Rising Like a Phoenix
I am learning who I am all over again. I am touching my skin, reacquainting myself with the fire that lingers underneath.
Buried under diapers, wipes, unwashed dishes, nipple pads or formula cans, it is easy to loose sight of one’s identity. Worries about the children can take over and coupled with lack of sleep, one can become lost in a haze of parenthood, blindly reaching out to feel something pulsing, something alive.
When I finally left my ex and the father of my kids, I felt like a volcano full of bubbling lava.
Need simmered in my veins: a need to be touched, wanted, desired as a woman. A need to trust again, a need for safety and care.
I wanted to claim my sexuality, claim my skin. Even if I was a mother, my want for intimacy was valid.
When I finally met someone and was touched for the first time in years, I exploded and what rose from the ashes was a new Ophelia, a woman that desired and was desired.
I was a phoenix, rising from a nest of orgasm, touch, and tongue.
My voice learned the notes of passion, seemingly for the first time. I ventured within, grasping hands with the woman inside me who was unafraid of her own desires, and pulled her forward. I shed my old skin like a rusk.
I remembered who I was as I was learning about myself all over again.
It has been a beautiful journey, full of re-awakenings, pleasure, and release. There is joy in the celebration of intimacy, one that I welcome with open arms. Trust shines through everything: trusting someone else with my body, trusting myself as well. Learning to trust is also exhilarating and frightening, like handing someone a breakable teacup of the thinnest porcelain and when they handle it with the care it deserves, the result is a feeling of solace so great it eclipses the sun.
Just because I’ve had children doesn’t mean the sexual side of myself needs to be shelved like an old pair of shoes. I found a loving and SAFE partner, which fills me with relief and joy barely contained, like bubbles wanting to escape a bathtub.
I have even started self-soothing by placing a hand upon my chest or my stomach, which I used to feel so self-conscious about. Stretch marks decorate my stomach and it is soft and jiggly after growing through three pregnancies, including a twin pregnancy. Now, instead of shunning my round stomach, I show it love.
The warmth of my hand upon my skin, greeting my heartbeat and the pulse of my veins, is a long-awaited gift. Self love is many things, and one of them is looking after your needs. Even admitting you have needs is an act of self love, for that puts us in a vulnerable place. It gives us the opportunity to validate and appreciate that part of ourselves.
I will sit in that vulnerability, soothe it, sing to it, open my arms to it.
I have re-entered the palace of my sensuality and need for touch.
It’s like greeting an old friend; there is warmth in the embrace of my sensuality: burning embers of self love and ignited hungry passion.
Part of it is also loving that part of yourself; there is no shame allowed in this palace of delight, there is just understanding and acceptance, which is a different journey for everyone.
As for my journey, I feel like I’m home and learning what that is at the same time.
What could be more exciting than that?
