The Grind

How does stress show up in your life?

For me, it manifests in whatever physical limitation will actually slow me down long enough to notice I need to, well, slow down.

Hooray for using hyper independence & busyness to cope. #winning

As I gain more time on the planet, I’ve learned not to take on as much and to slow down so I can actually live my life.

Years ago, when stress made it impossible to lift my arms above my shoulders and that I couldn’t do my job, I listened.

When my already compromised immune system felt like it fully shut down and I got sick(er) repeatedly, I listened.

But when I was twenty and my body couldn’t box up a rape and put it on the shelf at the back of the closet in my mind?

After years of trauma, assaults, homelessness, hunger, and more, it was a tipping point and I couldn’t shove it all down anymore.

I remember feeling betrayed by my body. Because how could I survive so much—and then get to college where the rape my junior year would push me over the edge?

Why couldn’t I hold it anymore? And what good was I if I couldn’t bury it, put on a smile, and go back to overworking, overcompensating, and hustling to prove my worthiness?

That same year, after stay number six in a psychiatric ward an doctor introduced me to the idea that maybe I was anxious and depressed and neurotic because of the trauma.

Maybe I wasn't broken and bad and destined to help others while receiving no love or care myself.

Back then I thought the worst thing I could be was needy. To HAVE needs? The audacity!

This summer after a surgery that left me scarred and unprepared for the recovery and another fucking assault, by someone I see almost every single day, who just opened a business right where I get off of the bus after school—my body took the stress and ground it down into my bones.

Into the place between my shoulder blades where he held me down until I couldn’t breathe, as though my shoulders bear the weight of my shame for “letting” it happen again.

Into the place where my jawline meets my ears and I hear crinkle paper and static that shoots pain down my neck and shoulders, as if my NO wasn’t:

loud enough.

forceful enough.

Just. Fucking. Enough.

to stop him.

My temples, my tremors, my teeth.

After five doctor appointments and a specialist I found out I have TMJ—short for the temporomandibular joint, which connects your jaw to your skull—disorder.

The specialist heard my symptoms and did an exam, noting my teeth were showing signs of grinding.

Then she asked me the gut punch question:

“When did it start? And what happened at that time?”

Not much, just back to back traumas, recurring clients pausing work or vacationing while new clients backing out or ghosting so that my income disappeared virtually overnight—all while I could barely function.

Well, crud.

So I got a mouth guard and learned to sleep in it. I navigated migraines, fitful sleep with my face on a heating pad, and flashbacks that derail my days.

I watched my capacity shrink, dropping down to part-time at school and jumping through hoops to keep my bills paid.

I searched for a support group while trying to eat when my hands don’t work, it hurts to chew, and the government withholds my grocery budget.

I’m doing my best to change the pattern of care for myself.

To move from hustle to home, from survival to settling in. To witness the evils of this administration and to hold them—without carrying them.

I remind myself that I believe me.

I believe my body, my experience, my stress’s self-expression.

After all, my body can only speak in body language and I will not judge or shame myself for however long I need, and whatever I need to do, to heal.

But how do you heal when it feels like you're out of control? When your body doesn't work? When capitalism (and rent) waits for no one?

How do I heal when I have to see his face? When my sanctuary, my home, has become a gilded cage?

I surrender, and try to sleep, and move slowly through the moments until I make it to the other side.

It's been less than a month with the mouth guard and it's almost flat, so I’m obviously winning the game against stress. #Checkmate