My yoga teacher used to talk about proprioception during class. The body has the incredible ability to sense where it is in space even when we close our eyes. How do we know where our leg is, our thumb, when we are in a dark room?

We have mechanosensory neurons within our muscles, tendons, and joints that help locate us in space.

I am curious if the trauma associated with losing your mother at birth or soon after affects the body’s ability to know it is there.

When I close my eyes, I am a head floating in space. The rest is something I was told I had: neck, torso, butt, knees, feet.

When your body isn’t allowed to have the privilege that most puppies and kittens get—to let the body finish cooking while in contact with the mothership—is the body done becoming itself? And can it finish cooking without the stove from which it emerged?

The thing is, I’m not sure I want to own a body. The one I had was terrifying. It disappeared! There I was, a body that was part of another body, and suddenly I was half, floating, being held by another.

Is it any wonder I have no sense of direction? Is it any wonder maps make no sense to me? In order understand the organization of space, you have to have a central point of belonging. Directions seem like fiction to me. North? Okay. Whatever you say. But I know the real truth: north is just something someone decided. It could flip and be south without warning.

The same goes for rules. The speed limit’s 55? Who says? Rules don’t apply to me because they came from a world that I have seen changes in a heartbeat. Rules are ideas just as family is. You make family however you want to. You can take a child from other parents and claim it as 100% your own, so why can’t I make the speed limit what I want it to be?

What would happen if I could fully feel my body?

I believe I would be filled with rage, a rage so big it would destroy me.

I would feel my body, erupt into flames and fury, and disappear. And if by some miracle my body could withstand the flames, what would come next might be the feeling I hadn’t been able to feel as an infant because it was too big for my small self: terror.

The world can disappear? What does it mean when everything but you is gone? What does it mean when you are gone and here at the same time?

Better to stay numb. Better to overeat and feel something that way: grounded, fully, nurtured. Better to starve and feel the thrum of hunger. Better to put yourself on hold: I’ll fall in love tomorrow. I’ll get my finances in order tomorrow. I’ll start working out regularly tomorrow.

Tomorrow I’ll be me.

Tomorrow I’ll touch my toes.