Reflections from A Body That Keeps the Score.
Vessel.
i’m best suited for that quicksand of ache
slithering into my bones long before it’s seen.
my understood possession that’s made
a contract with me since i was fifteen.
Reflections from A Body That Keeps the Score.
My therapist tells me when I feel physical discomfort I should lean into the soothing desires of my body. Tonight, I am resting in my bed nestled between two blankets; I need a hug, so I am trying to craft my own cocoon. One of the two blankets is heated. I have it positioned messily against my back to simulate human affection.
Two months ago, I started somatic therapy. I began treatment after having a blunt conversation with myself spiritually. I realized my disconnect from my body was harming me. Logic was the captain of my vessel; emotion and the physical were shadows. I admit my reliance on logic got me quite far. For a time, I was treating my body as a rational being not a living one.
Not sure exactly when or what caused my body to dissociate, but numbing became innate. So far in therapy, I have discovered my trauma expels itself from pressure points in my lower back, an unsurprising revelation to me since that same location caused a brief hospitalization in high school. Then, I slept as if I could hover. The hospital sent me home with pain killers and a question mark? Aches became my early announcements, hallmark signs of grief.
Learning the intricacies of the body’s emotional processing has been interesting. Since beginning treatment, I have felt more alive and open. Each weekly session is a refresh that pries me open. In these past three months, I have come to understand that it doesn’t take much for physical or emotional activation; in fact, the most basic has been the most difficult.
I describe somatic therapy as emotional Pilates. Each small segment of what has gone unfelt finds exposure. Soon, the seemingly easy triggers a response. At first a yawn, later a deep confrontation. For me, an unfamiliar discomfort unearthed intensely after my second week. I had done my first body graph, which I initially assumed would be senseless doodling. The exercise consisted of me drawing the front, back, and side of a body on a sheet of paper. I was instructed to listen to the music playing and release critique. Mark and draw over the box figure with the sensations I felt in my body. I colored my back in gel pen tornadoes and draped the weight of my shoulders in the bluest tension. It felt therapeutic but simple, almost immature but fruitful.
Later that week, I became overcome by grief and found myself crying. Everything made me emotional, and for a moment, I thought of quitting. A poorly drawn body graph had gotten the best of me. My therapist told me this is the place where we slow down and build foundational safety. The nervous system is reactive when it’s in a constant state of surviving. Speak to the body that you’re listening. That’s the first step to reconnecting.
It’s difficult not to feel shame about regulating emotions at such a rudimentary level, but I am learning to acknowledge my body’s responses with grace, not judgement. Normally, I would use weed to cope, but I don’t want numbing to be my hope; I want the truth. Since starting somatic therapy, my biggest emotional fears have been my gateways to alchemy; despite my fear, every shadow brightens me. I’m starting to realize vulnerability could save me.
Resilience is a badge of survival, but just as easily can be an unhealthy re-affirming of destruction if resilience presents itself as unfeeling.
Spiritually, my intuition has felt more concrete; the more I listen to my body, the more it listens to me. I feel as though my faith is integrating into my spirit, not just mentally. Interpersonally, I have been learning to be more comfortable in expressions of affection. I have been becoming unapologetically myself in the face of my previous neglect. Nothing about conformity gave me the comfort society made me think would be guaranteed. Artistically, I am becoming acquainted with the depths pain can create; I am revisiting the catacombs of each death that brought me here.
“You will never be satisfied playing the game of empty desire.” – Devin Park
I have been interrogating my relationship with passion: why do I feel unsafe in the softness of love? Why do I have an aversion to feelings all consuming? Is it not unfulfilling always being on the outskirts of desire?
Somatic therapy has been the opening to a frozen core; I thought feeling would be my unraveling, but it’s been the catalyst to living. I felt a false contentment in my reliance on logic, but now I know, emotions don’t manifest misfortune. I tell myself recurrently: “I want my soul to be happier.” Therapy has been the answer presented to me. I know it won’t be easy, but neither has life been generally. Here is my crossroads: repeat or change?