcating The Time When I Was Severely Depressed (essentially from my beginning memories of consciousness to age 22 or so) from The Time When I Started Reckoning With Things But Was Still In A Lot Of Pain (ages 22-28, roughly) from The Time When The Clouds Are Allowed To Pass (ages 28 - present). Only in hindsight am I able to carve out rough biographical epochs, useful for tracing growth, learning forward and trying not to commit familiar mistakes.

My depression as I knew it is gone, and that's weird. It's weird to wake up without a demon curled around my neck, whispering how worthless I am, sucking out my energy, reminding me throughout the day that the world would be better off without me, that I've fucked up many times over, that there's no atonement possible. That demon was my familiar for so long that without it I found myself not really knowing how to function - I'd relied on it to gauge my actions for so long. It warped my lens and cast a long shadow over everything I could perceive.

I had my eyes examined a week or so ago for the first time in eight years. Turns out I actually need glasses - my prescription isn't that strong (I'm a little nearsighted/astigmatic) but it's strong for someone who wasn't wearing any kind of corrective eyewear. When I put my new glasses on for the first time, the amount of detail I could see was astounding. My brain was processing "blurry" as "normal."

It was a quick adjustment to my new glasses, but the analogy to operating without the demon is obvious. It took way longer to figure that one out. For a period of time, every single step I took was a little bit wobbly. I had to learn all over, in my late twenties, how to assess myself and others, how to operate in the world. I had a decent idea, but the process of rehabituating is a strange and complicated one. After about two years of this, I feel like I'm on solid ground.

The sadnesses I feel now are normal, not all-encompassing, and I know how to deal with them - how to work with them (as I would work with any other strong emotion), how to let them flow over and through me. They don't appear rootless. Meditation, talking/thinking things out and letting myself lean on others (as I let others lean on me) actually help.

The demon - and various events, most of them traumatic - helped ensure that I was a real asshole as a teenager/young adult. Any wounded animal would be. I spent most of my time licking my wounds, trying not to smear blood everywhere, and lashing out at anyone who tried to love me. I count myself extremely lucky that I had music, art, writing, literature and what existed of an underground community (and people who loved me) to fall into, because if I hadn't had those supports I would have tumbled headlong into the abyss. I've spent the last decade or so trying to figure out how to pay others back for the support I received, and I think I've figured out a few common-sense strategies through trial and error - ethical principles, responsibility to my community, and so forth. (The demon enjoys stripping you of common sense and replacing obvious things with its own bent philosophies.)

I have this kernel of hope to offer others in various phases of struggling with the demon in the many guises it appears in, be it organic depression or PTSD or a combination thereof (or something else) - you won't know when it leaves, but its absence will be loud. It'll take time to adjust, but we humans are remarkably adaptable creatures and if you're tempered by the fire, as anyone fighting the demon is, you'll figure out how to reckon with its absence. There's never a day when the fight is over, but there are days when it gets so much easier, days when you can relax your vigilance, days when you can allow yourself to experience real joy and an entire spectrum of other emotions and experiences you previously thought weren't possible. Being a grown-up is weird. Being a grown-up who's spent her life reckoning with this shit is even weirder. It's complicated and it's messy and there is no neat ending - but there is motion beyond, life beyond, and you'll know it when you're in it - and it is worth fighting for. It is worth it a thousand times over.

the void

I haven't written here for a few months partially because I've been busy with Band and Work and Electoral Politics and General Life Stuff but also partially because I haven't felt like anything I have to say is cogent enough or worthwhile/useful enough to put into blog form or even to particularly exist outside of my head.

Here is a poem I wrote this morning.

Glass ribs filled with fluid
holding a dumb heart too
poor to hold up its metaphor
all the weight that we ascribe
to a clot of muscle
clanging around in there like
a churchbell late for service
I can't hear you over the sound
I can't hear me over the sound
I can't hear it over the sound
I say these words so often
they lose their meaning.

Here is this body, here she lies
shorn and glossy and picked for
public view, careful of context,
isn't she lovely. Here is the ghost
standing at the foot of the coffin
a paradox, too insubstantial
too poor to hold up her metaphor.
I can't see you through the fog
I can't see me through the fog
I can't see it through the fog
I say these words so often
they lose their meaning.

more to this life

I've been thinking a lot lately about the strength and possibilities of the female friendships I'm lucky to have. As someone who has rejected some aspects of traditional femininity and embraced some others, I worry about a kind of essentialist view of female-ness, and I'm keeping that firmly in mind as I write this; I am not always referring to ciswomen in the following entry, either. I'm thinking about all of my friendships with other people who identify as female.

The Archetypal Female Friendship we're presented with in modern culture - I'm thinking 'Sex and the City,' that sort of thing - might have a core of sincere love and support (I'm not sure sometimes, honestly), but it is most definitely presented to us as a friendship that in most respects only goes so deep and is divided easily by competition and materialism (and the competition is usually over a romantic partner). Internalized misogyny, as I've mentioned elsewhere on this blog, is a real thing and it eats a lot of these friendships alive.

I'm lucky enough to know so many women who I've maintained long, healthy friendships with; they challenge me, as the best relationships do, to be a better person daily. There's no untouchable subject with most of the women I know, no boundary that can't be explored, no hurdle we can't figure out a way to cross. There is a sense of trust and mutual respect. Without these relationships I'm not sure where I'd be.

This is not to say that these qualities are absent from my relationships with the male-identified folks in my life either. I've gotten extraordinarily picky about my personal relationships - though I can see the best things in most people, it's the rare one I let in close. I think of love as a thing that is huge and mutable - it can be poured into various molds, assigned various activities, but in its true essence it is something beyond those roles and activities, something much wilder and more fluid. My love for my friends is just as powerful as any other love, and just as sustaining. I'm focusing on female relationships here because, again, gender identification affects our lives and how we're socialized to relate to one another in a prism of ways.

So - this is for you. You know who you are. This is for women building communities, finding strength in one another, finding strength in ourselves, refusing to let areas of traditional competition come between us. Thank you.

slave ship

I had a really wonderful day-long hang with a friend of mine who just moved to New York, and one of the topics we discussed while we were thrifting and record shopping and trying to avoid weird spring hailstorms was labor and production in the culture industries (music, fashion, film, literature, art, and so forth).

We in organized labor don't talk about these industries that often, and when we do it's focused on anti-sweatshop measures (which are obviously important and I think something that always has to be borne in mind when thinking about the fashion industry - something that I think a lot of us, myself included, have pushed away thinking about at points because we are so used to fast fashion and the fact that it's very difficult to avoid sweatshop labor entirely post-NAFTA). The particular costs of production and exploitation in the culture industry are echoed elsewhere in the labor market

Our top entertainers make a lot of money. A LOT of money. Celebrity and opulence has become part of their marketing, because ... celebrity sells. Having money is cultural currency. (I'll expound at some point in this blog on this because it's something that horrifies and disgusts me and something that is omnipresent and that I am thus weirdly fascinated by and feel the need to study, take apart and analyze).

If you're anyone involved in the industry other than said top entertainers, though, you get worked to death. You have to deal with jobs that don't tie health insurance in as a benefit necessarily, jobs that treat you like a contractor even if you're a full-time employee, jobs that you hate that you work just because they allow you to go on tour. Sometimes you end up working for a small business that is just surviving day to day itself, and it's difficult to demand the fair compensation due to you because even the owner of the business isn't making enough to get by. The culture industry is like a highly magnified version of the stratified class system we function in at large - the very small top percentage take it all, everyone else gets fucked. The film industry is the one aspect that has been unionized for a long time, but if you're self-producing or not working for a big studio, there are major barriers there too.

The recording industry hasn't figured out yet their strategy for remaining viable in an age of digital media. The rest of the culture industries are all struggling with similar conundrums. Now is the time to organize this work force (or not to cede ground in already-organized industries); now is the time to assert what is ours as laborers. Now is the time to try to balance out the employer-employee relationship as best we can and to lobby for federally funded social programs that allow major grants to the arts (look at Canada for a pretty great system as far as that goes).

A side note: I maintain that sex work is part of the culture industry and that we need more worker-owned collectives/union shops for sex workers; the Lusty Lady is a start, but I have yet to see the stage (pun intended) opened up further.

There is much for us to critique in the products culture industry at large as conscious consumers as well as producers, as activists and feminists. We must not forget that worker advocacy in these industries is equally important (if not more important in some cases); the process must be critiqued as well as the product.