2.7
February 28, 2013

Have We Stopped Listening to Our Bodies? ~ Pat Barone {Adult}

What is happening? Has sex ever felt like this?

Oh, my god, ouch. So rough. Wait. What is he… oh, it’s getting better… that’s sooooooo good. Oh, uh, no. Agony. Wait. How many fingers is he using? Oh, but wait, that feels good there….Uh, no, that hurts. Maybe, if he just moved a little, oh, that’s better. Uh, no.

Later, as I limped out of bed, the awkward reverberation of too many strokes of my partner’s fingers and the pounding thrusts of his cock still resounding between my legs, I was somehow shocked to feel the after-effects. It wasn’t the warm but tangible echo of a simple hard fucking; it was pain.

Why hadn’t I spoken up?

I’m not shy. I’ll say just about anything to anyone. And, yet, I had completely ignored the warning signs and the pain building in my body. I continually talked myself out of speaking up.

A few days later, I was at the movies. As a former food addict, I’ve written about how hard it is for me to say no to movie popcorn. I’ve educated many people about the power of environment, which can fabricate an equation like movies equal popcorn and blogged on my attempts to cure the spell.

I’ve broken a thousand bad habits. Said goodbye to binges forever. Rarely eat too much.

So far, I hadn’t found a real healing for my popcorn dilemma, so I had created a “fix” and was executing it beautifully. I was consciously eating the popcorn before the movie started, without distraction, one kernel at a time. I was thoroughly tasting and enjoying it.

I was owning every bite.

Then, the tiny sign of satiation occurred. Deep in my belly, a twinge folded inward, the slightest movement that always tells me to stop eating.

I felt it. I acknowledged it.

Then, I reached into the bag again.

And again.

And again.

What is happening? Okay, I’m running right past the stopping point. I see that. I’m continuing to eat, even though the taste has turned to cardboard and the consistency feels like Styrofoam and I know I’m done!

And then I realized: they were the same moment.

In both circumstances, I abandoned my body. Just ignored the discomfort building inside of me, as well as all the raging, screaming stop signs inside my head.

I might as well have thrown my body under a train.

Pretended it was worthless. Treated it as if it was worthless. In that moment, it was worthless.

Because I was not heeding its call for attention, action, intervention, advocacy, redirection, I was giving my body the message its cries were meaningless.

At the moment I realized this, I couldn’t ask myself “Why do I do that?” or think about doing it differently. When did “why?” ever help anyway? It’s just a fucking mind loop.

The heaviness of realization was too great. The sadness was unbearably dense in my belly, which felt more congested than any post-binge condition.

Like most addicts, I grew up with messages of being unlovable and unworthy. I was doing what I was taught. My parents continually abandoned themselves. And me.

It was what we did.

Say one thing. Do another.

Make a promise to yourself. Break it.

Need something? Pretend you don’t.

Feel pain? Deny it, then stuff it and drug it with food or alcohol.

Abandonment.

It felt like the root of something quite deep. The only important kernel that day was a real kernel of truth: As far as I have come on my healing journey, I still have the ability to blatantly throw my body under the train, as if it didn’t matter at all.

To ignore its comfort. To fail to fully, lovingly, care for it. To thoroughly ignore its value.

Ninety-five percent of the time, I treat my body well, nourish it healthily, lavish it with movement, follow its deep yearning for pleasure and indulge its passions.

But the relationship between me and my body still suffers from lack of 100 percent commitment because of those tiny moments when I do not bow to its supreme knowledge. I listen, but I do not honor, all of its communications with appropriate action.

That willingness to ignore my body’s messages is the abandonment of responsibility, the refusal to own every single moment that is mine in this life. It’s the moment victimhood enters the picture and the lying begins. Pretending reality is different than what I’m experiencing. The hope, irrational hope, that pain will turn to pleasure and it will all be okay without my intervention.

If there is one thing I’ve learned from my journey along addiction highway, it’s this: Hope is weak. Hope is helpless. Hope is wimpy. Devoid of ability or energy. Wicked. Useless.

Hope denies the moment in favor of a mirage. And the moment is just where you want to be.

 

Pat Barone has defied all the odds life stacked against her and lived to tell her tale. The child of a southern belle food addict and an American Indian alcoholic, she often felt addiction was the only possible way to live. Much of her life was spent watching family drama playing out through the rear window of a car on a dusty Texas road. Apparently, she mistook this vista as a movie screen and thought it was a sign to pursue filmmaking, because her fixation took her to New York City, where she got her master’s degree in filmmaking from New York University. Sparked by her own healing journey, she works as a Master Certified Coach and Soul Awareness Healer with human beings discovering their spiritual journey. Pat met her spiritual guide at age 25, and has been healing herself and the world ever since. She sings with abandon, even though it scares small children and every form of animal life. Contact Pat Barone, MCC, at Catalyst Coaching LLC, patbarone.com, [email protected] and at AmericasWeightLossCatalyst on Facebook.

 

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Ed: Kate Bartolotta

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