Words from a Pal on Bodies!

Caitlin Breedlove, author of All In

Hi Y’all,

I first became familiar with Caitlin Breedlove through her work with Song, and recently read her book, All In: Cancer, Near Death, New Life. Since I’m barely on social media, I sent her a message through LinkedIn (which I look at 2-3 times per year), and she wrote me back!

Since 2003, Caitlin has been organizing, writing, and building movements in red states, working across race, class, culture, gender, sexuality, and faith. She is the former Co-Director of Southerners On New Ground (SONG), where for almost a decade, she co-led innovative intersectional movement-building work in the LGBTQ sector. She served as the Movement Strategist in Residence at Auburn Seminary and is the former Deputy Executive Director of Women's March. She currently lives in Phoenix, Arizona. Caitlin's first book, 'All In', her memoir about surviving ovarian cancer, was published by AK Press in Jan 2024.

In her words re: Body Betrayal, Body Forgiveness:

The terms body betrayal and body forgiveness are ones that I learned, and frankly, are not ones that I have related to in my experience with ovarian cancer. I am not sure if it is because other cancer sufferers have had different expectations than I do of my body? I do not feel my body ever owed me anything. I do feel I took it for granted, for decades. It works much differently now. I do not feel I have anything to forgive it for. I am getting used to it again. All parts of me are getting used to each other. Each membrane is more atrophied, less juicy. Each joint, less lubricated. The right foot bones, healed for years from neuropathy, by stretching and attention, occasionally go on strike. Often I sleep 3 hours or more in a row, but sometimes not. The reasons vary. Sometimes a kicking child, sometimes a crying baby, sometimes a drenching hot flash, from radical menopause, post-cancer surgery. It pisses me off certainly. I get irritable, but I also accept the conditions. I have been used to them for some time now. I changed other things in my life, so that I would not take it out on my body. There is nothing wrong with my body. It did not betray me. Dominating death-centric systems did. I have to work less. I have less money, but still plenty. I buy less. I travel less and more modestly. I eat out less. I see people less. I go out less. I cook simply. I do not waste food. Not everyone could make these changes and get by, but I do. I live in a less expensive city than some do. This means when everything has to go slower, I am not angry at my body. It is not my body that needed to change, it is my life that needed to change. And my life has. So I don't ask my body to do things it cannot do, and it does not try to do so. So, in my incredibly fortunate case, I can still do many many things, almost all I used to do, again, miraculously again!-very similarly to how I did before! I can walk, read, talk, pick my children up and put them on a hip, play hide and seek, have sex, go for a run. Because I radically changed my life, and my expectations of my body,I am not mad at my body for all I do, I do slower and with more breaks and in need of more rest. 

The link to Caitlin’s book is above. To me, it sits in close proximity to Audre Lorde’s The Cancer Journals. Both of these books resonated with me. Maybe they’ll vibrate with you, too. Books are critical as mirrors so that we may see ourselves, find connections, observe possibilities, and as windows into other people’s ideas and experiences so we may expand our understanding and compassion, and see new ways of being.

{Please note: this tip from Caitlin will slide into the session on body betrayal and body forgiveness}.

I intended to post about grief on Friday. Instead, I got a phone call with an offer for an appointment at the local Dizziness Clinic (original earliest appointment was in November) if I could get there in 30 minutes since they just had a cancelation.

My treatment could best be described as intentional whiplash, followed by an emotional disorientation and a whooshing in the washing machine sound in my head. Writing wasn’t possible that day. Fingers crossed that three treatments of this will disrupt my perpetual vertigo.

Until soon, sending love,

Kelly