A Home No One Can Take Away From You
I'm still thinking about the goodness of our bodies.
My body has often felt more like a prison than a home. External and internal messaging and the actions of others taught me my body was not safe, good, or free. My body was something to subdue and control, to make pleasing to others.
I thought all my earliest memories were ones marked by pain—and yes, some are—but embarrassment marks the majority. Something of me was not “right,” so people mocked me for being wrong. What was likely meant as good-hearted, instead, made me ashamed of my body.
My body, the betrayer, could not seem to be or do all the things that were expected of it. And so the attic of my mind became my home.
In her book, The Wisdom of Your Body, Dr. Hillary McBride says, “When we are hurting psychosocially—our pain revealing itself in our emotions, thoughts, behaviors, and relationships—most of us don’t seek help until suffering shows up in our bodies, as if the emotional suffering is not reason enough to ask for support. One of the underlying messages here is that the body needs to be paid attention to only when there is a problem. The body becomes the scapegoat and, as a result, we often miss the more subtle body messages that come before the alarm bells. And there are messages before the alarm bells sound, believe me.”
My body got my attention days before my thirtieth birthday as blood flowed with urine. Seven months later, after several non-invasive tests, an impacted kidney stone was discovered during an ureteroscopy. After lithotripsy released the stone, I realized my body had been trying to tell me something for months before the bleeding. This included a day when my body screamed with pain, yet I still took my four kids under seven out to a scheduled activity. The pain lasted only several hours; I may have sought help if it had lingered, but my poor body still suffered through my silence as I refused to listen.
Hillary refers to the body as the home no one can take from you, yet how many of us have rendered ourselves homeless?
Yes, something hurt us. Yes, someone betrayed us. But in our search for safety after suffering, we betrayed ourselves. We fled our bodies in search of something safer, not understanding that we prolong our suffering by keeping our bodies silent.
When we turn our homes into prisons, it is not only we who suffer. When one of us is not free, none of us is truly free. Many would say that disability itself is restrictive, but it’s our culture’s distorted views of the body that make us fear our limitations.
“No one body is more valuable than another body, but body hierarchies are pervasive and are typically reinforced by those who have a body placed higher on the socially constructed value scale. Body hierarchies shape what we believe and how we behave, and they have been used to justify horrific abuse. For example, the devaluation of Black people by white people has been used to justify slavery, murder, rape, incarceration, police brutality, voter suppression, and countless other ongoing atrocities. The devaluation of women by men has been used to discount the experience, expertise, and perspectives of women and to justify barring women from leadership positions, denying women the right to vote, and legislating against women’s reproductive rights. The devaluation of people with physical disabilities by those who are not living with a physical disability has helped create a civil infrastructure that prevents those with physical disabilities from changing the systems that oppress them. And so on. If people are not their bodies, then this does not matter. But if people are their bodies, and if we value people, then we are required to dismantle these hierarchies.”1
Embracing our neurodivergence and dismantling ableism requires us to love our bodies. It requires us to stop viewing our bodies as cages that confine us or objects to overcome. It requires that we top believing some bodies are better than other bodies.
To truly be free, our bodies must become, again, the homes that cannot be taken from us.
When we experience disconnection from our body, rather than connection, Hillary explains that “how we treat our body is based not on what we need but on what others tell us to do. This makes it difficult to identify our needs, express them in the world, and trust our body as a source of valuable information.”2
The path home is to listen rather than silence.
For me, coming back home to myself has meant being willing to listen for and name the needs and desires within me. Instead of pushing them down, worried that I’m being sinful or selfish, I acknowledge them with non-judgement. Each time I listen to my body speak and meet her with compassion, I remind myself my body is safe and good.
But this is not work we do alone.
“…if the body is sacred without condition—meaning that not just male bodies, white bodies, nondisabled bodies, or thin bodies are sacred, although those are sacred too—then your body and the body of your neighbor deserve to be treated as sacred as well. When you know this deep down in your bones, you’re also more likely to challenge any social structure, idea, behavior, or system that tries to tell you otherwise.”3
One of the best ways I know of honoring the sacred within us is to tell the stories of our lived experience.
Sharing my story on Cindy Thompson’s podcast, A Resilience Project, reminded me how important it is to share our stories in safe spaces. Cindy created a space for me to unmask and share vulnerably about my past and present experiences as a neurodivergent woman. This helped me feel more connected to the larger story of humankind.
I would love to use my platform to elevate the stories of other neurodivergent folx as well. If you self-identify or are diagnosed as neurodivergent, I would love to have you share your experience here in this space through a written interview. If that interests you, please email me at info@tarynnergaard.com with the subject line “My Neurodivergent Experience” so I can send you more information. Contacting me is not a commitment, so you can decide later if it’s something you’d like to move forward with or not.
I can’t wait to hear—and share—your neurodivergent experience. I believe in the power of story to challenge the structures that exist to disconnect us from ourselves and others.
I’m with you,
T
The Wisdom of Your Body, p. 32.
The Wisdom of Your Body, p. 39.
The Wisdom of Your Body, p. 48.