Hello, 2013.

In years past, I would spend time every December 31 writing a list of things I would either give up for the next year or vow to start doing.  And like all resolution-makers, I would charge forward into the New Year like some version of She-Ra, blade held high to kick the New Year's ass.  And, also like most resolution-makers, that blade of promise got heavy after, oh, about three weeks and I would give up, return to my old ways, and feel disappointed in myself.  Disappointed that I wasn't strong enough to make "real" change in my life.  Instead of the New Year bringing an opportunity for hope, it brought a sense of: Dammit.  I'm up to my old tricks again.  Why can't I just get this being perfect thing right?

And so, a few years ago I ditched the resolution-making.  Instead of resolving to change something about my current self, I've begun to use the end of the year as a time to reflect on the good parts.  How the previous year has changed me rather than me changing it.

2012 has been spectacular.  The best year of my life by far.  Not because of some external circumstance but because of the internal ones.  The ones that matter more.  This past year was the year that I began to love the person that I am.  Flaws and disability and all.

Don't get me wrong.  I still nag at my own self all the time.  That's human nature. We all do it.  About others but especially about ourselves. Judge, judge judge; belittle, belittle, belittle. You know, that voice that says if-everyone-knew-this-about-me-they-would-run-the-other-way.

Today, for example, I inhaled my lunch in four minutes. Literally. Food hung out of the sides of my mouth as I shoveled more in.  And I did think to myself, Gee, Heather, you really should slow down.  This is pretty disgusting. I am a fast eater.  It's such a nasty habit. And I made a mental note to practice eating more slowly so that I don't freak out my next date.


Part of the self-acceptance has come in accepting all parts of myself without (too much) judgment.  Even the part that eats her food like a starving crocodile.   And I'm happy to report that in the loving myself, changes have happened naturally--without my needing to pummel and punish myself into some new shape.  Some better version of me.  The changes have been slow-growing, but I find myself on the other end of this year a completely different person than I was at its beginning.  There is a new hope inside of me.  A sense that I deserve greatness.  Not in a selfish way.  In the way that I finally get it.  I finally get what I'm worth. I finally get that I have all of these gifts and talents and, most of all, love to give and be appreciated for.  Just like we all do.

And so I look forward to 2013 and the gifts that it will bring.  And I wish for you, dear reader, a year of abundance and joy.

Smiling is My Favorite

Last night I watched the movie Elf for the third time this Christmas season.  And as I sit now on my couch, I am fighting the urge to watch it again.  I love that movie.  So much.  And as I've thought about why over the past few days, I realize that what I love about it is Buddy the Elf's chid-like optimism.  For Buddy, life is one big reason to smile.  And, to him, everything is fresh and full of promise.  He never lets the grumps get him down.

Sometimes it seems the longer we live, the more un-Buddy-like we get.  The world and all of its suffering grates on our once quick-to-smile selves, leaving us worn down and a lot less shiny.

The past month has been filled with suffering.

And it's hard in this day and age, with the media making its money on the tragedy of the world, to see through the fog.  Hard to see the joy.

I have to be honest.   In my past, I have sometimes struggled to see the bright side.  You know, the Silver Lining.  Although I considered myself a fairly content person, in every day situations, I often felt pressure to put a negative disclaimer on my experiences.  You know, the-coffee-was-delicious-but-I-can't-believe-I-spent-four-dollars-on-it syndrome.   I had become--dare I say it?--jaded.

Especially during the holidays.

The holidays were rough. Rather than them being a time for me to celebrate my beloved family, they were a time for me to wallow in self-pity for my single-hood.  Poor Heather.  Everyone else all cozied up with their honey and me stuck in this perpetual childhood, spending the holidays at my sister's house because she was the one with a husband and a child.  She had grown up.  Happiness (which I used to equate with couple-hood) was for everyone else but not for me.  In my mind, somehow I had done something wrong and had been forever cursed.

I'm more than happy to report that this Christmas has been different.  Despite all of the world's suffering, I am seeing it through more Buddy-like lenses.

In this time of wondering how people could commit such atrocities, I've become more attuned to the kindnesses people commit.

And in my chance to grieve for the pain in the world, I've gained a recognition of the power of optimism.  Not to push the pain aside and pretend it doesn't exist.  But to feel it.  To empathize to the best of our abilities. That somehow through all of it, our hearts will be made better.  Because now we are realizing how important it is for us to be connected.  Truly connected.

To hug a little tighter.

And say I love you a little more often.

And maybe follow Buddy the Elf's optimistic words:  I just like to smile; smiling's my favorite.

And just wait and see what happens.

Shedding Skin

When I was a kid, I spent a lot of time doing tomboy-ish activities.  I played with Matchbox Racers, rode on the neighbor's skateboard (literally sat on it and pushed myself up the street),  collected bugs, built forts.  Perhaps my favorite tomboy-ish activity from my childhood was playing in the mud.  My sister and I would squat in the little patch of dirt underneath the kitchen window or in the vacant lots up the street, add some water, and dig in.  Like little elephants, we found healing in the clay that coated our skin as we packed it into small cakes.  Little cow patties of dirt.

In this grand time where we spent most of our time outdoors (what a concept in today's glued-to-the-screen era), we were one with nature.  Insects, spiders, hummingbirds, lizards.  Before my neighborhood was fully built-up, although we never saw snakes themselves, we would find pieces of shed snakeskin.  Paper-thin.  Indented with phantom scales. Evidence of change.  Evidence of growth.

Lately, as I've changed and become more comfortable with my authentic self, there are parts of me that have outgrown my former skin.  The old skin has become stretched tight.  Restrictive even.

As I begin to accept who I really am and let go of who I thought I should be, I realize that some paradigms I've established for myself are no longer working.

I used to thrive off of people-pleasing.  This, I believe, is a curse for many, if not most, women.  We spend our time sacrificing ourselves for the sake of others' happiness, not necessarily because we believe it will make us happier to do so, but because we either believe it is what we are supposed to do or we believe that it will somehow make us appear more feminine and worthy.

Don't get me wrong. I still believe in honoring the people in my life.  They are amazing, lovely, supportive people.  But I no longer believe that honoring them means sacrificing myself.  And those people who do not fit the adjectives above, no longer fit in the space of this newly-expanded skin of mine.

I've also lived a life where I have hidden my disability.  In this former life, before I shed the skin of shame, I would do whatever I could to mask the outward symptoms of MD in hopes that I could keep the ruse up, make people love me for my winning personality, and then tell them my shameful truth.  Inwardly, though, the whole time I just waited for the other shoe to drop.  For that moment when I would have to make my grand confession before the jury and wait for the verdict of whether or not the other person would stick around.

I've especially done this in my dating life.

Not being myself is exhausting.

I'm happy to report that I have officially shed this oh-so-painful skin.  It's been a gradual process.  This weekend, though, I experienced some real evidence of this growth.  I went out with a friend and met a nice gentleman who happened to have a puppy outside waiting for him.  Well, those are two things I cannot resist.  Let's face it, the puppy would have been enough.  When we went out to see it, I was faced with a quandary.  The baby Viszla was at the bottom of a flight of stairs.

The old me would have stood at the top of the stairs and oohed and aawwed from up there.  But I knew in that split-second of a moment that I had a skin to shed.  I had a new me to show.  So I did it.  I climbed down the stairs.  Right in front of him. And the even bigger moment of skin-shedding came when it was time to climb back up them.  Me climbing stairs is about as graceful as a horse on a highwire. The old me, making some excuse about having a bad leg, would have let the cute guy go ahead of me so he wouldn't have to watch me do the dirty deed.

I'm so proud to say that I didn't give in to my old habits this weekend.  I took a deep breath and climbed the damned stairs ahead of him.  And I told him what I have.  Said the words clearly without the inkling of a stutter.  Muscular Dystrophy.  And even though the inner child in me cringed a little and waited in that hair's breadth of a moment for rejection, I knew that I was doing right by honoring myself.  And guess what?  He didn't even flinch.  He just asked if it hurt.  And then continued flirting with me.

This newer version of me was partly inspired by a TED talk I saw this summer. I If you haven't yet seen this TED talk on vulnerability, please take a few minutes to watch it.  It's had over six million hits.  Six million.  That number speaks volumes to our need to understand what makes us tick.  Our need to be ourselves and be loved for exactly that.  Not the ourselves that we force ourselves to be.  Not the ones with the too-tight skin but the ones with the old skin sliding off.