The Communication of the Body

Two nights ago I went to bed too late.I have a pattern I’m well aware of that if I don’t get to sleep before 10:30pm I will not be able to fall asleep easily and my sleep will be more disrupted the whole night. There is a very physical reason for this. Around 11pm our bodies have a cortisol (stress hormone) spike because of the energy our liver needs to preform its very important work while we sleep. If we are not in a deep sleep by 11pm this cortisol spike can make it harder for our physical body to calm down and relax. This can even give us a ‘second wind’ where we maybe felt tired earlier, but now we don’t. On a physical level my ongoing dance with insomnia is very much triggered by cortisol dysregulation making my sleep very, very sensitive to cortisol spikes and dips. So all this being said; it’s very important for me to get to bed before 10:30pm and on this night my girls had trouble falling asleep and they didn’t get to sleep until 10pm and I was left with the decision to go right to bed or have some me-time and I chose the me-time. Although, and this is a big one, if my me-time leaves me ultimately more depleted, is it really what I need? So when I finally got in bed and turned the lights out at 11:15pm, I could feel the surge of stress hormones in my body and the racing thoughts start to spin. I could feel the swirling, airy, headiness and metallic taste of insomnia and a night of disrupted sleep about to take over. After over a year of working with my severe insomnia I have developed a relationship to it. On my good insomniac nights I can simply accept the sleeplessness. I can watch my breath and my mind. I can stroke my body lovingly and give myself comfort. I can get up and drink tea, have snacks, watch a show. I can do facial and ear massages that help my body relax. I can take some Chinese herbs or homeopathics or tinctures or CBD. And on the good nights one these things will work a little and I’ll get some rest and make peace with having to have a slow and rest-filled next day. On my bad insomniac nights I am in a torture chamber of my own mind’s creation. The what ifs and pits of hopelessness swallow me up and I feel like I’m on some terrible hallucinogenic trip gone very bad. Most the time, on my insomniac nights, I oscillate between these two and the thing that sticks with me the most is this feeling of hyper-vigilance that I can’t shake. Like something is going to slap me any second but I can’t see which direction it will come from. I drift off into a light sleep only to jerk awake by some gut punch of a thought or feeling. So on this night as the panic started to rise up along with the voice, “You KNEW you wouldn’t be able to sleep if you stayed up so late! Why do you do this to yourself?” I did a little face and ear massage and started breathing in and out through my nose rhythmically.I started to turn towards myself and that tight hyper-vigilance sensation in my body. Not to change it or maneuver it, but to really ask it what it needs. To make space around it. Throughout this past year plus of being an insomniac I have come at fixing it from many, many angles. I have come at it from the angle of the physical body. Balancing blood sugar, hormones, minerals, organ function and nutrient deficiencies. I have done countless hours of body work, acupuncture, osteopathic adjustments, nuerofeedback, biofeedback, chiropractic, supplements, herbs, literally you name it, I’ve most likely tried it. I’ve also come at it from the angle of the energetic, mental, emotional and spiritual. I’ve done many hours of therapy, somatic work, energy work, EFT, and spiritual work. And my experience is every single session I had, thing I took, expert I talked to gave me a little piece to my own insomnia puzzle. Each one was a little breadcrumb along the path to healing. At a more recent somatic therapy session I had with a clairvoyant guide, she said that before our session a young part of me came to her and told her that, “Clara cannot sleep right now. It isn’t safe for her.” I had encountered this part of myself briefly before in past sessions and in my own personal practices. A little, young part of me that believes sleep isn’t safe. Rest isn’t safe. A part that feels very, very hyper-vigilant. And so as I was working with the insomnia on this particular night, I started to call out to her and invite her forward to talk with me. And, to my surprise, I actually saw her, immediately and very clearly in my mind’s eye. She was about 3 or 4 years old. Brown hair messily chopped into a square around her face and chubby kid fingers. She looked up at me through her hair and said, “Are you with me?” I immediately felt this welling up of tears in my eyes and sobs in my chest and throat. The damn broke and I started crying. “Yes,” I said through tears, “I am with you.” “Can we rest now?” she said. More tears and sobs leaving my physical body along with a deep yawn. “Yes, we can rest now,” I said. “I won’t leave you again. Ever. I’m right here. You can rest.”She looks up at me with a not-quite-trusting, inquisitive look, like she is deciding what to do and whether or not she can let her guard down. I can feel how much she wants to. She starts to soften.I say, “It isn’t your job to keep me safe. It’s mine. It’s your job to laugh and play and imagine. I can see that you’ve been feeling like there is no one there to keep you safe, but I see you now and I will keep you safe. You can rest and play and imagine.” I see her eyes light up. She smiles. More sobbing leaving my physical body. “You’re not alone. I’m right here. I’m right here. You’re not alone….” I say, out loud in the dark bedroom, through sobs. She walks over and curls right up into the crook of my arm, just the same way my toddler, Alma, does and goes…. blissfully… asleep. And so do, I, deeply. The next morning I remember the experience so vividly and clearly. I can still see her little eyes looking up at me through her messy hair. I can feel the way she just wants to know she isn’t alone. And it cracks me open again. I feel the same fierce and bottomless love for her that I feel for my children. And I know I will protect her and stay with her. I know she is back at home within me. The last couple days since this experience I have been so bone deep tired. And I welcome it. I have been tired a lot the last year, no doubt. But it’s always that wired and tired feeling. The exhaustion of body paired with the on edge, frazzled mind. Feeling like my life is a game of whack-a-mole. Even though I’m completely worn out I have to keep myself poised for the next thing to whack down. Always ready. Always watching. I wasn’t really able to nap or rest fully.But, yesterday, as I was putting my youngest Maya down for a nap, I passed out. Completely dead to the world. I have never been a napper and when I had my babies it seemed like it just got harder to nap, even though I needed it more. The tiredness I experienced yesterday is the kind of wholesome tiredness I welcome with open arms right now. The sleepiness. The dozing off. The heavy eyes. This feels like a breath of fresh air to me after spending the last year so physically exhausted but unable to sleep. I’ve slept like a rock through the night the last two nights, cuddled up next to the little girl Clara I met. Are my dances with insomnia over? Probably not. I’m wiser than to think it’s any one thing that makes all the difference. Insomnia, unfortunately, is probably going to be something my body uses as a communication method for the rest of my life. Maybe not, but that’s my sense. My severe insomnia of the last year was a lot of pieces needing my attention all coming to head. And every single measure I took and continue to take toward understanding it better brought me closer to this moment where I have found a little relief and healing. However, the answer in my world is always, as my mentor Coly Vulipiani says, complete and radical self acceptance. All these breadcrumbs of the last year brought me to this spot of having the nervous system grounding that allowed me to see, welcome and integrate this little Clara into myself. To welcome her home.If I hadn’t done the work on my blood sugar, thyroid, liver, and hormones would I have been able to hold the massive wave of grief that over took me when she came to me a couple nights ago? I don’t know for sure. If I hadn’t seen glimpses of her in other sessions would I have been able to see her so clearly? I don’t know for sure. If I hadn’t done the work to be with my body in the midst of huge emotional waves in other areas of my life, would I have been able to hold her? I don’t know for sure.If I wasn’t doing so much work to be a more gentle mother to my own toddlers would I have been able to mother my inner toddler so well? I don’t know for sure.What I do know is that all of these pieces of my journey brought me to this exact moment and that this moment’s medicine for me was potent and will forever change me. It has made me a more whole, more soft, more loving and more integrated human. It has allowed me to accept myself in a new way that I hadn’t before. To see myself as sweeter and more supple. To feel more tenderness towards myself and others. I also know that our ailments and health issues are deeper than they may seem. Our well being is so much more than just our physical body. It’s the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. There is a lot of talk in my community around the energetics of trauma and how it affects the physical body and I believe most of it. I think most, if not all, of our health issues have an inception point in the energetic realms.However, when some distortion has come deep enough into our field to start affecting the physical body, like our ability to sleep, then we have to start there, with the physical body. We have to do the things we need to do to heal in third dimensional reality. But, as we do that work, we need to keep participating and work with and on all levels or we will just get another physical symptom or continue to have the same physical symptoms recurring again and again. True healing requires a willingness to truly listen and take full responsibility for our multidimensional wellness. Our bodies are the holders of our lives. They are our home. They are not broken. There are no mistakes. Each and every issue, tightness, constriction, ailment is a message, a sign, a breadcrumb to follow. Our bodies are divine communication devices. The physical manifestation of our divine essence. This is the piece that we forget. Our body, the tissues, the flesh, the bones, the blood, are sacred. Whatever our body is telling us, we must listen. Get curious. Bow down and be humbled at the altar of our bodies’ primordial wisdom. I want to make an invitation to my upcoming online two hour ceremony where we will be honoring our body as our home. It will be a beautiful shamanic experience where we will tap into our holy body and see what it has to tell us. This event is this Saturday, 3.18.23, at 9am-11am PST. We will start with a short check in and teaching, then we will go into a guided practice involving self massage and lymph work, meditation, and sound healing, and then we will have a short digestion period. The energetic exchange is $44. You must come to this event live. There will be a recording for the people who attended live to revisit for 2 weeks after the event. Sign up for the event here. If you have any questions feel free to message me.Other ways to work with me right now: * The next cohort of FED has not been scheduled but if you’re feeling called to join the next 6 month deep dive into feminine nourishment you can sign up for the waitlist here. * I have space for two more 1:1 long term clients right now. This is a big energetic and financial commitment. If you feel called to this alchemical work with me as your guide and doula, message me and we’ll set up a call. * I am offering nutrition deep dives as well. This is a 90 minute session with me going deep into your symptoms and health history where afterwards I create a personalized plan for you to follow to meet your individual well-being intentions. You can book one of those here. This is a public episode. 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