by Anon, UK
I have come to realise over the past few years the hardness I carry in my body as a protection; I would say I learnt this as a little girl when my tenderness, light, and delicateness was abused, not in a sexual way, but simply the reflection of the world, my home, the education system telling me it wasn’t safe or okay to show this and live like this. I grew up learning to harden and be tough, to do everything by myself; showing I don’t need any support as a way to get through the world. This is the complete opposite of everything I now feel and know myself to be.
By no means have I let all my hardness and protection go; I still carry hardness and protection, not like I used to, but I can still feel it, in my face, my jaw, my body, when I open my eyes to go out into the world I harden, when I anticipate feeling things I don’t want to feel, like the state other people are in and how they feel about me. But the thing is this hardness doesn’t protect me, it makes me ill.
For one it makes me exhausted, my muscles tight and tense, my jaw sore. It keeps people at bay, as I don’t let them in fully, which means I don’t let all their love in and I don’t let all my love out. It stops me from feeling everything I feel, and I know now that is what will truly support me, letting myself just feel all that I feel.
I used to use hardness to prove I was as tough as any man, I don’t mean by fighting or shouting etc., I still look very feminine, but there’s a hardness in my body, my face, you know when you look at some women you can feel it in their face, their jaw, maybe how they move. I used to try and out-do guys in the gym, lift heavy weights, or prove I could do full press ups or could keep up or do the same as them in a fitness class.
I used hardness to say things didn’t hurt me, when the truth is I am super sensitive and there are many things that have hurt me in this life. I used hardness to not feel the abuse of others, of myself, there are many instances I have used hardness in my life, all to not feel the delicate, tender and precious woman I am. And to not feel how much I feel energy, and I mean I feel everything energetically.
There are many ways that this has played out physically in my body, from issues with my periods stopping many years ago, that was me being in too much male energy, and motion all the time, go, go, go. To recently having extra bleeding in between periods. Knowing what I know now and how I live now, I made the choice to look at it from an Esoteric Medicine perspective, at how I had been living. This was my body clearing more that I had taken on, I had to look at what and where I had taken on extra stuff that my body now needed to clear, and that was in reaction to someone. But I also, lovingly and responsibly so, went to the doctor and got support from Western Medicine, a perfect marriage of both if you ask me, to support myself and my body.
I was referred to get internal scans of my ovaries and womb, which turned out to be on the birthday of someone very close to me who had died, so I was extremely vulnerable and fragile that day, in a very tender place. Not to mention it’s an invasive procedure, but one that I know was much needed and would support me.
What transpired was an opportunity to not be hard. As I lay on the table it turns out the person carrying out my scans was the same woman who had done similar scans on my ovaries and womb a few years ago when my periods stopped. We chatted and I felt at ease, I started to cry and apologise, I shared about how I was feeling, that it would have been the birthday of the person who died, what happened to them, and that I was struggling that day. I apologised to the nurse who was helping as I was a bit short with her, but purely from a place of trying to hold it together, and I said I’m sorry I just have all this going on, and I find it really hard today, sharing I’d cried most of the way there, sat in the car and cried. Both women were amazing, they were understanding, there was nothing being hidden in that room. There is something very freeing about being open and honest, being vulnerable and raw. I was treated with respect and care, the lights were dimmed and we talked through what was going on and what was found.
There were fibroids on the wall of my womb.
I was told fibroids are growths that can develop in or around the womb area, they are made from muscle and fibrous tissue, that there was nothing serious, as in it was not cancerous, but that I would be referred to gynaecology to get them seen to. This was great to know, but also I knew there was more to it than it ‘just happens’ to some women. So again I went to Esoteric Medicine for the missing part, the part I had to look at from inside, as in how had I been and am I living my life. I sought support from an Esoteric practitioner to confirm my feelings, and here it was shared and brought to my awareness that it was about my hardness. Which makes sense to me as these fibroids, as shared by my doctor and nurse, are hard lumps made up of muscle and tissue.
For me now, it’s about waiting to have a gynaecology appointment, then seeing with the doctor what the best operation is to have. It’s a bit scary, as none of them sound or feel very pleasant but I know it is absolutely essential for my health and that it’s self-loving to go through with this. I also need to look at how I have been living and still live, not beating myself up for it, but seeing the part I have played in my ill health, and making different self-loving and nurturing choices, to release the hardness I carry in my body. To look at how I treat myself as a woman, to let the hardness go, knowing now I don’t need to do it all by myself, and learning to value myself, to feel my absolute worth in gold, and live it, to allow and live my delicateness, tenderness, and preciousness as a woman.
Read more: