Crying for No Reason

Perhaps it's because I'm in my first real long term relationship or perhaps it's because I'm adulting hardcore these days. It's still unclear to me exactly how I became so aware of how dramatically up and down my emotions are. In therapy I brought this up a bit and we explored a number of things. My latest therapist, the scientist seated behind the glasses and the analytical stare, always trying to figure me out but never revealing her own secrets- explained to me how hormones may be effecting my emotions. It came as a shock to me that women actually get emotional twice a month. It's normal. So I started to pay attention to when my meltdowns seemed to occur and, surprise surprise, it was when I was ovulating.  I felt jipped.  Like, how did it take me 33 years to discover this? Why wasn't it printed in large ink on our feminine products? Why weren't more women talking about this? Sure, you've got PMS but what's this other space about where you want babies, everything is sexual, and you're suddenly so sad you don't know what to do.

Yesterday, as I was lying on my bed and my boyfriend was holding me I just started crying for no reason. He gently snuggled me and said, "Why the cry?" I answered, "I don't know." I mean it was probably more like "I...d-d-d-on't know" stammered through sobs.

So here I am again thinking about these things called hormones and how wild it is that we have them. How interesting too that a week ago I began this Ketogenic cleanse. I've been thinking a lot about what I put into my body since I got sick with long COVID in 2020. Both balancing hormones and inflammation in your body all go back to diet. It's amazing how much we can actually help ourselves by simply eating healthier.

This has been a long road for me though.  I tried a few times to give up foods like sugar because everyone who had similar arthritis inflammation from COVID told me it worked wonders. But I'm so adaptable to my environment it was hard. I knew I needed a community doing it with me.  Simply put: when you live with roommates who bake and want to share, it's hard to give up sugar.

But my boyfriend suggested this two week test and as I read about it and realized that we'd be doing it together, it felt like a dream come true. It's not about eliminating sugar and carbs altogether. It's about detoxing your body from them so that you can slowly introduce less amounts into your system and see how your body reacts. It's the most doable and healthy thing in my mind. It's a reset.

One of the many reasons I'm attracted to him is his core value of health. He pushes me to be more healthy. We went through long COVID together and then got better together. He's a marathon runner so when I push myself running I know I'm not going to die because he's there going, "This is normal. Keep going."

It's not that I'm not a healthy person. It's that I never really thought of my body as being important before. My head was always in the clouds. The real world seemed like a distant reality.  My faith and spirituality was far more important to me than my physical body. But what I discovered was that A) a lot of insecurity was driving that dissociation I had with my body and B) Faith is embodied.  We can't be our whole selves: experience our emotions and be fully connected to God and others without being connected to our bodies.

I think the insecurity came when I hit puberty and didn't really go away until I was like 27. Before I turned 11 I did ballet and gymnastics and swam and I was obsessed with these things.  Suddenly fear and shame hit me like a tidal wave when I got my period. I no longer wanted my body to be seen. I felt awkward. I got away with not working out for many years too because I had a fast metabolism I guess. I was told to cover up and I was also simply afraid. I used to do backflips all the time. Suddenly I was afraid of falling on my head.

But I did Taekwondo when I was 27 and started running a few years back. I began the process of being embodied again. I started going to yoga and pilates classes. The best way I got reconnected to my body was this class called the Alexander Method. It was revolutionary for me. I remember leaving the class one day and just breaking down in tears. The release of my body released my emotions as well.

Diet. Exercise. Sleep. I think these are things that I learned from my experience with recovering from long COVID are game changers. I instantly knew when I was stressed because my arms or legs would start throbbing. Taking time out to rest and nap when I need to has changed my life. I'm the type of person who will push through any activity just to cross it off my to-do list quickly. I have found that this is more than often not the best method to maintaining my health.

So what is the point of this blog post?

I suppose I want this to be a sort of intro to a daily blog of sorts on my experience with this cleanse and exercising. I want my embodiment to have a memorial space for others to make the pilgrimage to as well. I am longing for my spirituality, my emotions, and my whole being to be unlocked through the transformation of my daily habits. I know that may sound like a hyperbolic thing to say. But I truly believe the more I pay attention to what's happening in my body- even just keeping track of my emotions, the food I'm consuming, and how I'm moving through my day- I think that will be helpful for me. So maybe it's a journal but maybe it's a space where we can discover our bodies again.

33 and up to me

33 and up to me.

Every birthday I come up with a catchy rhyme for my age and this was what I chose.

Gods been speaking to me a lot about my choices and perspective. Life is made up of a billion small choices that lead to large choices.

The reality is- I used to love blogging because I felt like I had these “prophetic swirls” where I reached this deep understanding and I used the blog to preach to others and solidify the idea in my mind.

I set out, at least my intention was to do that very thing with choice. This year will be a year where I will only do what I want to do and nothing else. I’ll finally make decisions that I’m happy with and not make decisions to please others or to play it safe.

But, in delaying this post, I think I’ve become more curious about even this decision to write this post. The very words I am contemplating seem to hang in midair.

I struggle with making choices because I’m afraid of making the wrong ones. 

In the book Compassion and Self Hate Dr. Theodore Rubin explores why this is in a chapter that should be labeled "mantras of the self compassionate."  This section was titled with the words: "I need, I want I choose" and begins so: "My needs must be taken with seriousness if I take myself seriously." 

He goes on to say, "I never abdicate the chance to tune in on myself and my needs in favor of glorious martyrdom or in futile gestures of self-destructive sacrifice...I refuse to blind myself to any desire, to feel less than or more than human about any desire, to allow any desire to be a source of embarrassment to me or to reject it." Essentially, he is asking the question, are you making a choice out of your own desire or because you think you want it because it further feeds self hatred?

He talks about his patients and how they will stop at nothing to avoid making a choice.  "Their last ditch effort is to get someone else to make a choice for them. They're trying to ward off self hate, because they know about self-hate following choices made in the past." I've experienced myself doing this so I can relate.

He is trying to connect these two ideas.  The things we want and fear to decide and how we delay those decisions because we think we will make a mistake.  

"It means that I find my presence and myself to be a nuisance, an intruder and a stranger on the scene and that my actions and inactions are designed to ignore or even to obliterate evidence of my presence." I never thought about it but it sort of makes sense.  If I am constantly denying my needs or desires in favor of others then I am saying that I don't matter.

I am attending a church that also wants to explore what's underneath our actions and words.  Our pastor asked a question about the motivations behind this prayer in the midst of difficulty: "God, what do you want me to learn." He said he realized he prayed it so that he can learn it and not suffer again. His desire was control rather than surrender.

I feel a parallel reality happening in my own thoughts. the same with this.  If I have to justify why I want to do something to myself and others, then I must not take my desires very seriously. If I constantly feel embarrassed about my feelings then I must not take myself and my humans very seriously.

Coming back to my mantra, I guess what I’m saying is I want to make choices without the intense anxiety every time. I want to say, “here’s what I’m doing because that's what I want!” And not feel like I’m totally failing each time. I’ve worked through this a bit in therapy but I need more than just coping mechanisms to change. I need a deep reassurance that what I do isn’t life or death. That in fact, so called mistakes, can create beauty.

I also want to recognize and memorialize the 10 years I’ve been in New York. I’ve made a lot of decisions. I’ve worked really hard to prove to myself that I am worthy to be in this city. I’ve spent a lot of years sowing my time into church ministries. I’ve lost myself and found myself again. I’ve been broken and restored. Every year I thank New York in some short and sweet way. But 10 years feels big and felt like I should dedicate some time to think about how I've grown since being here.

When I was in KC before I even came to the city someone loaned me a book called Art and Fear. I can’t remember if I shared anything that may have precipitated this gift. I do know I was struggling with “what is my calling?” since I had finished my BA in theatre and felt like I had totally failed at that. I always felt like I wasn’t finished with art. I had so many dreams of different types of shows that would involve the audience in some way.

I had joined a small group at my church for artists and we talked about why we were artists and I dreamed about ways I could practice my art and be in full time ministry. But full time ministry was not for me and God radically called me out of it and to go live in New York.

Living here was literally living out Art and Fear.  For years I pursued theater hardcore but couldn’t catch a break. I had made some incredible theatre friends though with the amazing people I met along the way at auditions, August Corps, and even at worship training school.

I’m grateful for the turning points-the crazy moment where in prayer I felt called to Rikers and the connections that led me there and how I met Jeff. How I realized I had two equally strong passions- singing/songwriting and acting and decided to pursue acting by enrolling in William Esper Studio. How I got sick and crazily was forced back into my singing songwriting world as the world shut down in 2020. (I also took a musical theatre bookwriting class!)  How I decided to make an album. How I began going to church at New Life Fellowship, which aided immensely in my trajectory of inner healing and being ok with being instead of constantly doing in the midst of fast paced NYC.

New York City you are a dream and also a place where I felt like my dreams died. I hid behind your towering spires hoping that just being here would somehow qualify me to participate in a meaningful artistic life. My sensitive heart was torn out often and I am still learning how to protect myself from the ruthlessness of the entertainment industry.

But...I haven't given up nor have my dreams died. I haven't forgotten my dramatic EGOT dreams.  I followed my tears here to this city and 10 years later they are watering new seeds.