On moms & reclaiming the body
Heya, how’s your spring going? I don’t know about you, but with spring, I often get an urge for zhuzhing up my nest. So this year, I decided to sew a few zafus, or meditation pillows. I figured it adds good vibes and also delivers on my commitment to looking cool among hippie friends.
It so happens that my mother is a professional seamstress. I practically grew up in her shop, playing with zippers and fabric scraps, occasionally stepping on a misplaced needle, and every once in a while, swallowing a couple of delicious-looking buttons.
I was never trained to sew; I’ve just done it. Turns out countless hours of watching my mom go from measuring a body to neatly finishing off a garment with her precious and moody serger machine (seriously, these things are fickle AF), did the trick.
Begrudgingly speaking, precious and moody also sum up my feelings about my relationship with my mom.
Just this week, I was attending a training with somatic sexuality professionals, when we were asked to stand naked in front of a mirror and narrate authentic thoughts and feelings about our bodies, out loud.
As soon as the garment-free facilitator started to demo, I sensed terror. Let me be clear, I am not a never-nude. I enjoy getting naked and chatting up the beer-bellied regulars at the nude beach as much as anyone.
But a trigger had gone off and I began racing in the marathon of body shaming memories.
From flashbacks of my mom standing in front of her tailor-grade full-length mirror harshly judging her own body, to every time she had pointed out the flaws in mine…I was spiraling.
I excused myself and ran to the restroom for a good cry. Two dry heaves and five nose blows later, my eyes opened and landed on the words ‘Not your Mother’s,’ branded on a bottle of dry shampoo sitting on the sink.
After a double-take and a few moments of WTF, I felt the rush of divine communication. This body was mine. The hurt subsided; the pain transformed.
I was ready to tell the story of my flesh.
For all my cutting, intense, and evolving feelings about my mom, I remain aware that my veins are filled with her fiercely loyal and indomitable life force.
Like every child of a difficult parent, I’ve taken way too many trips to the land of afraid-of-becoming-my-mother. Yet, there is something about sitting behind a sewing machine and positioning my body like hers that alchemizes that agony into a sense of honor for having been raised by her.
Truth is, sewing is more than just a handy or showy craft for me. Sewing has become a place of refuge; a padded playground for exploring what is and is not my mother’s.