When I was a girl, I loved the physicality of my body. I loved climbing, swinging, balancing, running, ....and I am Generation X so this was...
When I was a girl, I loved the physicality of my body. I loved climbing, swinging, balancing, running, ....and I am Generation X so this was on equipment that was metal.
Metal that was freezing sometimes, hot enough to burn your skin other times, and jagged enough to cut you other times. Like people my age, I still have those scars from using "playing".
Somewhere around middle school, I stopped competing. I stopped seeing my body as "fascinating". That was right around puberty. When my body changed and more males started to take notice and refused to look away. Making a young me -who had already been assaulted multiple times by then- feel very anxious, self-conscious, and guarded.
Luckily for me, I joined and eventually led, a performance auxiliary of a funky Black marching band so I was once again very active in my teenage years.
In fact, I still perform many of the exercises that our sponsor Annie Mickens showed us. Moves that worked our hips. I remember us vocalizing how stunned we were that the moves were so challenging that they burned the muscles of our young hips.
It made a lifetime difference in my relationship to my body.
I grow up and learn that as it turns out a lot of trauma is stored in the area of the hips. As a female Survivor of violence and abuse, I have some of the same periods of mind-body disconnection that others speak of.
Movement, mindfulness, and certain types of exercise all assist in that. Coincidentally, these things also help women and girls to strengthen their confidence-a necessity in this world.
People can write volumes of books about what the benefits of males competing against girls do for males. Nothing about that is surprising. Big whoop!
The male ego has always been boosted and stimulated by besting girls and women. Prize money, sponsorships, magazine features and eliminating/erasing the legacies of athletes like Serena Williams, Venus Williams, and Angel Reese might feel satisfactory too. Cherries on top.
But, in a world, this world; where women and girls are defeated for sport, it is honorable that women and girls have no interest in besting males for sport. For the most part.
The fact that we know about the natural and beautiful differences in our strengths and are therefore more determined to match other women, natural feature for natural feature, and just compete....is so graceful, ethereal, divine, and honorable.
Acknowledging the differences between male and female anatomy is not hate! It is fascinating.
Female bodies are not all about regular and periodic pain and inconvenience.
When I see the miracle of the female anatomy, my pride in being a female human being is renewed all over again. Seeing female athletes compete is a fantastic antidote to misogyny and sexism. Organic female bodies are beautiful and powerful.
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