Self Reflection
In the first 34 years of my life, I avoided looking into the mirror.
I would do anything to avoid looking at myself. I became a master of it. Avert my gaze to a chip in the wallpaper, move myself away from the mirror or camera, focus on a spot on the carpet. I didn’t want to see my own body, my imperfections staring back at me. I felt like mirrors were a window to the soul - my soul was broken and my reflection would only remind me of that. Sounds dramatic, but it’s true.
Instead of looking at myself, both on the outside and in, I found distraction in writing and teaching and spreading positivity. I was still on a journey of giving myself the grace to feel this positivity myself. In pouring myself into motherhood in ways I hadn’t before. In busying myself with work during the week and seeing friends over the weekends. I went to church to cleanse my sins. I immersed myself in dating and trying to find someone that might ‘see’ me so that I didn’t have to see myself (of course, I met a few men that saw me and had no problem explaining the issues they unearthed, but I certainly wasn’t ready to listen).
Then Covid hit and lots of those things instantly went away. I couldn’t take my kids on lots of adventures, I couldn’t see my friends. I moved away from the church. Dating stopped. I spent an awful lot of time feeling detached and alone, without my usual distractions. I couldn’t handle that so I busied myself with my Instagram page, where I found community and solace but a growing unease and sense of imposter syndrome. As usual, I was spreading messages of self-love without doing the work myself.
I started therapy for the first time last summer, thinking I’d just do it over this tricky period, but I haven’t looked back since. I have always advocated hard for equal access to therapy, and I fully believe therapy is for everyone, not just people who are “on the edge” (whatever that means anyway). Of course, even though I believe and said this, I never afforded myself that privilege despite money not being an issue.
I found a Disabled therapist, who I’m incredibly thankful for, because the dynamic between us is so different to how I imagine it might be if they weren’t Disabled. In their presence, I feel safe and free to be myself and to offload without fear of discrimination or unconscious ableism entering the room.
Since starting therapy, I’ve learned so many things about myself just through talking. It’s painful, sometimes really painful, but it’s so healing too. And there is something amazing about that space being just for you and nobody else. The more therapy I have, the more I believe I’m deserving of it.
I have taken on jobs that previously would have terrified me, including one where I posed naked in the bath and then posted it to my Instagram (I still stare at the photo wide-eyed sometimes). I have ended relationships and friendships that weren’t feeding my soul and I am slowly learning to be better at enforcing boundaries both around my own actions and around those of others that affect me.
I have also developed a strange love for skincare. I say strange because this is so unlike past me; I never previously cared about putting anything except shower gel on my face and body. Touching my skin is something, like mirrors, I always avoided or hurried the process of. Through chronicling my skincare journey, I have developed a love for products and a slow-burning love for my skin too. I have realised - why can’t I talk about and experience luxury beauty like anyone else? What makes them deserving, and me not?
I still have loads of flaws, don’t get me wrong, and I still find it so hard accepting them, but I’ve slowly started to step out of the shadows I’ve been pushed into and found such toxic comfort in hiding behind. Thanks to starting a skincare routine, I’m forced to look at myself properly in the mirror at least twice a day. Some days this is so, so tough but bit by bit, it’s getting easier.
I’m also being filmed and photographed a lot more for various opportunities, which feels strange and scary, but a good kind of scary. I’m so passionate about disability representation and justice but there’s very little I can do in these spheres without making myself visible. It’s good to be scared to be seen in this context, I think. Though visibility comes with its own hurdles (sometimes unfavourable public reactions or hate speech), it’s well worth it for the messages I receive from other Disabled people who resonate with my words or feelings. And for the ability I now have to look myself square in the eyes every morning with a genuine smile.
I am my own reason to be cheerful, and I’m starting to own that fact more loudly than ever before. I’m sometimes overcome by shyness, and occasionally I take a step back rather than forwards, but I’m so proud of how far I’ve come. And I can say that while looking straight at myself too.
Cathy Reay