Rowing Back to Myself

I wasn't planning on getting on the rowing machine today. But, after basketball practice, I felt like I still had some cardio energy to use up so,  I went to the gym thinking I was going to handcycle as my legs are shot from all the physical therapy this morning. Yet I saw the rowing machine first, and couldn't stop the pull within one minute I was back in position. I wouldn't classify my relationship with the rowing machine as a love-hate one, just somewhat complicated.  I think my relationship with rowing in Israel and the old memories it brings up is one I have yet to fully process. But, I felt the urge to row instead of using a handcycle. I decided to sit and try and go with the flow of my body.

The numbers flash on the screen with my first pull, but for the first time, they dont start millions of calculations in my brain. Numbers mean a lot in rowing, especially competitively. They are one of the main measuring tools used to check how you are raising your skill and power, as the race is who can race the fastest to the finish line. The type of number differs between stroke rate, Five-hundred-meter average, power levels, and more but, it's all numbers on a screen. Numbers used to mean everything to me. I would constantly compare my times with others.  In the early days, it was against another teammate whom I was competing for a spot on the international team. During that time, it was also with the numbers on the scale, but that's for another post. Then in Florida, regardless of how much my coaches tried to help me make it just about my personal growth, I could rattle off last year's world championship times, and the standing world records for my divisions at any moment's notice. Towards the end of my stay in Florida, Coach Katie's words about rowing for myself, making personal goals and achieving them, while enjoying the process started to permeate my brain.  But, they stayed in my Florida rowing box and never made it to the Israel rowing box in my mind.

     Today, the numbers still sat on the screen in front of my face.  But, for once, if not the first time since Florida, they were that just numbers on the screen. I didn't try to speed up to get back to a pace I did when training four years ago, and didn't get upset when the numbers went up and down. The numbers were there, yet I listened to my body and enjoyed every pull and alternating types of pulls and just giving myself space to enjoy the rowing movement. Not letting myself fall into the need to hit a certain distance, or taking dreams so far in one practice, like trying to row a 5k and in my mind going all the way to international competitions. It was so different as many a time I've tried to come back to row on the machine that I miss so much. I miss rowing a lot, the power, and the release of the monotonous movement, the water, the breathing technique it requires me to use. Rowing takes me to a different place in my head. When I've tried to come back in the past, I would go to the box in my mind of competition with my old self, and where I used to be when I rowed all the time, this time I was able to stay in the moment and just row.

The first time I rowed it was on a rowing machine, my mom and I came to meet the rowing coach, he pulled the rowing machine out and set it up so I could see the water.  He showed me how the rowing motion, and then I was just supposed to try it for a few minutes. Two minutes in and I'm hooked and say I don't ever want to get off. Twenty-five minutes later, and the coach is like you should probably stop, you will be sore tomorrow even if it doesn't hurt now. There is something about the monotonous movement that calms me, my deep inner self. Maybe it's like swinging on a swing, the back and forth is so balancing outside and inside. Many moments and interactions happened after that moment, both good, bad, and ugly.  But, the rowing machine and I always had this first version of inner calm, that I found when rowing before politics, nasty comments, and after internalizing it all, had poisoned rowing in Israel for me.

Five years later, and maybe I'm healing. Because when I get on the machine and row, it's not about proving to someone that I am better than someone else, that my body doesn't contradict my results. It is about me loving the monotony of the row and the body that is giving me internal calm. And with that, loving my body enough to listen to it. Even though  I wanted to keep rowing till tomorrow, I listened to my body when it's tired, honoring it, and loving it. Throughout the row and all the passing time, I have removed many of the old hurtful voices that used to show up in my head, when I would try to come back and row.

This moment tonight is a lightening moment. One that I feel like I'm finally taking some trash out of my brain. Especially since my next thought wasn't, I need to compete in 5k indoor races around the world.  Rather it was just this rowing movement feels amazing, feels like a mental home, so I'm going to do it healthily for me and no one else.  Row,release,breathe,repeat.

Ownership of my Wrists

Unchaining My Wrists

TW: Rape,assault,cutting 

My wrists. they came up briefly in my a few of my Pride series posts and they have been a point of contention for me my entire life. This is an intense post one I've felt bubbling but have been struggling to write and talk about since I found this sketch and got the tattoo on my wrist. I haven't owned my wrists for years. How can I say that? They are part of your body, you own your entire body. First of all, to that, I'll say you have never lived in a disabled body before, but that's a topic for another post. Secondly, I'm pretty sure most people who have been through any type of assault, will tell you taking back ownership of your body is one of the hardest struggles long after the incident. 

The first time I felt like I didn't own my wrists I was probably three years old, having cerebral palsy meant I wore leg braces since I was two or three until 9th grade. I got these braces made, probably once a year and that required being casted as a mold for the braces. Which also meant as someone who is partly claustrophobic and hating to feel confined, but I was too young to explain how the process made me feel inside, I would just try to pull or push the casts off my legs, so the caster had my mom hold my wrists and lay me on my back. I think it took me two or three years of this process so by the time I was eight years old I knew to just lay on my back and wear my internal wrist chains. These chains laid dormant for years,or so I thought. But thinking back to when I started hurting myself I never touched my wrists, whether it was pinching, slapping, digging in nails, cutting, burning lightly. Many people assumed I wasn't hurting myself since they couldn't see the results. Especially since society has mostly decided the only place people assume self-harm cutting happens is on the wrists. I really never thought about that at that point in time but most of this self-understanding came sitting on my psychologist's couch many years later talking about tattoos. 

This lack of ownership of my wrists continued when I was assaulted by a healer when I was six, I had already learned just to be quiet and let my wrists chain themselves to the table. This continued when I dated a guy and was used to just being quiet so when I even bothered to say no it was easier to just be quiet, when he grasped my wrists, they weren't mine to ask back for anyway. 

Finally, I started taking my body back for myself, but even my first tattoo there was discussion about getting it done on my wrist but decided on the forearm instead, for a variety of reasons, but an unconscious one, was that I still didn't feel like I owned my wrists. It took years of therapy, coming out of the closet, and learning to own the rest of my body to realize I didn't feel like I owned my wrists. Giving an explanation of the internal turmoil that happened anytime someone grabbed my wrists, and sometimes even my hands. This tattoo thought process was faster than some others I had planned, but I think that also explains where I was emotionally and mentally processing some of the old moldy boxes in the recesses of my mind. This sketch of a cracked heart growing new flowers of life came up in a tattoo giveaway, I didn't win, but the sketch entered my brain and found a spot next to the semi-opened up box of pain, and the growth coming from it. The sketch nestled itself into the box and helped empty it out a bit more, and then sitting on the couch again, I realized that the perfect place for this was on my wrist. Taking back ownership of my wrists one step at a time. 

Pride Series part #2- Self love

Self-love has been such a long and arduous journey for me, and I have yet to get to a place I think of full self-love, but I am also not sure a place like that exists. I do know that on my journey of coming out and accepting my inner pride has many different facets and these different moments and facets of my journey build me into the puzzle that I am. Here is part two of my pride series,self-love.

Haircuts: the first time I cut my hair short I was actually super nervous, I was in Pittsburgh and moving to Florida the next day and I was speaking to a friend Mushky and I had kinda wanted to go short “to make showers faster and easier" but didn't understand to what extent it was something deeper. I remember some of the first responses I got from family friends they were all similar wording "it makes you look gay". Of course, this was my start of the journey in Florida and really had no idea what that even meant and didn't really get the anger and disappointment conveyed in the statement. I did notice that along with the physical weight that was removed from my head there was a mental and emotional change I felt when looking in the mirror. I started feeling calmer looking in the mirror and I actually started to like looking in the mirror. I've always had different body issues from my disability, chronic pain, and other issues, and cutting my hair short really helped me feel like me. The evolution of the cuts from the first one in Pittsburgh and the few in Florida, to the one with my grandmother. I came back to Israel and grew my hair out again thinking I needed to, to look a certain way for a very close friend's wedding, while I felt more like myself with my short hair but I still felt like I owed family and friends a certain version of me. After the wedding and cutting it all off again,I also finally came out and went on a more extreme shave, shape, and color journey searching for my hair to explain to the internal me who I was. Don't get me wrong I loved every haircut for the different lessons I learned during the time period in my life that I had that haircut. It sounds cliche even to my own ears to say this latest haircut I got this past Sunday is my favorite, but that of course is true but more so to do with where I'm at mentally with internal self-love and acceptance. And yes, I love the fact that my hair so clearly states to society a part of who I am, I use a wheelchair and that tells society what other community I'm part of and I love that my hair, another part of me conveys me to the world.


Body image and acceptance. TW: binge-eating disorder. I had a magical moment with myself in the mirror when for the first time ever I looked up and I automatically smiled at myself and felt at home in my body. I'm pretty sure that has never happened before. There was a calm in the smile, I didn't rush to complain to myself about the fat around my face or other rolls and imperfections. What does this have to do with pride month? I have struggled with a binge eating disorder for many years, and I got inpatient treatment now three years ago, while I worked on changing my habits, I still continuously felt like I needed to fill this black hole of self-loathing and I was still fighting myself on my sexuality. Now I have been working on recovery from my eating disorder and it's going hand in hand with learning to love all the aspects of myself. While I already accepted my disability at about 21 I've seen the more I embrace and love my body and sexuality and all aspects of my body, I'm not constantly trying to hurt my body to get it "inline" with social demands and rather my own self-love. I noticed this change when I decided to weigh myself at my sports center, it had been over two months and I try to just keep up with my weight, non obsessively of course. For once when I stood on the scale I didn't feel like I was checking my worth and if I could love myself, I already did and I didn't have the panicked thoughts of should've eaten less the past week. Tallying the number, I've managed to lose 25 pounds over the past 7 months. While the first thought that came back eating disorder style was "is that enough? How much are you supposed to lose?" But the powerful prideful inner warrior shot back with "that's great have you seen what your life has been these past several months, you're doing this in a healthy way, and you aren't losing weight to convince yourself to love who you are." That pride and power that my inner warrior has found has been a lot to do with removing lots of internal shame regarding my sexuality and how my body looks and wishing parts of it were not there. Removing those layers of shame, some of which are still there for sure have given me so much internal peace without needing to focus on a number on the scale for self-love. I love my body, my disability, my sexuality, and ultimately myself all the parts of me. Here's to learning to deeply love all of yourself the changes are magical.

Clothing- Clothing has been the silent but deadly hurdle I keep putting in front of myself claiming I have good excuses for why I don’t let myself dress in a way that feels authentic to myself. My inspiration board on Pinterest is filled with outfits I wish I’d let myself wear, and then my fearful mind unrolls the laundry list of excuses as to why I don’t need to be myself completely.  Pain, physical pain my brain's biggest hurdle it sets up first on the race to being myself is chronic pain even before the disability. The formal androgynous looks you want to wear, the jackets,button-downs, and pants they will enhance your chronic pain. I have internalized this so deeply I don’t even consciously think about it most of the time, but when I have a day I am internally struggling with my sexuality and gender, instead of wearing the few plaid shirts and jeans I feel express myself I wear shift dresses and disappear in the fabric. Another hurdle my brain sets up is about waste. Why waste the clothes you have, why get rid of them, when you need new clothes when you lose weight you can get new clothes. Why waste the money and space buying new and keeping or getting rid of the old. The sister hurdle to this is definitely how my mother reacted when she asked me if I wanted any clothes from a consignment shop and I asked for a men's suit jacket and some dress shirts. The silence suffocated ever feeling comfortable in clothes I internally am screaming to wear. This only enhanced the silence I had told myself that after graduating high school and wearing uniform shirts which were buttoned down and unflattering that I would never wear button-downs again. I didn’t even realize how much this was bothering me until this month of writing posts and there was this huge internal block I couldn't figure out.I’m yelling I am my authentic self to the world but every time I do laundry or open my closet to get dressed every morning, except for a few button-down shirts and jeans the swaths of fabric I suffocate my identity in, choking me.  I haven’t worked out this fear and even thinking about getting rid of all the clothes I hate wearing freaks me out, here's to doing things that scare you, so maybe this summer an actual closet purge will happen, and I’ll let myself shine proudly. I'm not sure why accepting and embracing this part of expressing my gender and identity is so hard. But, here's to doing things that scare you, so maybe this summer an actual closet purge will happen, and I’ll let myself shine in my skin and clothe it proudly.