I just finished running a Mind Body Fertility Group. It’s always so beautiful for me to see the shift in the women’s demeanour from the beginning to the end of the six weeks. The other day I received a most heart warming and meaningful email from one of the women in the group.
She wrote a poem and prefaced it by saying that the Mind Body Fertility Group helped her let go of the anger she was feeling towards her body. The poem is about her new found joy and gratefulness. I was really moved.
My body
My body lets me:
walk in forests of moss covered trees
jump into dark Ontario lakes
smell lilacs in the spring and
hold my husband’s hand on city streets.
My body enables me to:
hear birds sing in the morning
listen to waves in the afternoon and
plant tomatoes in the garden.
My body lets me:
feel the heat of sunshine through my clothes
and the cool breeze of a summer night on my neck.
With my body, I glimpse:
winking stars on a clear night
purple and yellow wildflowers in a sun-drenched meadow and
grey skyscrapers standing side by side in the rain.
My body:
connects me to my sister and my mother and my grandmother
connects me to all sisters and all mothers and all grandmothers
here and around the world.
This body is not a place of failure
It is a place of a thousand miracles
every day, every moment
from the synapses firing in my brain
to the cells processing oxygen
to the movement of my arms as they hug my husband.
A thousand miracles happen here each day.
This body is a gift and hundreds of gifts.
This body is sight and sound and laughter.
It is more than pain.
This body will grow and evolve
and it may sag and wrinkle but it will also grow wise.
Each struggle, each obstacle
brings wisdom.
And even when I cannot
feel that wisdom or see that wisdom
the body is collecting it,
waiting for me to uncover it.
This body, from my ankle
to my fingertips,
carries with it a hundred stories,
From today on, I will read
not just the painful stories
that bring tears or a chestful of anger.
I will read the other stories of my body,
those of pleasure, of bliss, of hope.
I will feel delight at:
seeing a hummingbird,
tasting chocolate
tasting a kiss
taking a deep breath and feeling a moment of peace.
All these stories are here too.
I just need to remember
to read them.
This body, which has gone through so much,
will help me to heal and forgive and grow.
This body is not failure.
It is possibility.
A thousand possibilities.
And for the first time
in a long time
I am excited to turn the page.
And today, I am also content on this page
this moment, this breath is as joyful
as tomorrow.
-TC
