As we dance around the sun once again
I will demonstrate my love for you
And I will listen
Every sign
Every metaphor
Body
You are wise
I will learn more from you
Things I cannot see with my eyes
Feel with my hands
You talk to me
And I’ll stay curious
A sore stomach
And ache in my head
Sweaty palms
The fast paced beating of my heart
The signals that you send to me
I will slow down
And I will be listening
For your wisdom
This is the year
Body and soul
Dance together in time

In this golden age of technology and social media, there are many things I am grateful for, and others that I could go without. I love sending people funny videos, but I despise the hateful comments underneath some. I love being able to recline the seats on a Costco leather couch, but when the seats get stuck, you’re left with an incredibly awkward positioned chair that requires a skillful maneuver to sit in it. No fun. But one thing I am incredibly grateful for is the feature on my phone that will send me “1 year ago, today” memories throughout the week. I scroll through and giggle at my antics or mourn the loss of my once long hair that nearly touched my bum less than a year ago. But those little slide shows and still moments invite me to reflect.
In those pictures, I see a girl who has no idea what is in store for her yet. She likes herself but isn’t ready to spend a night out alone with herself yet, or even 10 minutes in still silence for that matter.
In meditation, I visualize myself sitting down with her. We sit on my bed in the same places I always sit in with my friends when they come over. I tell her about my favorite moment I’ve had this past year, and she starts to look worried. She’s in disbelief that she would ever be able to muster up the courage to play out this memory I’ve described. But we did it, and there is no doubt in my mind that we’d do it again.
I used to say I had horrible social anxiety. Then my explanation turned into I am an introvert. Then it changed into “but those people are probably going to be there so I can’t go”, then it turned into, “I don’t have it in me to go,”. And those are the self-fulfilling bullshit prophecies I told myself for years every time there was something that I wanted to attend. But one night I saw a flyer for a concert that was going on. I liked the bands that were going to be playing, I had been to the venue before (a small little club with blue lighting and a Neapolitan style pizza by the slice Walk-up-Window right next door), and it was a themed concert. I adore any function that has a costume mandatory dress code. I looked at the date on the flyer to see if I was free. To no avail, the concert was that evening. I instantly jumped to “Well that’s a bummer, I guess I can’t go,” and went on with my day. But I couldn’t stop thinking about how fun it sounded. So, I texted my friends one by one asking if anyone wanted to go with me. But no one was free to go since it was so last minute and on a random weeknight. So once again, I excepted my defeat and tried to get excited for another mundane night in. But something in me just wouldn’t let the idea go.
I looked at the flyer once again and read that the theme was Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Like, come on. How could I pass up the opportunity to dress like a whimsical being and dance my little butt off to some punk music. The idea of going alone made me want to throw up. This was an incredibly social scene. It’s a college town so that means everyone usually came to these things in groups of four to five people. A duo was even a little rare let alone someone standing all by themselves. The fear of perception began to wrap it hands around my throat, and I nearly muttered another pathetic, “I don’t have it in me”, but I just wasn’t buying what that prophecy was trying to sell me. So, I put together a costume with approximately an hour before I had to leave, did my makeup, ate a quick snack, and said a prayer asking for courage and safety as I left my house and made my way to the venue. My stomach churned the whole way there. I couldn’t tell if it was excitement or nerves. But as cheesy as it was, one powerful and annoyingly catchy Chaka Khan song revealed to me that what I was feeling was excitement and equal parts empowerment. “I’m Every Women”, came on and I danced in my Subaru like I had tinted windows and an MTV music video appearance. I realized that it didn’t matter what people thought about me when they saw me standing alone in the club, I was going to have fun, and I was going to grow while doing so.
It was probably the most fun concert I had ever been too. I danced so hard my skirt nearly fell down and I was 99% sure I had whiplash. I had also talked to a lot of new people that were super fun and nice. I guess when you’re alone, people are way more likely to come up and talk to you. A lot of people even admired that I had come alone, saying things like “Wow, I’d never have the guts to do that,” or “My social anxiety could never,”. It made my entire night knowing that I got a taste of true confidence, but I also inspired other girls to give it a shot. Life is too darn short to not do what you want to do, and I am way to incredible to not become my own best friend. I think that is why this was my favorite moment of the year. I was there alone and there wasn’t a minute where I felt lonely. I whole heartedly enjoyed spending that night out with myself and letting go of anyone’s perceptions or judgements.
So, I learned I don’t have social anxiety. I am just on a journey of finding my confidence. I also learned I am not an introvert. But it’s also totally okay to honor when I need a break, and my social battery has run low. And yes, the world is small. Sometimes people who don’t like you are going to be somewhere you are. But as hard as it is, I am learning to release the fear of their judgement and hate. But most importantly, my “I don’t have it in me to go,” prophesy has now turned into a conversation that goes a little something like this. “Hey body. How are you feeling. Do you feel healthy and strong enough to go to this? Do you want to go to this? Is there anything stopping you? How can I support you through that?”, and I don’t think that would’ve been the case if I hadn’t shown up for myself and took myself out dancing on that random weeknight in October.

To a girl,
Young, scared, hurt, and overcome by the feeling of wanting to crawl out of her skin. You have come so far. You have marched down the length of that dock, felt the dead, dry, prickly summer grass on the bottoms of your feet, and you’ve kept walking. You threw away that swimsuit, you know the one. The pale blue bikini with the tiny yellow and pink flowers. You’ve even gone back to that lake. It took you a couple tries, but you gathered the courage to place your picnic blanket under the big oak tree, remove your shoes, and swim in the beautiful deep blue Washington water once again.
I don’t blame you for staying away for as long as you did. Even just driving on the bridge that overlooks the water made you shiver. There were a lot of firsts that happened that day at the lake, and the weeks to follow. It was your first time going to the lake without an adult. It was your first time visiting the public swimming area of the lake. It was your first time jumping off the long wooden dock. It was your first time being touched by a man. It was your first time feeling the gaze of a man threaten you into silence. It was the first time you were so terrified that you couldn’t make even the tiniest weakest sound. It was the first time you felt like an uninvited guest in your own body.
Some disturbed people will tell you it was your fault. “A fourteen-year-old girl shouldn’t be wearing such a skimpy bathing suit,” they’ll say. That is an idea that has been passed down through the generations, and unfortunately, that idea is still widely communicated to young girls today. But you know now that the way you dress is never an invitation to somebody else. I wish someone would’ve told me that in the weeks that followed.
I am incredibly proud of the way you handled yourself in those following weeks. Looking back, it was upsetting that there wasn’t more the police could do. You gave them the location, the date and time, and they even had you go to the police station and meet with an artist who drew a portrait of your assaulter while you picked his eyes, ears, mouth, and nose out from a book of a thousand little drawings. It was like playing paper dolls. You still question if you got it right. You didn’t have a clear image of his whole face. Just his eyes. Those penetrative eyes that silently shouted at you to sit still, stay quiet, and tell no one what had just happened under the water. His eyes were the easiest feature to pick out of the book. To this day, I believe you could still pick them out of a crowd. Some images just never leave, even if the pain has started to fade.
Pushing through that darkness and letting that fear die out was one of the hardest things you’ve done. Even if your predator wasn’t brought to justice, you created a personal justice. Your body belongs to yourself again. You feel at home in your skin, and you dress however the hell you want. You wear scarves in your hair, bikini tops and little jean shorts, turtlenecks and long skirts, cropped shirts. You wear it all, and you don’t wear any of it to send a specific message. You just like how you look. And let me just say that that is a huge accomplishment in a society that raises women to hate how they look once they reach a certain age. Keep fighting that predetermined narrative.
Taking back your body was the first step. June 14th, 2023, you went back to that public swimming area. You wore your favorite swimsuit. You took your dog and your partner at the time for extra comfort and support. Getting back in the water was hard. That dock might always hold a painful memory, but you will never let it keep you from enjoying something that everyone has the right and privilege to do. Young girls shouldn’t have to fear something as innocent as a lake day or removing their swim coverups in a public swimming area. You have now marched back down the length of that dock, jumped into that water, and enjoyed the freedom of your body swimming in the magnificent deep blue Washington waters. Those eyes aren’t watching you anymore and those hands have let you go.

Why do I love myself? I don’t think it’s a question that can be simply answered, and that is due to the fact that there is nothing simple about navigating the long, messy, imperfectly cracked road to loving yourself. I also believe there isn’t one correct answer to the question of “how do you learn to love yourself?”, but maybe multiple correct answers from all kinds of people who are working towards the common goal of finding true love in who they are. So, while I believe this isn’t the only answer, I’ll provide a glimpse down the long, messy, imperfectly cracked road I walk along every day to try and achieve loving myself fully.
For me, it starts with forgiveness. Forgiving each era of myself that stacks upon one another like a wobbly tower made of unevenly cut wooden blocks. Forgiving the lonely little girl who never asked for help. Forgiving the shy little girl who was too afraid to speak her mind. Forgiving the confused little girl that made the decisions that have brought me here where I stand today. Choosing every day to love that little girl regardless of her mistakes, and understanding that she and I have so much more in common than I can wrap my adult brain around.
Like her, we are both learning as we go. Born into each today as someone who knows more about ourselves than we did each and every yesterday. By forgiving and understanding her, as well as all the version of myself that came after, I repair that wobbly tower of blocks, supported by the love that I couldn’t give to them at the time. Because how can I find it within myself to love who I am without loving how I got here?
I keep in mind that I am still very young. Eight-teen years old really just means I’m a teenager with a longer leash, the right to vote, and to blow my paychecks on tattoos without a parent signature. Someday I’m sure I will look back at who I am right now, and probably find dozens of reasons why I need to forgive her. However, with a more stable foundation of love for the versions of myself I’ve forgiven, comes the ability to see the parts of who I currently am that I admire deeply. Like the fact that I am extremely creative, I have a huge heart that I plan on using to help people for the rest of my life, and I am an incredibly determined individual who will give one hundred and ten percent to anything I am passionate about. My words are never empty, and my heart and mind are always full.
I am positive that I will pick up handfuls of reasons to love myself as I understand myself more and walk this road hand in hand with the girls I have been, and the women I have yet to step into.
On this long, messy, imperfectly cracked road, I will find brightly colored, unique flowers growing in the cracked pavement. And when I reach the end of my road, I hope to have a magnificent bouquet to show for it. One that I can hold up proudly in front of me and say, “this is me, and I absolutely love her”.

Dear Carolyn-Jean,

It’s getting very difficult to feel proud of myself. Former classmates ask me what I’ve been up to since graduating, and it takes me about three and a half seconds to answer that question with a “Not much”, that I push out as blithe as my conscience allows me too. Then I sit there, listening to them talk about new friends they’ve made, new places they’ve visited, these absolutely beautiful narratives they are creating for themselves with the newfound freedom of adulthood. I smile and congratulate them on their success, but I worry the envy is starting to unveil itself from underneath my expressions of admiration.
People who know me well, know that this isn’t where I wanted to be in this point in time. I talked big talk, filled with optimism and ambition. I wanted to be in Italy or Denmark, fulfilling my dreams of studying abroad through a program that I was more than ready to apply for. But now I gaze through the screen of my phone and view the photos and videos my peers post from their travels. It was my dream, and they’re living it. And that is a really difficult thing to sit with.
I was an incredibly grateful and content person, but I now feel myself overflowing with anger and jealousy, and it makes me feel even sicker than I already am. Did the universe think I was underserving of the future I desired so badly? Is this what I deserve? A body that’s cemented to tired familiarity and routine. A body that’s rejecting everything. Food, medicine, sleep. Have I been deemed undeserving of those things as well?
How is it that you no longer find yourself lying awake, during the nights of insufferable pain and nausea, circling that question in your head? You can look at someone who is abled bodied and achieving things you once dreamed of achieving and feel nothing but joy for that person.
It’s because you’ve shut down the comparison game. All the anger you felt towards your illness has been tranquilized by the act of accepting your illness and appreciating the aspects of your life that have been improved since getting diagnosed with an auto immune disease.
You no longer let your fear of sickness get in the way of anything you want to do. You take chances. You started going to festivals and concerts again, because you trust your body and the signs that it gives you. You make plans with people that you didn’t get to see much the year you were really sick. But you’ve also learned how important it is to find people who make an effort to understand your illness. You no longer feel guilty for having to drop out of plans at the last minute because of a flare up. Or for having to leave commitments early due to medication side effects making your body feel foreign. The people in your life have more understanding and grace for you than you ever thought was possible.
You have also developed more grace and understanding for yourself and your body. Understanding that there are things about the physical appearance of your body that you cannot change due to your illness and having to relearn how to be okay with the new appearance of a body you worked so hard to keep healthy. I tell myself that there are things out of my control, and I need to accept that. But I find that somedays I am still far from fully believing that.
When explaining all my emotions towards my illness to people, I have found myself coming back to the emotion of grief. This has confused some people, but not those who are also managing a chronic illness. They understand how painful it is to grieve things as little as favorite foods that we can no longer eat, to grieving the immense loss of the reality where my body would be able to sustain a pregnancy. It all feels like I am grieving the loss of a life that I haven’t even lived yet. But the fact that it is isn’t attainable anymore, causes enough frustration to begin grieving.
One day I won’t have to long for the life that I dream of having, because I’ll be able to be content in the one I am living inside of this body that’s been given to me. Our body that is teaching me so much about perseverance, optimism, resilience, and how to be grateful for every little moment of peace that shows me that I am still more than deserving of an incredible future.

To the future that awaits,

Carolyn-Jean Cox