A New Annual Festival Day for Me

 Paid my bills tonight and it was pretty clear why God thought
maybe Bruce Springsteen didn’t need MY $85.00 *sigh* I’m not too upset
anymore. Win some, lose some. After all, I DID see him back in the
eighties.

Anyway, I was looking up my brother’s address in my
Handspring today and I happened to hit some weird key and up popped a
journal entry that I didn’t even remember writing. I had written it…
well, it must have been almost three years ago, at least two… This was
before the weight loss surgery. In a way it was disturbing to read. The
emotions were SO painful. But, in another way, it highlighted just how
far I’ve come and how much happier and more balanced I am now. I’m
going to transcribe it in here.. It’s rather long and somewhat graphic,
but here goes:

We went to a
wave pool yesterday and I had a lot of fun there. After paddling around
in the water for awhile I lay down on the chaise lounge and listened to
the roar whenever they set off the wave machine. From the first it just
sent my mind back a bunch of years to Long Island, where I grew up. I
remember the pounding of the waves against the rocks at the end of the
island. There was water there that you’d never want to swim in. It
would toss you up against jagged rocks and tear your body apart before
you could even pull yourself out a yard or two. The water had white
foam fangs that would lift into the air and spit salt at you, leaving a
coating in your nose and on you tongue.

It
sounds violent, but I loved it. I was unafraid sitting safely on the
grass by the cliff’s edge. It was exciting to know what the water could
do but not be in any danger from it. I’d climb on the rocks a little
bit, but mostly just breathe it in, that great salt air, and feel my
hair whip against my face. It made me not care about anything… just
feel the freedom of the breeze.

Coming
back from a trip to Montauk Point, my husband drove in the wind and I
took off my top, baring my breasts to the sun and the world. What did I
care? It was exciting and he laughed and loved it as did I. It thrilled
me so that I could barely wait to find privacy to make love and abandon
myself to him. The ocean air always worked like a strong aphrodisiac on
me. I loved the whisper of the wind against my skin. Nature knows the
best foreplay and why not? It’s of God.

Now,
of course, I hold my feelings tighter. Nobody would be excited to see
these sagging breasts. I couldn’t bare the sight of someone groaning
and turning away in disgust. I’ve seen how they leave nasty notes in
the guestbooks of the fat naked women on the Internet. I could never
stand that kind of pain! I could never even risk it.

But
I miss wearing naked skin. I miss the feathery touch of my own hair
swinging against my back. I miss the breeze whisking across my bare
shoulders. Age has stolen it all away. My repugnant aging body might
offend somebody so I’ve got to keep it covered… keep it in line. And
then my husband can’t figure out why I’m just so deadened about sex.

I
miss feeling men’s desire. I remember how much I used to enjoy fixing
up, making my skin soft and glowy, smelling good with my silky dark
hair floating around my shoulders in some feminine off-shoulder blouse
with a velvet ribbon forming a choker around my neck. Buys would take
you out and they would want you so badly you could almost smell it. It
was exciting, it made me feel beautiful, valued.

I
used to love to tease my husband. He was especially vulnerable when we
were just dating… when there was more of a question of whether he would
“get it” or not. Back in those days you could practically make a guy
jump through a hoop and he’d happily do it just to have you naked and
be given the opportunity to “please you.” And that always really got to
me too! All that fuss because they just wanted to please you? In the
summer I’d show off my sun kissed skin in hot contrast to the private
parts that stayed pale. I remember sitting at the table, one leg
crooked under another, knowing my husband was looking at my tanned
thigh and wanting to touch it. In the winter I had a pair of long brown
woolen thigh high stockings that I’d put on, claiming that they kept
out the cold. What they really did was excite him when he caught a
glimpse of the flesh above the stocking. I knew that, but he didn’t
know I knew that… and it felt good. It felt special… I felt special
and, again, I felt valuable.

Now,
there’s just too much thigh, too much flab on that thigh and on me. I
feel useless and ugly and unattractive. Nobody’d want me now except I’m
blessed because, somehow, my husband still sees someone that turns him
on. I’ll never know why. Is it love? Is it our history? Is it because
we’ve had so much sex together before? I don’t know? He can still make
me feel beautiful if I just close my eyes and forget who I am and how
old I am and how fat I am and just imagine I am who he sees.

I
hate what I see in the mirror. I’m shaped like an O and have so much
extra flesh in places I don’t want it. My eyebrows are turning white
along with several of my eyelashes. They used to be so thick and dark.
I’m nothing now… a woman that your eyes would just scan right past in
search of something nice to look at. Age is a terminal disease. It’s a
slow death and I hate it!

And
nighttimes are so heavy now. We get into bed and it’s like hell. As the
light goes off I can feel his request and I tense up and pull away. His
unspoken pressure fills the air until I can barely breathe and I know
he wants sex but I just don’t want to “give” it.

I
wish for one minute I could just feel like he wants ME. But how could
anybody want me. So, instead, I feel like it’s just this pursuit of a
hormone release. He tries to pretend he wants to be close to me, but I
just can’t believe it and I see it as him just wanting to “get off.”

I
feign sleep or act as if I don’t notice that he’s fairly begging for
it. Why can’t he just be my friend for a night and not have all that
pressure building up in the background?

I
hate sex! I used to love it… or at least many of the things surrounding
it. Now I just hate it because, in its own way, it comes between my
husband and me instead of bringing us closer together. And then, if I
do come through for him, it’s not enough to just satisfy him. Now I
feel the pressure of me supposing to have an orgasm too. I really HATE
that. It just drives me further and further from even wanting to
connect.

Then
I get scared that he’ll have an affair with somebody who may be more
into sex than I am right now. So I pull even further away and end up
thinking that this will be a self-fulfilling prophecy if I’m not
careful. Sort of like it will all end up with, “I KNEW you were going
to eventually cheat on me. THAT’S why I always kept my distance…”

“Well, maybe I wouldn’t have cheated on you if you would have let me get close!”

Then,
sometimes, in my worst moments, I almost wish he WOULD have an affair
and just leave me alone. And why is that? Because I feel so unable to
compete… so UNwomanly… so old and so fat and so repulsive.

So…
I was stunned when I read this today. It came at such an odd time
(arranged by God, thank you). Because this morning my husband and I had
incredible sex… loving and fulfilling (thanks to the wonderful therapy
I’ve been getting). Sex has been becoming the kind of sex I never
thought I’d have, an act of love and intimacy. And, of course it stems
from the weight loss surgery and my new feelings about my own body and
the way I look. And all I can do at this point is just bless and thank
God because, you know, that is who is behind this all. I can honestly
say that I remember so clearly feeling what I felt above, but I HAD
forgotten it because God has brought me “out of the desert.” This must
be very much what the Israelites felt like after they had entered the
fringes of the land of milk and honey. The desert memories must have
begun to fade. That is probably why they set up annual celebrations to
recall what God had done for them.

LOL – Maybe I need to do the
same! Set up some sort of annual celebration where I have a feast and
dance around in an off the shoulder shirt and celebrate that God gave
me back my sexuality!!!