The Long Walk Home

There are some objects that can tell a story, one beyond their physical presence in our lives. When the story ends it is good to recite it. To remember the history as an ebenezzer (marker of Gods presence and goodness) in the ground.

And so to my breadmaker. 

I was given it when I left a church I worked for in my early 20s. I’d been there as a student worker for a couple of years and loved many things about it. For a start it was in Cockfosters (got to love that name…), it was where I started to learn to preach and lead services, it was where my ‘ministry’ was shaped, where I discovered that success is not about numbers but about loving those you are with and paying attention to the reality of God in our lives, it was where I inhaled a whole load of Eugene Peterson and found a depth to my work. It was where I hung out with students in North London, went to parties with them and saw their dance shows, it was where I saw the aching loneliness of life in halls and soaked in the mixing pot of cultures, spiritualities and humanity around me.

It was a place where I found delight in small children, meeting with my boss and family each Monday lunchtime and being loved by their 4 and 2 year old was one of the best things about those years. It was a place I learnt more about myself and look back with immense fondness at the love I was shown by the church family. 

It was also a place I struggled with singleness and the glut of friends getting married straight out of uni. (Ah Christian culture). I went to see friends with their new collection of shiny kitchen equipment, rice cookers, bread makers, all for people who weren’t me. 

Another friend and I talked lots about these things in our 20s. There was a strange pull in us to leave good things until we were married, until we had another life to share them with. Looking back this seems SO odd but it was probably the culture and family backgrounds we grew up in, the expectation that marriage would come early and be the heart of our lives.

I am thankful that we talked about this oddness and did something about it. Bought the picnic blanket that only married friends seemed to have just for us. Went on adventures with mates rather than wait for some uncertain future. 

When I left the church the vicars wife sourced the best breadmaker and it was their leaving present to me. I still don’t know what the thinking was behind it but it remains one of the best presents I’ve ever received. It said, you don’t need to wait until you are in a mythical relationship to have amazing bread, you can be you all by yourself and still experience goodness. It was a symbol to me that life was not about finding the other half of me but was enjoying the goodness around me now. 

I loved it. 

It also lasted (thanks Carol because you sourced a good one!). 20 years I’ve had it. It’s lasted through many of the wedding presents I got when I did eventually, to my surprise, get married. It’s kept us in warm bread and pizza dough for years. 

And then last week it vibrated off the countertop and died, as all things do. 

We replaced it straightaway because unlike the mixer, the microwave, and other broken things we haven’t got around to replacing, we use it weekly and I reckon another 20 years is worth paying out for. The new one is the same model but the more recent version (because who likes change?). It’s a lovely machine. 

And there you have it. To my breadmaker and all the richness of finding life here and now that it symbolised to me. May you rest in peace.

It turns out that moving, going through a whole load of change, grieving the loss of a lot of things, experiencing a fair amount of culture shock, coping with being a regulating system for your youngest child and generally ripping up everything you know and trying to form a new life in a new place is pretty exhausting and not all that conducive to having the brain space to sit down and read (or use full stops and new sentences). 

I have read some books this year, not as many as I had hoped or usually do, but there you go. Here’s my thoughts on the ones I have. 

Are we having fun yet?- Lucy Mangan

I love Lucy, I loved her Guardian articles years ago, I love her sarcasm, wit and general observations on life. I loved reading this book, it made me laugh out loud and want to read chunks to the husbandface. It’s about a mum with two kids juggling life and work and school runs and the mental load etc. So if that’s you then I imagine you’ll love it. It’s middle class london life, Motherland territory so if you aren’t in the mood for that then steer around it. It’s a treat though for anyone in a very specific stage of life. 

The Man Who Died Twice- Richard Osman

Does what his first one did, lots of warm comforting intrigue, mild suspense, fun characters and very much a sink into an arm chair with multiple cups of tea for the afternoon cosy kind of a novel. There is a bit of mild peril/death etc but it’s a lovely read. (I know, I’m not sure how he does it either) 

Beautiful World, Where Are You – Sally Rooney

I wondered why I went for this one, I think it’s because Sally is an excellent writer and although I have really not enjoyed much of her first two books I wanted to give her another try. I may have worked out my issues with her characters and really enjoyed this one, possibly because they are further on in life, have some existential angst and some of the relationships actually work out. It’s a beautiful book, a treat to read and with some timely observations on life. 

Platform 7 – Louise Doughty

I couldn’t remember much about this one, except it was in that vein of novel that had a gaslighting horrid man in it. It blurs in my mind with all the others but was a fairly engaging read all the same.

Ways to be me- Libby Scott/Rebecca Westcott

The prequel to Can you See Me? A really helpful novel explaining what it’s like to be PDA (pathological demand avoidance, which is the trait of autism we think our youngest fits with). SO relatable and very much a soothing book to read to remember we aren’t alone and to have words to describe some of our life. Worth a read to see the world from the perspective of an 11 year old who is autistic with PDA. 

The Best Things- Mel Giedroyc

Oh Mel I wanted so much to like this. I read it and tried to engage but it just wasn’t my cup of tea. It’s about a rich family falling apart and whilst I kind of liked the main character in the end there was too much fatphobic talk for my brain to deal with. I really wanted this to be a book version of Schitts Creek but it just wasn’t. Ah well. 

I am an Island- Tamsin Calidas

A beautiful, heartwrenching, harrowing read about the life of Tamsin who moved from London to a remote Scottish Island to take on running a croft. It’s so wonderfully written and deeply moving. She documents the break up of her marriage, the hostility of some of the people on the island and a deep dive into foraging off the land in a period of extreme ill health. It has moments where if it had been a novel you would have thought she was being too harsh on the main character, she faces a whole load of hard horrid times. Of course, being a nature memoir it has a chapter on cold water swimming. I couldn’t put it down and was moved and inspired by her life. Although I have to confess I’m getting a little tired of the chapter on cold water swimming in every nature memoir I read, I’m either going to have to take it up or put a chapter in my memoir about cold water paddling… 

4000 Weeks – Oliver Burkeman

An amazing book about the startling reality that we aren’t in control of our lives, we can’t do everything or achieve everything and we can’t control the future for us or our children. What now? 

I think I underlined most things in this book, it reassured me, it reminded me of freedom found when we accept that we are not in control and we can’t achieve all we want to.

He writes things like this: 

“Convenience culture seduces us into imagining that we might find room for everything important by eliminating only life’s tedious tasks. But it’s a lie. You have to choose a few things, sacrifice everything else, and deal with the inevitable sense of loss that results.”

“The day will never arrive when you finally have everything under control—when the flood of emails has been contained; when your to-do lists have stopped getting longer; when you’re meeting all your obligations at work and in your home life; when nobody’s angry with you for missing a deadline or dropping the ball; and when the fully optimized person you’ve become can turn, at long last, to the things life is really supposed to be about. Let’s start by admitting defeat: none of this is ever going to happen.”

“choosing curiosity (wondering what might happen next) over worry (hoping that a certain specific thing will happen next, and fearing it might not) whenever you can.” 

(I would LOVE this to be my parenting manifesto) 

I want to read it again because it was so helpful for remembering that all I have is now, this present moment. I really need to know that in the ways I relate to my boys. In spending my whole time fearing about an unknown future but enjoying them, helping them, engaging with them today, in the present moment, not because it gets them to some future thing but because it’s worth it right now. 

So much of parenting leads us out of the present moment and towards the future.  I am not in control of that future and frankly there are too many unknowns to even think that what we give them now will necessarily be relevant in their future (except maybe teeth brushing). Anything that helps me stop doing things to get to a mythical point in the future when everything is fine and bring me back to living this moment right now has got to be a good thing. Also it’s a book that reads like Ecclesiastes and I liked that. 

Gilead- Marilynne Robinson

The letters of an ageing pastor to his young son. Finally I read it. I loved it’s gentle warmth, it’s wistfulness and the wisdom, love and grace that oozes from the page. I’m glad I got round to sitting with it. 

The Storyteller – Dave Grohl

Dave tells stories about his life, much of this I adored and loved. I loved his relationship with his Mum, the tales of rock and roll living, the love of music. It ticked all my music memoir boxes. There was something a bit lacking though by the end and I can’t quite put my finger on it. Maybe it was just a little too much of the rock and roll excess lifestyle, maybe I wanted more details of the Nirvana phase, maybe something else. Still, ignore me, it was fun and moving and light enough to breeze through in a couple of sittings. 

Girl A – Abigail Dean 

I am not sure why I read harrowing novels about horrid situations, maybe because they are gripping enough to get me back into the habit of reading again, maybe they are a quick win on my book list, maybe they are better than scrolling through facebook. Anyway, this is the perspective of Girl A on the horrid abusive father she had and the way she escaped and formed a new life, and what happened to her various siblings and their perspectives on the horrid past. Not a fun read. 

The Road Trip- Beth O’Leary 

Ah, I love Beth O’Leary, fun easy to read novels with intelligence, heart and lovely characters. Another great one. Perfect holiday read. 

Apples never fall- Liane Moriarty 

I kind of liked this one about a family in Australia as they grapple with the disappearance of their mother. Lots of flicking back to their pasts, how they were formed to be the way they are now and a pretty compelling story line. Worth a read. 

Changing our minds- Naomi Fisher 

A manual on self directed learning. I really enjoyed this, it was easy to read which helps me a lot when reading non fiction. It wasn’t too prescriptive and is one I want to return to lots to remind me of why on earth we are embarking on this unschooling journey (and why I’ve given up my blissful 6 hours off each day to try and live out our values when it comes to school). It’s a compelling read and worth it if you are contemplating ripping up the script the world has given you when it comes to education and trying something new. (or you know, don’t pull at that thread and enjoy your 6 hours a day when your kids are at school… once you pull the thread it’s hard to go back…). I won’t offer her arguments here, you can read those for yourself if you want to take the blue pill (or is it the red one?). 

I walk on. Down a straight path 

Hawthorn hiding singing thrush 

The cold of morning 

still lurks underneath these branches 

Bird song takes me back 

Green grass, tangled brambles 

To the paths where goldfinch never 

Winged their flight, darting across to say 

Good morning. 

These woods look so much like mine

Yet this path takes a different course

Feels sacred, full of a different call

No golf course to my right but 

A vast tidal plain 

No majestic view, no best bench to sit on

But a straight green line ahead. 

Nature wrapping me in familiarity 

And yet I still travel into unknown 

Not knowing where the next step lies 

Aching for safety and known 

Where is the best place to dig down and stay? 

I don’t know 

But this green, vibrant, vibrating path 

Enfolds me, Calls me on. 

And whispers in my ear. 

You are here.

Easter Sunday is strange when you aren’t feeling the big joy wonder of delight at hope returned. I remember big praise events as a teenager, the high of singing ‘Thine be the Glory’ loud and long whilst our vicar joined the band on the organ and soloed away with joy. But these emotions cannot be forced. If I love anything about Easter these days it is that all our stories are found in this big story and some years we need the aching silence and the jump to the joy can feel too much. For me this year Today means I can weep my tears of grief knowing that they are heard, seen, known and loved. There is a hope which is quiet and holds me on this course. Which is not loud and exuberant but gentle and tender.

I know that others will need and feel the big fat joy this year and I know that in other years I will dance in that to. This year though I stand with Mary in the garden and cry, asking where my Friend is and I gaze over the water with Peter in desperate longing that it really is him on the shore. 

I love Jan Richardsons book of blessings ‘Circle of Grace’ and this is unashamedly influenced by her beautiful words. (And the wonderful line ‘how it felt when you stood in the place of death and heard the living call your name’).

For all whom the joy is jarring

For all whom the grin won’t come 

For all who can’t find the hoorah 

On this day 

For all who ache 

For all who can’t see the way 

For all who the Easter Saturday has 

Not broken into sure certain wonder

For all whom the jump is too wide

For all who need to sit in tears 

For all who need courage 

To be wrapped in love 

And hear the living call their name 

In this place of death, 

In this lost, lonely landscape. 

May this hope breathe gently on you

May you hear your name spoken with love

May you taste the droplet of hope for the next step on. 

May you hear the invite of ‘come and have breakfast’ 

But if you can’t 

Come sit and be still 

May you know you can come,

sit and breathe for a while.  

In this silence. 

Waiting for the Dawn

It’s Good Friday. I’m sitting trying to find the meaning of this day again. I miss sharing it with others, I miss not having a fixed faith community at the moment. I miss Good Friday’s past, trailing from my teenage years of sitting in the shelter of Guildford Cathedral and soaking up the silent awful majesty of this day. 

And so today I pause. 

I breathe in the long history past, a cross, a man rejected, killed, friends who fell asleep and denied they knew him, a man alone in a garden wondering if there was another road to take, a mystery of curtain torn, darkness falling in the daytime, the divine ripped apart, the forsaken lostness, the cup drunk, the shifting change, the newness about to be forged, but first the fire, the stopping sadness, the silence, the end. 

Always the end. 

Before there can be a beginning

Always there is an end. 

I sit and breathe in this story all our stories are found in. 

Each year I need something different from this Easter wonder, this mystery, this clarity of view, this story to end and begin all stories. This year I need to know that all stories must have an ending before there is a new beginning. I feel the ache of our ending. I lean into the grief and the loss. I lean into the loneliness and know that somewhere there will be hope again, a new start, a path ahead. I wrap this silence around me and wonder. I sit waiting. I look at the most desperate of all places in this story and know that the end gave way to more than anyone could have dreamed. 

I hold all our endings and longings for new beginnings and I wait. No easy timeline for any of us but never the final despair. I hold onto hope finding a way.

I know mothers day isn’t easy for anyone, it can be full of ache, grief and sadness. It can be full of disappointment at the lack of children, the pain of loss of mothers or children, the desire to be honoured well as a mother and the feeling of not being celebrated or seen in your mothering. It’s a whole lot of strange. It might be just to raw to think about, in which case ignore this post. But I think I wanted to find myself in the mother heart of God, to receive mother love and care myself as I ponder what it means to be mother and in other mother type relationships. 

Back in the early 90s I grew up going to a big Anglican Church in the heart of Guildford, my Mum worked for a charity called the Amos Trust and the man behind that charity went to our church, Garth Hewitt. There is a small subsection of English Christians who will know Garth, big on the Greenbelt scene and with a deep heart for justice. I think it was him and his songs which helped give me a context for life beyond white middle class Guildford. He was also slightly ahead of the game when it came to different expressions of spirituality and ways of experiencing the divine.

I remember when his album with the song ‘we need your mother love O God’ came into our house. It was probably the first time anyone had highlighted the need to look at the divine feminine (and was a super low key way of introducing that concept..). I wasn’t sure though, was this phrase allowed? God had always been described to me in terms of father, male, and, lets face it, the old man with a beard was never far from my mind when it came to images of God.

I knew those passages were there though, the ones where God said as a mother can’t forget the child at her breast, I cannot forget you. I knew about the mother hen gathering chicks. I stored away the thought, not quite able to deal with why this talk of the mother love of God still jarred with me. 

Looking back I think I absorbed the negative talk of our society about mothers. Nowhere were mothers honoured or used as a metaphor for good and wonderful. To ‘mother’ someone was almost a derogatory phrase, used to dismiss and scorn. I grew up in a world where women were fighting to be seen as more than just mothers (which I wholeheartedly agree with) and somewhere along the way I had taken the mother part as a negative, a thing to get past.  

And then I became a mother. 

Which is a phrase that I know is a privilege, an ache for some, an area which causes pain and trauma because of the past or lack of future. I didn’t expect it to happen. I had felt the pang for children before I found anyone to have them with. I was convinced I could never be attractive to someone who I could make babies with so I parked the thought. I hadn’t envisioned a life with kids in it, I wasn’t prepared and I was left with a sense of disorientation when my son was born. Who was I now? And what positive images could I cling to about being a mother? If the societal voice I heard was dismissive, where could I find what it really meant to be a mother?

And that’s when I came back to this phrase from the song I’d heard growing up. ‘We need your mother love O God’. I found the mother images of God, I clung to them in the long dark nights of feeding and desperate prayers for sleep. I clung to this God who would not forget me, who was fierce in love for me, who was awake in the night when I was, who adored me with the intensity that I adored this little face staring up at me.

I want to reclaim this mother heart of God, I want to lean into this image, to see God’s mothering of us bringing worth and dignity into the ways we mother each other (which is deeply profound when it occurs both within and beyond biology).  I want it to be a positive image in our relationships with those younger than us or in particular need of a mother kind of love. 

I want mothering someone to be equated with providing safety, comfort in the storms of life, a place to run to for shelter, a place where you know you will never be forgotten or alone, a place where we know we are always carried in the heart of the God who made us and formed us.

When my first son was born I could not get his face out of my head, when I went anywhere without him I felt a lack. I still feel that something is missing when I am on my own (Don’t get me wrong, I very much enjoy that aloneness but I always know there are two small people out in the world because I carried them and birthed them and I feel different without them close). I love that this God of the universe puts herself in that place, of vulnerability, of connection, of love.

I’m slowly working this image into how I see God, into how I experience God. I like to imagine God as male and female, as other and beyond, as tender and close, as many and varied images, I love the richness of all the different expressions of God. I get that parental images will not be helpful for many people, but for me, as a mother in this world, this mothering nature of God speaks deeply. I long to dive into it, to swim in the richness and wrap it around me like a cloak. I too often run from that part of me and yet it is at the heart of who I am. I am a mother to our boys, God’s mothering looks like fierce protection, deep compassion, never giving up love and more. I want to be a mother like that.

Life feels very much out in the wilderness right now. But it’s a wilderness, not a desert. There is life bursting all over the place and there are holes to fall into, paths that are overgrown and no clear way ahead. It’s a full on world of tension of all the happy and all the sad. An undefined place and I am learning this new skill of holding the tension.

And I am asked

How are you doing? 

And I sit, breathe, 

Try to put into words.  

How to explain this tension 

This season of joy and sorrow

Grief and wonder 

Delight and frustration

Fear and light 

Love and despair 

Closeness and loneliness 

Fullness and emptiness.  

Sunshine and clouds. 

And then, surprise 

I am holding them both 

These consolations

Desolations 

Always I’ve lived in the extremes and 

Now I walk this path 

Of here. 

In all it’s messy confused 

full depth glory. 

And you? How is it for you right now?

I never know how much to post these types of posts. On the one hand I know I write to know we aren’t alone and so I think being open about this will help someone at least.

On the other hand I fear the voices that tell me I’m attention seeking or self pitying. I’m pretty sure those voices are part of the black dog experience and so I shall push past them in the hope that it’s always good to talk about the realities of hard mental health weeks and good for others to know that they aren’t the only one.

Anyway. Here we go. I haven’t had a week like this for a long time but I’ve remembered that naming what is going on is the start of finding my way out of the tangled thickets I’ve got stuck in.

And the black dog says:

The swirling mass of dark approaching says:

The blanket over my eyes, the glass box I am trapped in, watching the world goes by, says:

You are too much 

You are worthless 

You will drive everyone away with this need 

You are hopeless 

You can never do what you say you will 

You are the problem 

You are failing them 

You are an imposter 

You are too messed up to be of help to anyone 

You need to grow up 

You should be able to handle this by now 

You should be able to sort life out 

You are disqualified 

Out on the scrap heap 

Forgotten 

Alone

Disconnection 

Disorientation 

Damaging wounds 

I sit and wait. 

For the one with the light to come 

Rushing over the hills 

Holding out the glowing jewel like Raya and her friends 

Against this swirling mass of fear and shame.

I sit and wait.

They’ve always come

They will again. 

I will see things in their right perspective, I will smile again, I will know peace, I will know connection. I will be able to reach out in love. 

I sit and wait.

So there’s this video doing the rounds of an American chat show host talking about his faith to a guest.

It seems to have captured the imaginations of people of faith, to hear such beauty and depth spoken in places which are often reserved, by the nature of their purpose, for light reflections, for promotion of films. There was so much resonance with what he said and the clarity of his voice in a world which I think is aching for truth, integrity, authenticity, love and gentleness.

I think the reason it wooed so many is because of the confidence, the integrity with which it was spoken, the honesty and the reality. You can watch it for yourself and make your own thoughts on this droplet of beauty and why we ache for it so much.

What I’m writing about is my supreme annoyance and triggered thoughts I had when I made the mistake of reading some corners of Christian Twitter talking about it. Which took me down the rabbit hole of my days hanging around people who talked about ‘evangelism’ a lot. To be honest the word still makes me feel a little ill. It was the random analysis of what the chat host said that made me want to vomit most. The tweaks of what he could have said to make people properly understand the ‘gospel’ (again a word I would like to redeem one day, I like good news, I just can’t say that word without a dump of memories of people deciding who is a good Christian based on how well they recite the ‘gospel’).

It’s this kind of approach which makes me never want to think about ‘evangelism’ again, this critic of anyone who talks about faith in the public sphere, this over excitement about people who do, and this weird desire to correct them about what they could have said better. When I was more in tribes that talked about these things lots I would sink deeper into my chair, why would I talk about faith if I had to recite a script or be scared to get it wrong? Why would I be honest about all the things I have no flipping idea about if peoples eternal destinies were at stake if I hadn’t memorised the ‘right’ answers? Evangelism training days would leave me cold, unable to find my real voice within and feeling like I had to pretend. They were some of the most inauthentic moments of my 20s.

If I had to do an ‘evangelism’ training day now (I mean I wouldn’t, but if I really had to..) I would just spend a day helping people connect with God. Creating space where they had time to hang out and work out who they were with this God, delighting in that God, raging at that God and trusting that God to show up and bring reality into peoples lives. At the end of it some might discover they have little faith, that would be ok, some might leave with smiles on their faces, that would be ok, some might be in tears, some might be laughing with the relief of being able to be themselves and be known. We would find out where we are with God and that might just lead to a more confident authentic way of life in our everyday world.

We would hold our experience of God together and hopefully leave with more congruence within. Not trying to recite answers to questions there are no answers to. Not trying to crowbar Jesus into conversations but deeply connecting with the God of our lives. So there might then be no need to get sweaty about ‘evangelistic’ conversations but instead we could live life authentically with our Maker and be honest and open about that at appropriate times and places. (Just as we would about anything else about ourselves in our lives.)

Just like Stephen Colbert did.

Sigh.

All this goes to show I really should spend less time clicking on Twitter and more time hanging out with the One who loves me most and strangely works with us in all our errors, odd ways and behaviours. The One who calls us to love through all this. I’m aware I’m probably wrong but you know. I like being this kind of wrong.

Let’s talk about periods.

I’m not sure I have much before. Maybe once or twice. Which for something that affects pretty much aspect of my moods and emotions each month it feels like not enough airtime.

A few years ago I heard a talk from a woman who ran her own business. She talked about how her menstrual cycle affected her weeks and how she leant into the weeks where she felt the energy and buzz and lay low and quiet in the times when she felt the heavy moods upon her as her body prepared to have a baby and then worked out it didn’t need the extra stuff and sent it on its way (dumped felt too harsh, bled loads might be more accurate but with caveats of how it’s not a scary type of bleeding, although even having done it for 30 years I still get weirded out)

Once I mentioned my monthly feeling like I was the worst, the job was awful and everything is wrong with the world to my two male colleagues. I did so in a reassuring- I’ll think differently next week because that’s just where I am in my cycle right now way. It felt daring and taboo to name it and almost sacred to talk about what goes on each month but which few people mention.

I say all this because I’m two days into my period (it still feels odd saying that, now you know I bleed each month and I’m doing it right now, the secret is out… wow our culture of secrecy and shame in this area has A LOT to answer for) and my brain is waking up. Two days ago I thought I was fat and ugly, couldn’t think straight, I was slumped on the sofa reading a book because I couldn’t face interacting with my small humans, I had no energy, thought I was the worst parent, despairing at ever being able to help my boys do anything constructive.

Today I looked in the mirror and smiled at my cheeky grin, adored my dimples, smoothed my hand over my soft fleshy stomach and felt ok, put clothes on and felt good rather than pit stomach churning distaste at me. My brain woke up, I felt energy and motive to plan and use my day well. I smiled at God on my morning walk and knew love. I saw the dark corner of angst and questions and knew it was ok to have it there and stand on the sunny certain of some stuff side of life for a bit.

I feel like in my 40s I’m finally getting in tune with my wonderful body but this morning still took me by surprise, the obvious cause, the extremes in my moods, the joy of knowing I’m not in a dark tunnel, I just had my period.

And as always I’m left with wanting more conversation. More chat. More flipping awareness that this is a thing and more honest openness about listening to our bodies.

I felt the instinct to go slow over the weekend and wanted to embrace that but I also had the fear voices telling me to get up, keep going, plough on through, the voices that tell me to maintain secrecy about periods and uphold this weird societial pretence that they don’t happen. I wish I’d listened more to the voice that said be patient, the joy and energy will return. I wish body knowledge was talked about more and more and more. I want to be part of those chats, of how the rhythm of what’s going on in my body each month shapes and affects what I do, think and feel.

Anyway. There you go. Probably my now annual post about periods and how I want more openness about them and want conversations about how we become more body aware.