“When a part of me is able to feel loved, it awakens to its own healing!”
I already exist
Rather than make myself Be Someone
or Be Some Way
Just notice me-here.
I’m here!
No need to be someone else.
The Great Good already exists.
Rather than trying to manufacture It,
to prove Its existence to someone else,
or to convince It to Do Something.
Just notice It-Here.
Can you sit quietly and Notice It?
Can you capture a glimpse of It
now and then?
It’s Here!
No need to Make-It-Happen.
Elizabeth Morana
Five WBF Trainers are talking about WBF. They are from Spain, Canada, Italy, and the United States. They were celebrating the preparation for the First Anual Whole Body Focusing Gathering in Italy. The Gathering took place in August 2014. . Each brings their own experience of WBF from their work in their countries
We want to highlight that Wholeblody Focusing is not a particular series of actions but a dynamic practice that responds to cultural differences, languages, and needs of practitioners. Our five Wholebody Focusing trainers talk to each other about how they practice Wholebody focusing. It includes practice samples and commentary on how different practices suit different cultures. Americans, for example, tend to read theory and apply it. Italians live at the edge of their emotions and find interaction with a partner or a group lively. Our Spanish practitioner uses tennis as a structure that helps the practitioner(s) connect to whatever is needed.
Wholebody Focusing isn’t an organization but rather a community of people who have learned Wholebody Focusing and love to share what they have learned. We have resources that help that bond in the absence of a company or organization that does that. This blog plays a considerable role int keeping international practitioners up to date on how others practice. You may also be interested in another website of Kevin McEvenu’s work https://wholebodyfocusing.com/
https://vimeo.com/dianascalera/download/990778923/fa2206d9b8
Focusing Initiatives International has a monthly Wholbody gathering it is is open to anyone interested in Wholebody Focusing. Kevin McEvenue often participates in these gathering. The gathering happens on the second Saturday of the month at 11AM to 12:30. Wholebody Focusing isn’t an organization but rather a community of people who have learned Wholebody Focusing and love to share what they have learned. Wholebody focusing Gatherings
Search webinars on the Focusing International.org websitehttps://webinars.focusinginternational.org/webinars/wholebody-focusing-community-gathering-65/ Continue reading “Five People Talking About WBF/Cinque Persone che Parlano”
When I was a young girl, my mother and I had a battle for “Whose body is this?” Mother felt the need to control all aspects of my life: what I ate, how I ate it, what clothes I wore, and how much space I deserved in family interactions. She decided my body was her body and controlled me based on how her parents raised her. Her behavior led to regular battles for control.
This story showed up a few months ago when I was facing some medical issues. Questions of “whose body is this” emerged when I needed to have someone else decide whether some part of me needed to be removed or not. I woke up and started preparing for my upcoming visit with my surgeon. I had oral macular cancer in 2017. One of the side effects of the radiation was cancer of the tongue from these harsh treatments. A few months earlier, I had a lesion removed from my tongue where the radiation was strongest.
I quickly took a look at my tongue to do a check like the surgeon told me to do. Unfortunately, I saw something new where the cancer was removed from my tongue. I contacted my surgeon, made an appointment, and went on with my day. There was a black dot in that space. It looked like a poppy seed was stuck in the area where the surgery was performed. It’s a poppy seed until I hear otherwise. I’ve learned from my three bouts with cancer, “It isn’t cancer until the biopsy says so”.
I had a session with my shaman partner, Susan. We held space for what was at the root of this new disturbance. What came to me was something that had shown up before. A focuser partner and I found that the dinner table was where we learned to be ourselves. It was a place of constant reinforcement of our roles in the family: This is where we were trained to be who we “should” be. My wholebody sense was directing me to revisit that place; my childhood dinner table experience. I doubted that this had anything to do with my new illness. However, I have learned to trust that my body knows more than I do.
One of the rules in my family was that we had to eat all the food on our plates. My grandmother, mother, and father all lived through the Depression of the 1930’s and had deep wounds from going hungry over a long period of time. My Italian-American family treated food as a gift that could not be wasted. They often ate things that were eaten in Italy but unknown in the US. For example, there were meals of Lamb’s brain and Cow’s stomach offered as a special delight. One needed to eat every mouthful on our plates.
As young as 5 or 6 years old, I developed a fear of these non-American meals. I feared that these meals were poisonous. My mother viewed these thoughts as belligerence. She was incensed that any of her children could reject the food set on the table after the family’s experience during the Depression. There were no alternatives offered. On a particular night when a more normal meal was presented to me, I noticed that I had developed that same fear of poison, even though I might have previously eaten that particular food successfully.
This time, I felt a definite NO. It seemed like my fear of food was starting to extend to everyday foods. I told my family that I could not eat the food on the plate because it would make me sick. My mother was beside herself. She picked up my plate and dragged me to the stairway that led to the basement, where my family ate dinner in the summertime. I was sitting on the top step, face-to-face with my mother. She held my plate, demanding that I put the food in my mouth and swallow. I told her again I couldn’t because it would make me sick. She demanded that I put the food in my mouth and swallow.
I did what she asked. The result was that my body rejected the food. After a few minutes, I involuntarily vomited the food onto my mother’s face. She was initially really mad, but something shifted in her. Mother realized (maybe) how inappropriate she was being. She never forced me to eat anything again!
When I finished describing what happened, Susan suggested I ask my earlier self to tell the story. Susan’s words shifted energy in my body. My arms and hands rose and moved violently, my voice shifting to a deeply disturbed, almost growling sound, and I began the story again from an inner place I had never felt before. In general, my mother was very controlling over many aspects of my life. My younger self let me know this interaction was about ending my mother’s control of my body.
The physical depth of the growling sound helped me understand why this moment was so important. This was an act of bravery by my younger self that led to my mother having less control. I was grateful to meet this powerful part of me that knew what it could and could not tolerate, given the lack of adult support. Unfortunately, the fear of food continued to show up deep into adulthood, and once in a while, it shows up again when I feel threatened with a possible new medical diagnosis or other threats. For example, as Trump’s violence against immigrants gets more intense, that fear emerges, and I have to be more patient with myself about what I eat.
Susan told me that when my younger self was present, I was surrounded by an extraordinarily bright white light. I am so inspired by my 5-year-old self that successfully fought against being forced to eat things she feared by a traumatized, out-of-control mother. My five-year-old self’s steadiness, bravery, and body wisdom in that moment changed the course of my life. It limited my mother from trying to control me in all sorts of ways. She may not have wanted to suffer that moment again. While she was never able to treat me with kindness, my mother seldom tried to impose her will on me from that point on. How much to control children?
Many years of Wholebody Focusing and Method Acting training have given my body the capacity to connect physically and emotionally, expressing long-lost experiences. Susan’s words and energetic presence gave my body permission to show me what I experienced in that moment and how it would influence the rest of my life. It also convinced me that I have the power to live more authentically.
NB2 The problem with my tongue was quickly resolved. It was a small suturer placed in my tongue during surgery that broke through: thus the black dot. The Surgeon removed it quickly. The final result is that the black dot was not completely removed. The extraction led to a reduction of pain.
…You offer me Space for that encounter a couple years ago with the two does. As I have your words here it comes back so palpably, so viscerally that moment of going out the front door and finding the deer just across and up on the high side of the driveway.
We all stopped.
And from somewhere there was a becoming more as I somehow knew or it came to just meet them wordlessly yes but also deeply from my heart as though it were a sending and receiving directly.
As I “remember” this and re-feel this I am in there again and wonder what/how this relates with your experience.
My heart comes more alive. Yes that sounds right, the activity of my heart comes more alive to itself in this stopping in this way. I see/feel/give from my heart. And the piece that comes more to know itself is the receiving part.
I have to pause here. There are oceans of Benevolence to receive that I have been letting in by the dropper full. OMG
OK This one can go on the blog.
As I reread this having typed it here, a reticent bit comes, this is wide open and something worries about its safety.
It comes to me to pause back at the words that seemed to describe or point to something – oceans of Benevolence.
Letting this In.
A word comes further as I have the whole of this experience – Reception. Something satisfying in there, to have these words come. Oceans of Benevolence. Reception.
Laura Dickinson
Wholebody Focusing Haiku # 15
Being with the pain
That is trauma residue
Takes grounding and love.
Photo Credit: Anonymous
What does my body need now? Frequently writing Haiku about my WBF discoveries not only helps me document what is emerging but also helps me to sustain the new healing.
As I was preparing for bed a few weeks ago, I noticed that I felt defeated. There were so many challenges that made me anxious and fearful that I wondered if it were useless to try to sleep. My husband and I have been experiencing serious health problems for the last year and a half and it felt exhausting to be in this place.
The words “what does my body need now?” came to me. I thought I would give it a try. As I got into bed, I felt into my body as I asked this question. My hands moved. They landed crossed, on my upper chest with my hands near my shoulders. It felt so comfortable and comforting. The next thing I remembered is that I woke up at 6:00 AM. I had slept through the night and my hands were still in this position. It was as if I had given myself a seven hour Reiki treatment.
In the days following, I noticed a shift. When a situation arose, I didn’t have to “check” in with my body what it needed. The answer was just there.
“Did I want to work on taxes right now?”
“No! I needed to finish my film project.”
“Did I want to be part of a committee to make important decisions?”
“No! I just wanted to play.”
“Could I take on a new responsibility?”
“No! I had to organize myself to be with the responsibilities that were already here.”
I am noticing ME as my first reaction to a situation. It is coming from my body and out my mouth before I can get a chance to filter it. In the past, when someone wanted me to do something, I would usually say yes first and think about it later. That caused a lot of stress because, while I may come to know how I really feel about something later, I would never want to renege on my agreement to take on a responsibility.
Old feelings emerged. Was I being selfish? Would this new assertion of my needs alienate people? These are the same feelings that lead me to say yes to most of what people asked of me, however, now I was having them after I declined to do the whatever was asked of me. I had the opportunity to see in real time what the result was of my going with what my body needed. Here are some respones from ohters. Sometimes people were surprised or amused or agreed that I needed to take care of myself. No one has disowned me or started to not return my calls. These Haikus helped me feel less stress and anxiety because I was doing what my body needed rather than what others might want of me.
Writing about what comes for us in any format supports our WBF work by continuing the healing that is already in progress. I encourage all who read this blog to share their own experiences with shifts and new ways of living. You can do this as a contributor to the blog
15
Being with the pain
That is trauma residue
Takes grounding and love.
16
When there are stressors
Allowing movement steadies
The nervous system
17
When progress is made
New shifts need to be noticed
So that they can stay
18
When good things happen
I hold space for all that comes
With an open heart
19
When challenges pop
And there is nowhere to go
Go inside and move!
20
What does my heart need?
Slowing down to listen now
This is new to me
21
When upset, I ask
What does my body need now?
Then I notice me
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A Wholebody session with a male partner started by discussing sex in general and then the differences between how boys and girls had different experiences. What emerged was a sense of Female Grace in the sexual awaking of young girls.
A WholeBody session created the phrase Sex and Female Grace during a discussion with a male focusing partner of sex in general and the differences between how children may have different initial experiences of sexual sensations based on their sex. What emerged was a sense of Sex and Female Grace. We focused on the early recognition of sexual feelings. For people, especially for those of us born in the 1940s and 1950s and earlier, we experienced our early sexual sensations differently. After listening to my partner’s experience, I came to understand girls’ sexual awakenings were ignored in comparison to what boys experienced. The phrase that came to me was Sexual Grace because no one worried that girls would masturbate and did nothing to prevent it. Boys often suffered from a form of monitoring.
While girls at that time were frequently underserved, we often didn’t have a chance to play sports or ride bicycles for fear we would injure ourselves and inadvertently lose our virginity. Boys were usually provided with many more opportunities to be active, but they were also under scrutiny by family and Church to prevent them from “self-abuse.” No one ever mentioned masturbating to me or my female classmates. As part of the Wholebody session, the words Female Grace emerged to separate the differences. While girls tended to be ignored compared to boys, neither family nor Church seemed to be concerned about preventing girls from having experiences of sexual sensations. It was the opposite for boys.
My Wholeboby partner described how his Irish Catholic family and his Church were very strict about preventing boys from masturbating. They tried to make sure their boys did not masturbate. This control was often very suble and communicated via a non-specific verbal code. My partner shared the impact of this prohibition on himself and other boys. They would continue to masturbate but go to confession every morning to ask forgiveness for their sin before taking communion. This information wasn’t the first time I heard this story. My experience was that I never experienced any guilt of fear from the Church or my family. Instead the lack of attention allowed me to feel sexual sensations with pleasure. This was my Female Grace.
My husband, also raised as an Irish Catholic, was taught to remember that he shouldn’t take Holy Communion unless he asked God’s forgiveness for “self-abuse.” This phrase was whispered to him by one of his Churche’s priests. My Husband also had difficulty meeting this high level of ignoring his body’s natural, pleasant feelings. He participated in the ritual: masturbate at night, go to 6:00 am confession with the sleepiest priest, and take communion at early Mass each day before school. The Catholic Church and families were highly engaged in this endeavor. The boys, however, were highly involved in finding an acceptable compromise between the power of the Church and the power of their biological sensations.
In those years, girls didn’t exist the way boys did. Holding space for this disparity brought something new. Instead of my normal anger at what I missed out on, Wholebody helped me see this lack of attention was a sense of Female Grace. No one was paying attention to how girls reacted to the natural feelings that emerged from our bodies until we were older. We had the opportunity to have this personal experience without all the condemnation. However, the prohibition would become to stay away from boys for fear of out-of-wedlock pregnancy. This prohibition came full force as we entered our teen years. We did, however, have this period in which we were free to invent our reality in regard to the sexual sensations and stimulation.
Children start to feel sexual bodily stimulation from the age of three. Many learn independently to find the pleasure areas through exploring their bodies. Families and religious entities in the mid-1900s were adamant about how boys responded to these natural sensations our bodies create. Adult attention started earlier in boys’ lives than girls. For boys, it started early in their lives and was about the prohibition of masturbation. For girls, it started after a girl started to menstruate and boys began to be attracted to girls in their teenage years. While Boys must not masturbate, Girls had a different set of rules that made them responsible for their “virginity.” These practices had a life-long impact on our relationship to our sexual selves.
My first memories of sexual sensations started with television. I was in early grammar school. One night, I was lying on the floor, watching TV with my family. A Peter Sellers movie, A Shot in the Dark, was on TV, and the storyline was that the Sellers’ character happened upon a nudist colony. Most of the bodies in the scene were covered by bushes and trees. However, the concept that one would want to be naked in front of other people was exciting to me. As I watched the movie, I felt a familar stimulation in my pelvis. Then, I found that if I pressed my pelvis into the floor, the stimulation became stronger. I was lucky that the rest of the family also was intently watching the TV.
In our home, there was a severe prohibition to expose part of one’s body to another family member, so the thought that people might want to be naked in front of others was highly stimulating. That experience led to masturbating most nights before I fell asleep using the idea of wanting to be nude. I This was a private experience that connected me to my body though Female Grace. I sometimses feared that these sensations might not be what “good girls” do, but, like my male counterparts, the sensations were too pleasurable to stop. Also, no one ever told me to confess this practice. Raw Desire Awakens to It’s Own Power
Neither Church nor family imagined that young girls experienced these feelings. It wasn’t until I entered high school that my mother gave me a book written by the Catholic Church about the dangers of sexual feelings. She spiced up her attempts to dissuade me from considering any interaction with boys. One of my favorites was to tell me that “kissing a boy was like kissing a wall”. Girls don’t experience any sensations from kissing.” I felt sorry for my mother and father if they believed that. National Center on Sexual behavior of Youth
Many years later, I started to watch Italian films and heard one of the characters say those exact words in Italian. It was a cultural practice to keep young girls away from boys. I wasn’t particularly attracted to boys nor they to me until I was a sophomore in high school.A popular boy started to pay attention to me. It was the first time that I experienced that kind of attention. He invited me to be his date for the school play. My parents were not particularly happy about that.
My father told me I couldn’t date boys until I was eighteen years old. We argued, and I won. I went to the school to play with this new friend. We sat down in the auditorium and waited for the play to start. The young man reached for my hand and held it. That immediately instigated a recognizable sensation in my pelvis. It was the first time another person sexually stimulated me. I couldn’t believe that having someone’s hand in mine could produce that sensation. I was delighted that it was so easy!
When New York State legalized abortions 1970, I remember sitting in the bleachers in the school’s gymnasium with other girls, talking about how that law changed our lives. Up until then, I was so terrified of any sexual contact. The life-changing possibility of pregnancy terrified me. Now, there was a safety net. It was a momentous change. I had agency and was no longer ruled by the fear of an unwanted pregnancy. I had already seen the impact of an unwanted pregnancy on a classmate. While I wouldn’t have unprotected sex, I felt like the threat of a pregnancy was gone.
The removal of abortion rights in the USA is a profound loss for women and girls. It changes their relationship to their sexuality and right to control their bodies. There is no justification of this loss other than the STATE’s need to control female bodies.
I did have an important ally at the high school: the school’s building. NYC built the impressive building from 1912 to 1915 in the Collegiate Gothic Style, emphasizing education’s grandeur. The auditorium was especially grand. When I first walked in there, I felt the powerful energy of the building’s history, which brought me to tears. When I needed support, I would sit there to catch my breath.
When I am holding trauma with equal regard, I am inviting an expanded understanding of the traumatizing experience. This means one needs to let go of judgments and simply accept the situation for what it is in order to learn the full story.
I had been waking up in the mornings recently with obsessive thoughts of trauma I had experienced 12 years ago. Before I retired as a high school administrator, I served as Assistant Principal at a large New York City high school. I was in charge of educating immigrant children. There were 400 English as a Second Language students at a school known for failing to provide adequate support. I felt I was the right person for the job because of my extensive experience helping other schools improve outcomes for immigrant students. However, all I could do was obsess about the horrible experience I had with the staff during that period.
I faced a hostile environment where the teachers and administrators felt their low ratings were unjustified. They believed it was the fault of the “students we are getting now” rather than “the better students we used to have.” That is an ineffective structure for teaching, learning, and excellence. Teachers and administrators have a responsibility to meet all students where they are at and to provide suitable pathways to learning.
I was not welcome in this school because I represented the change that was needed. Admitting that change was necessary would require undoing deeply held beliefs. Administrators and teachers strongly felt that it was the African American, Latino, immigrant, and special needs students were the ones who made it seem like the staff was ineffective. The administration planned to identify the best-prepared students and provide them with special instruction to raise the graduation rate. This plan was not feasible because a large part of the population was performing below grade level.
I chose to take this job because the new principal was someone I had worked with for several years. Our shared philosophy was that administrators and teachers need to recognize students’ needs and provide appropriate instruction to meet them. Unfortunately, we encountered hostile teachers and unmovable colleagues.
After eight months of their failed practices, there was an incident in the principal’s office in which the male assistant principal, Math, attempted to physically attack the principal because she demanded that African American students be allowed in higher-level Math classes. The AP Math was stopped only by my screaming presence in the room. The principal was traumatized by the attempted attack. It was worse for her later, especially after our superiors refused to address not only his attack, but they would not bar him from blocking African American students from second-year math. The principal ended up finding another job.
The hatred toward low-performing students remained around the school. Fortunately, I had a very talented team of bilingual teachers who were excited to use their extensive skills to improve student outcomes. These teachers helped build a very effective language-learning program. I finally had my dream job: creating a safe, supportive place for English language learners and special-needs students, with a teaching team who shared my belief that our students could become literate in English if we did our best. I wasn’t going to leave the school with it’s hostle environment outside my department.
As a child of Italian immigrants, I knew how much my parents suffered from inappropriate instruction. They were intelligent people who never fully learned to read and write because they were assigned to classes where little effort was made to help them to read and write in English. That was where Italian speakers belonged in the 1930s. Eventually, I became a leader in the Bilingual Education Second Language community. I was part of the social and political changes affecting immigrant students.
When I first started teaching, my colleagues were people who grew up in the 1960’s. They were part of the fight for equal rights of African Americans, Latinos, and against the Vietnam War. Many of them were African American or Latino and shared my commitment to language rights and equal access to a proper education for all. They were my mentors whose integrity and commitment to improving students’ lives inspired me to be the best at what I do.
At my new school, the hostility was constant. I was also shocked by how most members of the faculty did not share the same background that led me to my dedication to immigrant and African American special needs students. It left me depressed and angry that others didn’t feel a connection to the school’s current students.
I did have an important ally at the high school: the school’s building. NYC built the impressive Collegiate Gothic-style building from 1912 to 1915, emphasizing education’s grandeur. The auditorium was especially grand. When I first walked in there, I felt the powerful energy of the building’s history, which brought me to tears. When I needed support, I would sit there to catch my breath. I also brought my student to the auditorium to have some respite. It was a great place to bring students who met the NY State qualifications for immigrants. I asked them to share their experiences, and later we enjoyed a meal together and offered them books to keep.
To address my obsessive thoughts about the difficulty of this period in my life, I began working with Kevin McEvenue using WBF and with Susan McClellium, a Shaman, to connect me to my memories of this experience. One day, Susan suggested that I talk to my obsessive thoughts. She had me move into a different chair as if I were a different person telling my story. What came was utterly different from my obsessive thoughts from this three-year experience. My essence refused to mention the traumatic experiences, but instead reminded me of the joy I experienced by doing what I knew was right.
My Wholebody self started with the beautiful memories of working with immigrant and special needs students. It reminded me of an avalanche of stories about why I had chosen this work. This part of me that remembered more than the trauma was not willing to stop telling its side of the story. Out of this, I realized that, despite the battles I lost and the abuse I witnessed and experienced on a daily basis, my interaction with teachers, some of the staff, and the students was effective, improved learning, and made me extremely happy. State evaluations verified what I knew was happening. My department had the best academic improvement among all the other departments.
Holding both with equal regard was the key. I fully understood the power of my memories of the trauma. When I experienced obsessive thoughts, I realized that the trauma was still raw and needed attention and acceptance.
What came to me from the positive memories is that “this is the price one pays to do the right thing.” I was experiencing the challenge of fighting the racist behavior of adults as an attack on me. When connected to body wisdom, I learned that, despite the abuse, I was able to meet the needs of my students. We seldom consider the extent of the antagonism teachers and administrators face because they put all students first. It is not until now that I can celebrate my ability to be steadfast and successful in the face of this violence. Now I have a deeper appreciation for others who have also fought against racist ideologies on a grander scale and what price they paid.
N.B.
As I was writing this blog, I wondered if holding space with equal regard might have helped the situation. Wholebody Focusing would have helped teachers and Administrators find their place among the new students being served by the school.
Our loved ones seemed to be responding to our disabilities from the point of view of their loss of our presence.
“My illness is not a rejection of you. It is simply my reality.” This phrase came to mind when a Focusing friend and I began to see similar patterns in the behaviors of some of our friends and family member’s relation to our disabilities. Our loved ones seemed to be responding to our disabilities from the point of view of their loss of our presence. They seemed to want us to somehow overcome our limitations so that we all could return to our pre-disabled selves.
My husband and I live isolated lives because of his severe pulmonary disease. In addition, I had Salivary Cancer in 2017 that was treated with high levels of radiation. This treatment greatly damaged my immune system. While I am physically able, I also need to keep myself healthy to protect my husband from infection. A friend of mine is regularly insisting that we make an effort to be more available and spend more time doing things that require us to be among a lot of people. She believes that our need to isolate is no longer necessary even though my husband’s prognosis has not improved.
A friend has developed a disability that, at this point, has no treatment. In her case, an important person in her life insisted that she learn to overcome her disability because it makes that person not want to be with her.
My family lives in another state. My husband and I do not go to family parties because driving is out of our range and the family parties include mostly people who have never vaccinated. I need to remind relatives each time we are invited why we cannot participate. They seldom discuss what they can do to remedy the situation of the loss of contact.
We are aware that this problem isn’t only something that my husband and I experience, but seems to be something that other disabled people experience as well. Knowing this helps us look at the situation from a different perspective.
I sense a distinct sense of grief among friends and family. It could be grieving the end of how we interacted in the past and expecting the disabled person has the power to turn back time.
Recently, I experienced a number of people expressing these sentiments. After my conversation with my focusing friend I decided to find a way to help not only my loved ones but also myself to clarify how disability can lead to new lives. Here is what has helped.
The nature of each person’s disability is unique and unpredictable. We need to allow ourselves time to take in what is different, what was lost, and what we might have gained.
Once we identify how we have changed, we can begin to accept our limitations and even be able to see some advantages. For example, certain types of immobility can lead you to find ways of expressing yourself without interacting in person or spending more time being willing to read, write, and contemplate, the world around us. My husband, used his time alone to chronicle his life including the time he had dedicated his life to stoping the Vietnam War and fighting racism in our society. I have spent my time helping to extend Wholebody practices to a larger audience. This blog, for example, has readers in 60 countries. I also help focusers in different countries to communicate with each other.
I take time to do more things that require that I have time to think, explore ideas, and write about what I find. I also spend time learning new ways to manage my digital life that include, films I create with friends and writing letters to government officials regarding responses to laws or lack thereof.
When I was in grammar school my parents realized that I was more advanced than my grade. They sent me to a tutor. She was a teacher in a wheelchair. I went to her home once a week. She asked me what I needed and I told her I wanted to be a writer. She taught me how to think and write about the things that were important to me. Without this training I may never have been able to fully enjoy my abilities. That experience showed me that a disabilty is not the end of life. Our friends and family members need to appreciate what we are able to do in spite of the things we can’t do.
My WholeBody practice encourages me to hold space for what is challenging, what needs support and what needs to be celebrated. We have to help our friends comprehend the complexity of being disabled. They also need to be aware of their emotional response to the changes in our lives. If they don’t, it can lead them to demand that we change in impossible ways. It is important to remember that your friends and loved ones have their own reality in response to your illness. Some people will begin to understand your reality on their own and how to support you. Others might need your support. Most importantly hold space for the love and concern that you know is there.
