I'm laying on the massage table, naked and vulnerable under a thin cotton sheet, talking with the massage therapist about my chronic sinus problems, when she asks: "Do you feel safe in the world?" My mind conjures an image of myself at 9. It was a difficult time for me. I was already going through puberty and they hadn't even gotten around to showing us "the film." That would come next year - in fourth grade.
I was mortified by the way my body was changing. My newly formed breasts were particularly troubling, they seemed to drawn unwanted attention. Older boys and men would look and leer. Their whistles and cat calls terrified and excited me. I soon learned that my indecently large breasts broadcasted a message to the world. At times I tried to harness their power but mostly they made me feel vulnerable and ashamed.
Shame is a funny thing. It hides in our bodies, laying dormant, sometimes for years, like a festering boil, undetected, until one day it is pricked. Suddenly it oozes putrid, black bile. That's what happened to me yesterday. As the massage therapist caressed and rubbed the tired, achy muscles on my back, I remembered being 9 and feeling ashamed of my body. Now the genies out of the bottle. I can no longer hide from the shame. I have to face it, accept it, love it and try to make something beautiful from it.
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