So I've been reminiscing about my old dancing days. It's a mixed bag of fantastic memories and some sadness, a little bit of pain. I was a very very shy person in high school. I was nervous and would trip over my words if more than one person was looking at me when I was talking. Presentations in front of class were one of the most terrifying things I could imagine. I was not comfortable in my own skin. Most of my friends before college might not know this about me, but the personality I had most of my school years was a mask personality.
I will go a bit deep in this post, so for all my fellow survivors, here is your Trigger warning.
Things were not okay at home. From 5th grade to Senior year of high school, many days I would get off the school bus after school and face horrendous sexual abuse. It was my reality. It could happen at any moment. I usually didn't know I wasn't safe until the door was shut and I was blocked from exiting a room, or friendly wrestling took a drastic turn. I couldn't face what was happening. My mind could not process the fact that I was helpless, so instead I blamed myself for what happened. Instead of being myself, I had rigid rules for myself. I was so hard on myself. I picked up a quiet, organized, serious personality. That is actually the opposite of my true personality. I became an observer of life instead of someone who actually lived. It was horrible.
Then something changed Junior year of high school. My abuser laid off for a time. He pursued other interests in his life. The number of days between abuse sessions got bigger and bigger. I started to relax and my mask started to come off a little bit. My voice got louder, though still quiet. I got a little braver. Then of course the amazing class, Visual and Performing Arts, happened. This class was pulled out of my worst nightmares. You didn't just do presentations, you didn't just speak in front of class. You choreographed your own dances and danced them in front of class. You composed your own melodies and played them in front of class. You demonstrated music elements by actually singing in front of class. You acted in class. It pulled nearly everyone out of their comfort zones. It was uncomfortable and strangely liberating at the same time. Eventually the whole class just silently agreed that anything that happened in that class would never be mocked outside of class. We're talking choreographing ballet dances and performing them in front of class. Yeah.
Our teacher announced one day that he was starting a dance club. "Oh, extra torture, no thanks!" was my first thoughts on the subject. But I had a very persistent friend. Not going to mention any names but I've known him since we were 4 years old and in preschool. He came up to me and asked me if I was going to the first dance club meeting after school. I tried to dodge the subject, shake it off, even told him I probably wouldn't. My communication skills weren't nearly as straightforward as they are today. He asked me so many times if I was going that I lost count. Eventually, he wore me down and I gave in. Against all odds, I was there for that first dance club meeting. And the one after that. And the next one after that. In those meetings, I relaxed a bit more. I wasn't being graded or evaluated. I could just dance and have fun. I found out that I LOVE to dance. I was made to dance. Dancing woke up something inside me that until that moment was dormant. It unlocked the door to my self made cage and for a little while, I was just myself, free. Dancing felt right. It calmed and excited me at the same time. My nervousness and shyness just slipped away for a while. I literally got chills.
Funny how one thing leads to another thing. And that thing leads to yet another thing until you have a long line of events that lead to something you never imagined was possible. During one of those after school dance club meetings I got paired with the guy who would become my long term dance partner. He had performed in dance shows before and he really knew his stuff. I remember that first time we were paired together. By himself, he taught me how to dance the Swing dance. I can still hear his coaching "Triple step, triple step, rock step." One thing led to another and I found myself committed to performing in a next dance show. HUGE step for me. Dance meetings turned into dance practices. The more I learned, the more I practiced, the more I fell in love with dancing. I ended up dancing in two different dance shows, in front of the whole school, and other schools. Crazy how that happens.
How did I get to where I am today? I don't dance these days. I haven't really danced in years. Years and years. Why? It's a question I've asked myself a lot. But when I looked a little deeper into the why, I found myself pulling back because there was something deep and painful there. Besides a small ballroom dance class I took for my required physical activity credit in college, I haven't danced since high school. Not doing something you love takes a toll on you over the years. I guess a lot of different things happened in quick succession my Senior year of high school.
The night before the first day of school my dad came into my room and told me that police had found my uncle wrecked on the side of the road. He was already gone when they found him. This was a huge blow. I was so close to my uncle. I opened up with him in ways I didn't open up with anyone else. I had been super excited about getting off the school bus after my first day of school and telling him all about my day. All of a sudden, that couldn't happen. It could never happen again.
That January, my abuser broke his long break from abusing me. It happened so suddenly. It felt unreal. My world was crashing down around me. That night my boyfriend at the time convinced me that I had to tell an adult about what was happening. It wasn't going to stop happening. He didn't get off the phone until I promised him I would tell someone, immediately, before my abuser could get a hold of me again. After he hung up he and his family prayed for me. It was a terrible night. My parents went nuts. I don't even want to go into how crazy things got. That's around the time that my PTSD hit me like a Mack truck. All of a sudden I was afraid of a million and one things. Every boy and man was terrifying to me. I couldn't relax, ever. I wasn't okay and I couldn't hide it anymore. Add to that some unsupportive family members, some harsh words, some sweeping under the rug, the sudden end of a relationship that I treasured deeply, and a crazy jump into living in college dorms where I could be safe, but where I actually struggled with worse PTSD, depression, anxiety, and serious thoughts of suicide. It marked the beginning of the darkest years of my life. Those dark years didn't end until nearly 3 years ago.
On the other side of those dark years I am not the shy, cautious girl I was in high school. Through so much healing work and facing my past, my true personality broke through the mask for good. These days my voice is louder than it ever was before. My motions bigger. My facial expressions unrestrained. I laugh comfortably and loudly. I'm actually a witty person and a bigger nerd than ever. That's saying something when you consider that I was also in the chess club in high school lol. On top on that, a few months ago something clicked inside me and I started to understand innuendo. It really threw my cousins for a loop when I understood their jokes, and laughed at them. I laughed so hard I cried! All of a sudden, jokes like that weren't threatening to me anymore.
I've made so much progress, but why have I not started dancing again? I'm still stuck there. There's still a deep wound there and I don't quite understand it and when I examine it it stings. I think about dancing and I feel like crying. Maybe that's a sign that I'm close to bringing this to the surface and healing. I don't know. I sure hope so. I signed up to serve on my church's dance team. I have to face this stuff. I refuse to be robbed of something I love by just not challenging the pain. It's worth it and need to keep reminding myself that I'm worth it. I can't wait to put on my dancing shoes again and rock out on the dance floor, whether that dance floor is the stage at church or my kitchen. When you're passionate about something, you gotta pursue it. Why wouldn't you?
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