Love Warrior

by Glennon Doyle Melton

  “You’re Gandhi? Tell me more.”

  “I don’t like sex. Since everybody else I know claims to love it, I used to secretly wonder if I was a repressed gay person. But when I admitted this to a gay friend, she reminded me that gay people have sexual feelings for people of the same sex, not a lack of sexual feelings for anyone. So then I decided that I was asexual, or maybe a person who was supposed to be celibate for spiritual reasons, like Gandhi. I’d always suspected I was almost exactly like Gandhi. So what I’m saying is that if Craig and I end up together, he’s going to need to channel Mrs. Gandhi and just deal. Obviously, this will be the least he can freaking do.”

  Ann nods and replies, “Yes, the only downside of being Gandhi is that while the kids are at school you’ll need to start some kind of peaceful revolution and then maybe be murdered for it.”

  “That’s fine. Not a problem. It’s unfortunate, but it doesn’t seem half as difficult as figuring out this sex thing. I accept that fate. I am totally willing to die for my cause of not making out.”

  “Glennon, I’ve only known you for a few minutes, but I’m pretty sure you’re not Gandhi.”

  “Fine. I won’t be Gandhi. I’ll be Elsa from Frozen. I just want to be Elsa and live in an ice castle far away and sing anthems by myself and braid my hair and shoot ice out through my hands at men who try to visit.”

  “Ah, but Elsa had to come back—because no one can live a full life isolated from other people.”

  “Yes. She came back, I’ll give you that. But I guarantee she didn’t have to have any sex. She just got true love from her sister and kept busy being queen. And you better believe all the men stayed a little afraid of her forever. That’s what I want.”

  Ann smiles. It is not a therapist smile, not a patronizing smile, not even a sympathetic smile. It’s a smile of recognition. There is a twinkle in her eye that says, Yep. I hear you, sister. I’ve got a little Elsa in me, too. But I can see in her face that she doesn’t believe the castle is the right place for me. Ann wants to help me thaw.

  “Just real quick, you should probably know that I’m a recovering everything. I became bulimic when I was ten, and then an alcoholic. I got sober eleven years ago.”

  “Wow. What happened? Why do you think you became bulimic so young?”

  “I don’t know. Overachiever, I suppose. Ahead of my time. I don’t want to talk about that either. It was another lifetime. When I found out I was pregnant I wrapped all that up in a box and put it away. I need to move forward. Let’s just stick to the family stuff. I have small people to take care of now.”

  “Okay. It makes sense though. Many women who feel the way you do about sex have histories of body and eating struggles. I know you don’t want to, but instead of setting aside your past and concentrating on Craig, we need to put Craig aside and concentrate on your past. Glennon, you both have work to do—separate and together—and the goal of the work is not necessarily reunification. The work is about you. You are going to have to learn to be intimate. If you box up your sexuality and put it in a closet, your life will never be as full as it could be. You’re a smart woman. You know this is not all about Craig. This is an opportunity for you to figure some things out.”

  “Ah, yes. An Afgo.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Another fucking growth opportunity.”

  “Yes. An Afgo. In the meantime, let’s decide what boundaries we need to put into place so you can feel safe in your home.”

  “I need Craig to move out of our room. I need him to not touch me.”

  She writes those things down. “Great, give this list to Craig and tell him it’s what you need for now. Then let’s figure out how to help you make peace with your body. We’ve got to host a reunion. Bring back together your body, mind, and spirit. Vote your body back on the island. Make you whole again.”

  “That sounds really hard. Do you have a pill for that?”

  She smiles and starts filling out the paperwork. “No more pills. We have to do the work.” Next to diagnosis, she’s written a number. “What does that number mean?” I ask.

  “It means ‘adjustment disorder.’”

  “Ah. What am I not adjusting to?”

  Ann smiles. “Life, perhaps?”

  “Yes. Well, how does one adjust to life? How does one adjust to something that won’t ever stay the same? Anyway, it hasn’t even been forty years yet. I just need some more time.”

  “You’ve got time. You’ve got all the time you need. One more thing. The way the brain works is this: We make a hypothesis about someone, and then our brain searches for information to verify our hypothesis. You’ve decided that Craig is a fool who is unworthy of you, and I don’t blame you. But because of that belief, your brain is finding that information. You are actively making that true. Just as an experiment, what if—just for a week—you tried on the hypothesis that Craig is a deeply flawed but good man who loves you and is working hard to keep you? If you decide he’s that man, you might find proof to back it up. And also when you feel the anxiety: Take three deep breaths. Then think. Don’t think before you breathe.”

  “Okay,” I say. I take three breaths, thank Ann, and walk out her door.

  * * *

  That evening, I look into my bedroom mirror until I don’t recognize myself. It feels similar to staring at a familiar word so long that it seems all wrong, misspelled. I look into my own eyes, and that feels so overly intimate that my insides start to flutter. It feels almost aggressive, like I’m staring down a stranger. I reach out and touch the mirror. Who is that? Why is it so hard for me to believe that the figure I see is as much me as the mind trying to recognize her? I look away from the mirror, down at myself, and try to believe. I touch my legs and cross my arms, embracing myself. I try to notice that when I touch myself, I feel it. Why did I abandon this self of mine? Why does it feel like my whole life has been an out-of-body experience? I think back to something Ann asked me: “Glennon, what happened when you were ten?”

  Ten is when I noticed that I was chubbier, frizzier, oilier than the other girls. I became self-conscious. My body started to feel like a separate, strange entity, and I thought it odd that people would examine and judge me based on what they saw, something that didn’t have much to do with who I was. I just didn’t feel like my body was at all a decent representation of me, but it was all I had to send out to the world. So I did what I had to do. I went out into the world. But being human always felt like too private an experience to share with other people. In public I felt naked, exposed, utterly vulnerable. And so I started hating my body. Not just the shape of it, although there was that. I hated having a body at all. My body made it impossible for me to succeed at being a girl. The universe had presented me with some very obvious rules for femaleness: Be small and quiet and wispy and stoic and light and smooth and don’t fart or sweat or bleed or bloat or tire or hunger or yearn. But the universe had also already issued me this lumpy, loud, smelly, hungry, longing body—making it impossible to follow the rules. Being human in a world with no tolerance for humanity felt like a setup, a game I couldn’t win. But instead of understanding that there might be something wrong with the world, I decided there was something wrong with me. I made a hypothesis about myself: I am damaged and broken. I should be shiny and happy and perfect and since I’m not, I should never expose myself. I should just find a safe hiding place. And so I retreated out of my body and out of the world, every chance I could.

  My first escape was books. Oh, books! I lived for books. I took one everywhere I went. To the pool, to the babysitter’s, to friends’ houses in case things got awkward. I was constantly in a corner with my head down in a book—there but not there at all. Books are how I learned to disappear, to live in a world other than the uncomfortable physical one. And then I found bulimia, and heaven was both: a plate of food and a book. Then the food turned into booze and sex and drugs—one hiding place after another. And after I got sober, I became a writer. How predictable and convenie
nt! A writer is a helicopter; she is not as much having a human experience as she is circling above human experience, reporting from a safe distance. Even if she visits the present moment, she’s just there to gather material. I’d been gone since I was ten. Gone, gone, gone.

  Earlier in the evening I was washing dishes and Amma walked into the kitchen. She was trying to get my attention but I didn’t notice until she pulled on my leg and said, “Mommy, Mommy! Are you underwater again?” Underwater is what she calls it when I’m deep in thought. I’m like a submerged scuba diver, trying to search for treasure while people keep pulling at me, beckoning me back to the surface. I want to say, Leave me alone! I am comfortable down here. I cannot pay attention to you, because I am too busy thinking about you. I am either hovering above my life or diving deep beneath it.

  I think about Craig and how I experience his need for affection as a constant interruption. How he is always insisting I resurface or land, and how much I resent it. The truth is that I’ve found my mind’s life to be both safer and more interesting than my real life with him. When I’m lost in my thoughts, I am in the deep, underneath, where the treasure is. Life up there with him is, well, shallow.

  But what if I’ve been wrong? What if what’s real is out there, not in here? What if the purpose of life is connection, and what if you can only connect on the surface? Maybe the price of refusing to live in my body is loneliness.

  I consider the question people ask me again and again when they hear the News: Glennon, are you in love with him? This question baffles and frustrates me. What do they mean? Do they even know what they mean? What the hell does in love mean? I’d always assumed that in love was some perfect storm of feelings that some couples were just lucky enough to have. But now I wonder, is love not a feeling but a place between two present people? A sacred place created when two people decide it’s safe enough to let their real selves surface and touch each other? Is that why it’s called in love? Because you have to visit there? And was I unable to grasp this concept because I was trying to understand it with my hovering mind—and love can’t be known that way? Can the place in love only be experienced, traveled to? Maybe the cost of being a hoverer and a diver—someone who thinks about love and analyzes love and admires love from a distance—is that I cannot be in love. Because I don’t go there. I stay removed. I have somehow decided that if I’m not truly present, I can’t be hurt by people, but what if I can’t be loved by them either? What if my body is the only vessel I have that can bring me to love?

  Reunion. Ann was right—that’s what I needed. Early in my life there had been a civil war, and my body had ceded from our union. How can I bring it back? I want a truce. I want to be whole. I want to learn to live in this body, in this world, with my people. I don’t want to be trapped inside myself forever. I want to be in love.

  I leave the mirror and walk to Tish’s room. I curl up next to her while she sleeps, and hold her body close to mine. Her hair smells like coconut shampoo and fresh dirt. Her cheek feels like satin. Her breath on my arm is steady and warm. When I am with her, I am landed. I am loving her with all of my senses. I am in love, here, with her. I start to feel less frantic. I think of all the times my body has reached out to hold her, to feed her and hug her and dress her and bathe her and cradle her while she slept. My body has loved her and been loved by her. I must know how to visit love with my body. I must know. She wakes and I kiss her forehead and then I leave. She needs to sleep.

  I climb back into my bed and wrap myself in the covers, tight, like a cocoon. I want to be here, in my body. With her. With the others. If love is a place, even if it’s a scary place, I want to live there. As I fall asleep, I decide to stop writing for a long while. I need to live this, not create it. I need to let it be what it is, let it become—without forcing my pain into art. I need whatever happens with my family to be real, not shoved into a storyline. I will not try to control it by making sense of it. This is not material. This is my life. These people are not characters. I’ll let go of control and live this instead of write it. I will not hide from this by hovering above or diving below. I’ll land inside of it. My bedroom door opens and my dog, Theo, walks in, jumps onto my bed, and curls up in the nook behind my knees. I feel his warmth and the weight of his body grounding my legs, holding me down like an anchor. I’m in love with Theo right now, I think. I’m here, and he’s here. We’re together. But dogs and small children are one thing. It’s easy to let myself fall into love with them because they can’t hurt me. Grown-ups are another thing entirely. Grown-ups are dangerous. And yet. I want to fall in grown-up love. I want risky, true, scary love. I want to learn how to let my body bring me to love with an equal partner. I want that.

  12

  THE NEXT MORNING my writer-friend Mia calls. When I ask how she’s doing, she says, “Marriage is good, kids are happy, not a problem in the world. It’s terrible. I’ve got zero material. How’s your shit show going, you lucky duck?” When I tell her about my need for reunion I expect her to laugh, but instead she says, “How about yoga? That’s what they do there, you know. All that body, mind, spirit stuff. Why don’t you go today?” I hang up the phone, sit in my kitchen, and stare at the wall. She’s right. Yoga feels like the next right thing.

  I drive to a nearby yoga studio and as soon as I walk into the lobby, the smell of incense hits me like proof God is there. I rent a mat, tiptoe into the yoga room, and wait. After a few minutes, the teacher walks in and introduces herself as Allison. Right away, Allison starts offering gentle, steady, specific directions about what to do with our bodies. Put your right hand here, tilt your head to the side, move your left leg there. I feel relieved, like I’ve been driving through treacherous conditions up a steep mountain and Allison has suddenly appeared to take the wheel. For months, I’ve been the decision maker, examining each possible move, then stepping lightly and stopping to measure the havoc each step may have wreaked upon my family. I’ve felt like the unqualified God of my family’s future. But here, in this warm little room tucked away from my life, Allison is in charge. It feels like the goal here is to pretend for a while that I am not the God of my life. Or maybe to stop pretending that I’ve ever been the God of my life. All I know is that there is no move I can make in this little room that will hurt my children or me. I want to stay here forever, not making decisions, not thinking, not screwing anything up, concentrating only on where to put my hands and feet. I love not being God. I want to not be God forever, which is why my heart sinks when Allison bows to the God in us, says that class is over, and stops telling us what to do.

  * * *

  The next morning I’m back on my mat in the front row of the studio, excitedly waiting for the God in Allison to restore order to my world again. I go again the next morning, and then the next, and the next after that. I start learning in that room, but differently than I’ve ever learned before. In yoga, instead of using my mind to download wisdom, I use my body. Allison tells me to do something with my legs, “Settle into Warrior Two, stand firm, ground your legs and you won’t fall; balance is created by equal forces pressing in on an object.” I stand there, pressing my legs together, and it hits me: Wait, what? I’ve been trying to find my balance by eliminating pressure from my life. The demands of work, friendship, and family all felt so heavy. But what if all this pressure isn’t what’s throwing me off, but what’s holding me steady? What if pressure is just love and love is what keeps me anchored? Complete shift. My body is teaching my mind.

  Over and over in those classes, my body will do something new and Allison will say something new, and I will suddenly understand something I’ve never understood before. It is a stunning revelation: My body can be a teacher, a conduit of wisdom. It still feels like my body is a separate entity, but I’m growing to respect it. My body is a new witty friend I’m beginning to eye with curiosity. What is going on with you? I ask it. Are you smarter than I gave you credit for? I knew I was put on the earth to love and to learn. I knew that. I just didn�
��t know I needed my body to do both.

  Just as I learn to trust my body, I start losing faith in my mind. It seems fair to me that the harder I work, the more progress I should make. I’m desperate to pay whatever dues will earn me my peace, stability, and life back. So I continue with yoga, meet with Ann regularly, carve out my daily quiet time. I do everything a grieving person is supposed to do to climb out. Sometimes I feel strength and hope that last hours. Bundled in that hope, I feel confident enough to plan an outing with the kids or to go grocery shopping. Then, out of nowhere, while I’m at the playground or walking down the cereal aisle, hopelessness appears in front me, staring me down like a snarling dog. I freeze, knowing that if I run, it’ll catch me. There is no way to overpower, outrun, or outsmart the mad dog of hopelessness because it’s simply more vicious than I. The only thing to do is let it attack, go limp in its jaws, and be shaken. But I notice one promising pattern. If I play dead, it will eventually let me go. I start thinking of the dog of hopelessness as an obstacle that will reappear on every curve of the spiral staircase. He’ll always be there waiting and snarling, but with every go-round, I’ll be more confident and less fearful. Eventually, I’ll learn the tricks that will allow me to breeze right past him. But the mad dog of hopelessness will always be there. My spiral staircase of progress means that my pain will be both behind me and in front of me, every damn day. I’ll never be “over it,” but I vow to be stronger each time I face it. Maybe the pain won’t change, but I will. I keep climbing.

  * * *

  Three months after I start yoga and therapy, I’m in the kitchen, pouring the kids’ cereal while they rub their sleepy eyes and try to wake up. Craig has started seeing Ann both with me and on his own. It’s a positive development, but we’re still sleeping in separate bedrooms and the kids are struggling to understand. Craig walks out of his bedroom and the kids watch him approach the table. We try to smile at each other to ease the awkwardness but there is no ignoring the heaviness of the moment. When I put the spoons on the table, Craig touches my hand and I recoil. The kids witness this, and Chase and Tish look away quickly. But Amma is still too young and too honest to pretend, so she starts to cry. I sit down on her chair, pull her into my lap, and hold her like a baby. I pat her hair and say, “It’s okay, honey, everything’s okay. We’re fine, baby. We’re fine.” I say this over and over again, like I’m trying to cast a spell. I’m lying. Nothing is okay. I look into Amma’s eyes and find proof that she doesn’t believe me. She knows better now. She is four and she already knows that I can’t make it all better.