Notes from Jiu Jitsu. (Patreon)

Hello loves.

I didn’t get to the Althing but it’s en route.

Storytime now that I’m on this pre-tour truth tear.

I’ve been practicing Jiu Jitsu on and off for about a year now - with Ash, we wait for each other on the bench - and this is the third time it’s happened.

I’m learning, I’m fighting and flowing with some random stranger, and something in me just snaps in half and I start weeping.

I’m a performer. I know how to read people. I have a mechanism in my brain that can carefully select whether or not to let my floodgates open. Sometimes the mechanism breaks, sometimes it’s also just allowed to glitch.

So this guy today, let’s call him John, is sweating opposite this crazy-haired 49 year old mother who starts weeping…and he says what the other two people said. He looks me straight in the eye and says “This is the place for this to happen. You’re safe. You’re in the right place.” This guy is like 6 foot tall and 200 pounds. So I look at John and he’s just…right. So let myself cry for a second while simultaneously pulling myself together.

I don’t say sorry. Or at least I try not to.

This is the thing. If you’re a survivor of sexual assault, abuse, any trauma, you stumble into these vortexes where the time band-aid rips. The memories flood back. The scar opens. This is not good or bad, it’s the leak across trauma from then into now. The minute you’re physically defending yourself and feeling that fight and flight, it all pours out. You feel the fear all over again.

But then.

It’s about what happens next. Who you’re with. Whether you can let the scar open and close a little bit tighter. Safer. Stronger. Thicker. Wiser. This is why you need community.

Where and how the break and flood and repair can happen is so vast.

During a marathon, in a kitchen at a friends table, in AA, in group therapy, on a yoga mat, on a wrestling mat, in a car screaming at the top of your lungs with friends when that song comes on. The who, the community, is so important.

John added this: “I’ve been where you are.” Who knows what his story is. It doesn’t and can’t matter.

Whatever you do, keep your body in the story. Don’t forget. The body keeps the score. Keep your blood pumping, keep reminding your cells that the story is not trapped in the darkness. Keep going. Find community. Be me. Be John. Be you.

I’m still in it, I’m still trying to claw my way out of these last six years, these last six months, but I’m on the mat, and this is where I get out.

Not on anyone else’s terms, the fight is inside my own brain, and I’m winning it. I’m sailing out of a dark cave. No man, no story, no abuser, no punisher can cage me where I do not want to be caged.

It’s a jagged exit, folks, but it’s so satisfying.

If you need to break, break. Let strangers carry you out if your legs are weak. Take the donuts.

I love you.

See you out there soon.

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