I felt naked walking around. Sometimes I would freak out hours into my work day and grab my shoulder to find the strap: "Oh good, I put on a bra today." One day I forgot to put on a bra; thankfully I realized it on the way to work. That is how out of it I was. If you know Lizzy, you know, this is like really, really out of it.
"Free to be" day was easy to recover from, though, compared to how exposed I felt in other ways. I felt like someone had turned me inside out and my internal mess was out there for all to see. Perhaps it was all the processing I was doing; perhaps the therapy. But mostly, it was that I could not hide behind anything I had anymore: not my productivity, not my good nature, not my Christianese, etc, etc...
I walked around feeling like everyone could see "my junk," (double meaning intended - go ahead and laugh). It felt terrible for a time...and a time again. To not be able to hide behind your normal defense mechanisms is a terrible and wonderful thing. Terrible and wonderful are a great team - especially 7 years later. In the moment it totally sucked!, yet I am grateful. Especially since I have been assured in retrospect, "No, Lizzy, I really could not see that you were afraid all the time; that you really felt you were dying most moments of the day even though it was totally irrational. Or that a close secondary concern was how your ass looked in those jeans. (Every thing is relative?). Or who you have a massive, embarrassing crush on." But the point is I started to be honest with people; being honest is a lot easier when you think "they" have seen it anyways.
To be seen is a wonderful thing. Now people saw in part what God saw in whole. Only I don't think God requires modesty. But, don't worry, people like me do: occasionally I still check my shoulder for a strap.
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