the flat truth

I always thought I would grow up and have nice, defined, full breasts. Society made me think that way. I would read magazines as a young girl and thought these images of perfect cleavage defined femininity and beauty. Even though my Mum didn’t have a big bust I still believed I would. The way society conditions us is potent, it ingrains ideas in us without us even realizing. It takes logic out of the scene and replaces it with unattainable realities. Realities that can only be fulfilled if we cut open our bodies and reshape them with man made material to fill some emptiness in us that we don’t understand. Some lack of deep self love and self acceptance of who we were made to be. It is sad because we think we are manipulating our bodies for OUR-selves, for OUR self confidence. But what we are really doing is trying to fill a hole created by societal impressions of what the “perfect woman” looks like. When I was around 16 years of age that thought I had as a girl of the “ideal me” wasn’t coming true and I began to start longing for breasts and it soon dawned on me that I wouldn’t have a big bust. Funny thing is, it is really hard to be thin and have big boobs, when you loose weight your boobs likely will lesson too (there are always exceptions) but society asks us to be look a way that anatomically just isn’t practical for a human and the functionings of the human body. Before having children I just filled a B cup and now, post babies, I exist with only a slither of an A. I can’t even buy padded bras because they don’t make them small enough and underwire really hurts my frame. It is a very harsh and demeaning part of being a woman. I know woman with all different sized boobs struggle but I don’t know that truth I only know my own to share so I can only take this perspective. When I was going through puberty I felt like something was wrong with me when my breasts didn’t seem to grow with the rest of me. I felt inadequate, lost, fat - having body weight in other places but not there. How was I supposed to be an actual woman if I didn’t actually have the boobs? Would a man still love me if I didn’t have big boobs? Would I be able to fulfill that desire of what society made him believe a female should look like? Would I be able to feed a baby? I am happy to say that yes I fed my boys very proficiently and that my husband is the most accepting man and he has always made me feel like I am beautiful and enough, despite my own lack feeling good enough inside of me. I am so lucky, so blessed. I have a strong, fit and muscular body, I am light, my legs look good if I ever decide to show them off and my face is within the box of what looks good to society. I am thin, I tan easily and loose weight very fast. These are the parts of life society seems to think I get right but that is what is SO wrong. I am thin because I am unable to produce a proper appetite due to my trauma. I tan easily yet my mother and grandmother have had much skin cancer removed (some malignant) because the reality is that when we tan we are actually really hurting our skin. My ability to lose weight fast means three days of experiencing harsh and uncontrollable PTSD can lead me to only weighing 45 kgs. My usual weight of 50 kgs is HARD to maintain. I drink calorie drinks and blend oats for calories. I don’t really like or care much for food and that makes social situations including food very hard for me. I can’t even talk about my husband being a chef at this point. The irony of it all. It’s not just the fact that weight on me repulses me. The act of swallowing is also very overwhelming, something I have experienced since a child and sometimes I cannot physically swallow the food down into my stomach or I will choke on it and puke. It could be related to phallic objects being forced in my mouth as a child, I don’t know. Does it matter? What matters is that it SUCKS that society happily puts me in these boxes without considering what it could mean for a person to be fit into that box. What “sucks” is that I don’t fit the box that society defined as having “proper, adequate boobs” it doesn’t suck because I don’t have them, it sucks that I spent thirty years of my life thinking I was flawed in this particular part of being female, what “sucks” is that thousands, millions of other woman feel inadequate for this EXACT reason. But there is always a positive to the bullshit. Always. And here are my positives. My milk supply during breastfeeding was incredible. I mean those babies turned into DD powerhouses and that is a really fucking miraculous thing. I finally got to experience my big boobs and it was so much more profound than I ever could have imagined. It wasn’t for my superficial desire to be beautiful in the eyes of society like I used to long for, it was for the life and wellbeing of my babies. That alone is worth the fact they look like deflated balloons now. It doesn’t matter. They grew two humans. Two INCREDIBLE humans. They did exactly what mother nature intended them to do. They are very very special parts of being a woman and the fact that we sexualize them, and place value on their looks over this magical function is beyond reason. Not only did they do this they also were NOT apart of my abuse as a child. Because I was late to develop, I didn’t have anything to offer from this top half of my body. It is my safe haven, these puppies didn’t get his hands and mouth and body all over them. Is that not a blessing? Isn’t that so special to have that part of me that is left for me? I truly believe this is a blessing and I am not being sarcastic. I am not going to spend my life drowning myself in my past and victimization. I am taking on my triggers head on instead of pushing them away and I can feel the strength in me grow. From the inside out. Yes, I have had a very painful life but I have always looked for things that are good in the world and these flat boobs are a BLESSING, not my downfall like I spent my whole life thinking. I would never sexualize them now and give society something to stare at if it weren’t for a purpose deeper than aesthetics. I don’t want my boobs to be a sexual object, even though I can’t stop what other people think when they look at me, or them. They are not that to me, they are my legacy. My legacy that being apart of the itty bitty titty committee doesn’t take ANYTHING from your Womanness. NO THING, not a single thing, from a Womans ability to feed her baby and be a divine symbol of the feminine Goddess. These breasts are sacred, I will not be apart of the system and hide my truth that I am a woman with tiny breasts. I LOVE MY FLAST CHEST, and while I have to build that love everyday I LOVE THEM. And NO BODY, not a single soul, a single thought anyone else has about my body, can take that from me. This body is mine, it is my temple, God blessed me with my body and so much to be grateful for and I will fight my whole life to live for the supreme Parabrahman (stream of light) from which my body comes forth to shine forth the truth about life. What I am sure about at this point is that life is about love and truth and that comes from our openness and acceptance to how fucking hard the human condition is and realizing that we are all just trying our hardest, given our history and our circumstances. If you can trust that self love and self trust conquers all you too will see the reflections of the divine reality grow from within you. This divine source, Isvara, God, he/she/it dwells in the heart of all beings and how could something that is a home for God ever be anything less than magnificent?

Dont ever forget your worth.