TDoR and Spoon Theory
Preached 11/17/2019 at SouthWest UU in N. Royalton OH
By Rev. Meg Mathieson
This Wednesday, Nov 20, will be Transgender Day of Remembrance. Every year, we are encouraged to remember the names of the transgender people whose lives have been lost to anti-transgender violence. In a few moments, I will respectfully read the names of transgender people we know of whose lives have been taken due to anti-transgender violence in 2019, but it should be noted that these crimes often are misreported, go underreported, or are not reported at all.
Breonna “BB” Hill, a black trans woman, was killed on October 14 2019 in Kansas City, Missouri. She was 30 years old.
Itali Marlowe, a black trans woman, was killed in Houston, Texas on September 20, 2019. She was 29 years old.
Ja’Leyah-Jamar, a black trans woman, was killed on September 13 2019 in Kansas City, Missouri.
Bee Love Slater, a black trans woman, was found deceased on September 1, 2019 in Clewiston, Florida. She was 23 years old.
Bailey Reeves, a black trans woman, was killed on September 2, 2019 in Baltimore, Maryland. She was 17 years old.
Tracy Single, a black trans woman, was killed on July 30, 2019 in Houston, Texas. She was 22 years old.
Bubba Walker, a black trans woman, was killed in late July in Charlotte, North Carolina. She was 55 years old.
Pebbles La Dime Doe, a black trans woman, was killed on August 4, 2019, in Allendale, South Carolina. She was 24 years old.
Kiki Fantroy, a black trans woman, was killed on July 31, 2019 in Miami-Dade County, Florida. She was 21 years old.
Denali Berries Stuckey, a black trans woman, was killed on July 20, 2019 in North Charleston, SC. She was 29 years old.
Brooklyn Lindsey, a black trans woman, was killed on June 25, 2019 in Kansas City, Missouri. She was 32 years old.
Zoe Spears, a black trans woman, was killed on June 13, 2019 in Fairmount Heights, Maryland. She was 23 years old.
Chanel Scurlock, a black trans woman, was killed on June 5, 2019 in Lumberton, North Carolina. She was 23 years old.
Chynal Lindsey, a black trans woman, was killed on June 1, 2019 in Dallas, Texas. She was 26 years old.
Paris Cameron, a black trans woman, was killed on May 25, 2019 in Detroit, Michigan. She was 20 years old. Her two friends - 21 year old Alunte Davis and 20 year old Timothy Blancher - were also killed in the incident. Alunte and Timothy were both black gay men.
Michelle “Tamika” Washington, a black trans woman, was killed on May 19, 2019 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was 40 years old.
Muhlaysia Booker, a black trans woman, was killed on May 18, 2019 in Dallas, Texas. She was 23 years old.
Claire Legato, a black trans woman, died on May 14th, 2019 in Cleveland Ohio after being shot in April 2019. She was 21 years old.
Ashanti Carmon, a black trans woman, was killed on March 30, 2019 in Fairmount Heights, Maryland.
Jazzaline Ware, a black trans woman, was killed on March 25, 2019 in Memphis, Tennessee.
Dana Martin, a black trans woman, was killed on January 6, 2019 in Montgomery, Alabama. She was 31 years old.
Layleen Polanco, was a 27 year old black trans woman.
Johana “Joa” Medina Leon, a 25 year old trans woman of color died after being released from ICE custody.
I’m sure you can pick up the obvious pattern here. For a variety of reasons, many having to do with racism and classism, transwomen of color, especially black transwomen are uniquely vulnerable to deathly violence. It is important to remember these people because they were people, first and foremost.
It is important for people like me, a queer woman, who experiences the constant benefits of white privilege, and what’s called “Passing privilege” to remember these victims and the many others who go unreported. In honor of the people I named and the many folks we do not have time to name or even do not know the names of, want to read a poem by UU minister Otto O’Connor, titled “On a Holy Night.”
On a holy night in 1969, in an Inn, also known as a bar,
Called the Stonewall Inn, A basement— which had no running water,
Nor safe fire exits— Queer people, of many colors and kinds,
Danced together, For it was the only place Where they were allowed to dance,
At least, permitted to, by the mafia who ran the Inn.
In those days, It was common for the police to frequent this Inn,
No to join in the dance, the underground celebration,
But to send the dancers home and make arrests.
When they would arrive, The lights would go on, The people would be lined up,
And then All those in drag, All those who were trans,
All those without proper identification: They were arrested and taken into custody.
But on this holy night, That early morning of June 28,
The people said “not tonight.” As they called to them to line up,
The transwomen refused to go. And as the police began to beat and arrest them,
And as the people spilled out from the bar on to the street,
Christopher St, A crowd grew to watch. And then,
As transwomen, lesbians, and gay men were getting arrested,
A yell came from the crowd: “Gay Power.” And as a transwoman was shoved,
She shoved back and the crowd began throwing bottles at the wagon,
And suddenly it erupted. For once the people didn’t line up;
For once the people said “no more; we've had enough.”
It was almost as if, that night,
being pulled out of the darkness of the underground at Stonewall Inn
One too many times, They said, “I’m ready to be seen.”
On this holy night, when the power of the oppressed rippled through
the streets of New York, When queer people said, No more
Our world would never be the same. Fifty years ago,
It was illegal to be gay, to be trans, to dance and to love and to celebrate.
And now, only fifty years later, Here we are celebrating at a church.
Gay and straight together? Queer and straight together?
Trans and cis together? All in this together.
And so as we hear these stories of life and love and defiance and celebration,
Let us also remember and pay tribute to our movement ancestors,
Many of them transwomen of color who led the first rebellion that night.
You see, Pride is a celebration of that anniversary:
the anniversary of that riot, at the Stonewall Inn in New York city. A holy night.
So Happy Pride. Welcome to this joyful celebration,
Bring your whole selves Your gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender
Queer selves Your drag queen Butch and femme Cross-dressing Nail-painting
Tutu-wearing Selves
Your Genderqueer Genderfluid Agender Pansexual
QUILTBAG selves And all the other identities That are and will be
And let’s have a celebration, Because joy is a rebellion, too.
And this church is Queer; Queer and fabulous.
Amen?
And in the spirit of being seen, I’d like to add an asterisk at the end of that poem: Transmen matter, too. This group - transgender men - is often silent, often silenced, often overlooked, even in this lovely poem. Enbys, we see you. Transboys, we see you. Questioning, undefined, people without labels, you are valid.
Studies have shown that just meeting with, just having a conversation with a transgender person can decrease transphobia and increase compassion in individuals. Many of us might say, oh, I don’t know any trans people, but the reality is that you don’t know whether you do or not. Because gender identity is often a very private thing. Anyone you know could be struggling internally with their gender without you being at all aware of it.
You might know and be unaware of countless folks who have completed transition. And this gets to the core of what I want to talk about today: Invisible disabilities.
Now, it’s not exactly right to refer to gender differences as disabilities, but I think within our current culture, folks who do not fall into the cisgender binary often can relate as well as anyone to Spoon Theory.
Christine Miserandino, the woman who came up with Spoon Theory is a sufferer of Lupus. She describes the frustration she felt when a friend asked her to describe what it felt like to have a chronic medical condition.
“I quickly grabbed every spoon on the table; hell I grabbed spoons off of the other tables. I looked at her in the eyes and said “Here you go, you have Lupus”. She looked at me slightly confused, as anyone would when they are being handed a bouquet of spoons. The cold metal spoons clanked in my hands, as I grouped them together and shoved them into her hands.
I explained that the difference in being sick and being healthy is having to make choices or to consciously think about things when the rest of the world doesn’t have to. The healthy have the luxury of a life without choices, a gift most people take for granted.
Most people start the day with unlimited amount of possibilities, and energy to do whatever they desire, especially young people. For the most part, they do not need to worry about the effects of their actions. So for my explanation, I used spoons to convey this point. I wanted something for her to actually hold, for me to then take away, since most people who get sick feel a “loss” of a life they once knew. If I was in control of taking away the spoons, then she would know what it feels like to have someone or something else, in this case Lupus, being in control.
She grabbed the spoons with excitement. She didn’t understand what I was doing, but she is always up for a good time, so I guess she thought I was cracking a joke of some kind like I usually do when talking about touchy topics. Little did she know how serious I would become?
I asked her to count her spoons. She asked why, and I explained that when you are healthy you expect to have a never-ending supply of “spoons”. But when you have to now plan your day, you need to know exactly how many “spoons” you are starting with. It doesn’t guarantee that you might not lose some along the way, but at least it helps to know where you are starting. She counted out 12 spoons. She laughed and said she wanted more. I said no, and I knew right away that this little game would work, when she looked disappointed, and we hadn’t even started yet. I’ve wanted more “spoons” for years and haven’t found a way yet to get more, why should she? I also told her to always be conscious of how many she had, and not to drop them because she can never forget she has Lupus.
I asked her to list off the tasks of her day, including the most simple. As, she rattled off daily chores, or just fun things to do; I explained how each one would cost her a spoon. When she jumped right into getting ready for work as her first task of the morning, I cut her off and took away a spoon. I practically jumped down her throat. I said ” No! You don’t just get up. You have to crack open your eyes, and then realize you are late. You didn’t sleep well the night before. You have to crawl out of bed, and then you have to make your self something to eat before you can do anything else, because if you don’t, you can’t take your medicine, and if you don’t take your medicine you might as well give up all your spoons for today and tomorrow too.” I quickly took away a spoon and she realized she hasn’t even gotten dressed yet. Showering cost her spoon, just for washing her hair and shaving her legs. Reaching high and low that early in the morning could actually cost more than one spoon, but I figured I would give her a break; I didn’t want to scare her right away. Getting dressed was worth another spoon.
I stopped her and broke down every task to show her how every little detail needs to be thought about. You cannot simply just throw clothes on when you are sick.
I explained that I have to see what clothes I can physically put on, if my hands hurt that day buttons are out of the question. If I have bruises that day, I need to wear long sleeves, and if I have a fever I need a sweater to stay warm and so on. If my hair is falling out I need to spend more time to look presentable, and then you need to factor in another 5 minutes for feeling badly that it took you 2 hours to do all this.
I think she was starting to understand when she theoretically didn’t even get to work, and she was left with 6 spoons. I then explained to her that she needed to choose the rest of her day wisely, since when your “spoons” are gone, they are gone. Sometimes you can borrow against tomorrow’s “spoons”, but just think how hard tomorrow will be with less “spoons”.
I also needed to explain that a person who is sick always lives with the looming thought that tomorrow may be the day that a cold comes, or an infection, or any number of things that could be very dangerous. So you do not want to run low on “spoons”, because you never know when you truly will need them. I didn’t want to depress her, but I needed to be realistic, and unfortunately being prepared for the worst is part of a real day for me.
We went through the rest of the day, and she slowly learned that skipping lunch would cost her a spoon, as well as standing on a train, or even typing at her computer too long. She was forced to make choices and think about things differently. Hypothetically, she had to choose not to run errands, so that she could eat dinner that night.
When we got to the end of her pretend day, she said she was hungry. I summarized that she had to eat dinner but she only had one spoon left. If she cooked, she wouldn’t have enough energy to clean the pots. If she went out for dinner, she might be too tired to drive home safely.
Then I also explained, that I didn’t even bother to add into this game, that she was so nauseous, that cooking was probably out of the question anyway. So she decided to make soup, it was easy. I then said it is only 7pm, you have the rest of the night but maybe end up with one spoon, so you can do something fun, or clean your apartment, or do chores, but you can’t do it all.”
I want to pause and say this clearly: I am NOT bringing Spoon Theory into a reflection on Transgender Day of Remembrance in order to tie together the ideas of gender nonconformity and illness. What I am proposing is that the idea of Spoon Theory can also extend to any and all of us who must spend extra energy every day doing internal emotional work. Many of us who are not ill, but who live in a world which pathologizes our identities. I cannot begin to imagine the number of spoons it takes from you in order to wake up in a body that not only I have a complicated relationship with, but a body which all sorts of other people feel entitled to have opinions on - some of them physical or violent.
When I word it that way, not only do gender-nonconforming people come to mind but everyone whose bodies and whose appearances make them more vulnerable to our culture’s ire.
Struggle, suffering, and pain is often invisible. Most of us are able to hide our vulnerable parts, the parts that ache. Sometimes we even hide them from ourselves.
I’d like to invite you to think about how Spoon Theory applies to your life. What causes you to wake up some days with very few spoons? Who in your life has less spoons than folks expect them to have? Are you a person who must prepare for the extra emotional work that you will be faced with when you leave your house and go out into the world? How might someone lessen this burden for you? How might you lessen this burden for others?
I’d like to end this message with these holy words from UU minister Sean Neal Baron:
Your body is welcome here, all of it.
Yes, even that part. And that part. And yes, even that part.
The parts you love, and the parts you don’t.
For in this place we come with all that we are
All that we have been, And all that we are going to be.
Our bodies are constantly changing, cells die and cells are reborn
We respond to infections and disease
Sometimes we can divorce them from our bodies,
and other times they become a permanent part of us.
Your body and all that is within it, both wanted and not wanted has a place here.
Our bodies join in a web of co-creation, created and creating.
Constantly changing, constantly changing us
Scarred and tattooed, tense and relaxed
Diseased and cured, unfamiliar and intimate
Formed in infinite diversity of creation
Your body is welcome here, all of it. So take a moment and welcome it
Take a moment to feel in it. Take a moment, to be in it.
Preached 11/17/2019 at SouthWest UU in N. Royalton OH
By Rev. Meg Mathieson
This Wednesday, Nov 20, will be Transgender Day of Remembrance. Every year, we are encouraged to remember the names of the transgender people whose lives have been lost to anti-transgender violence. In a few moments, I will respectfully read the names of transgender people we know of whose lives have been taken due to anti-transgender violence in 2019, but it should be noted that these crimes often are misreported, go underreported, or are not reported at all.
Breonna “BB” Hill, a black trans woman, was killed on October 14 2019 in Kansas City, Missouri. She was 30 years old.
Itali Marlowe, a black trans woman, was killed in Houston, Texas on September 20, 2019. She was 29 years old.
Ja’Leyah-Jamar, a black trans woman, was killed on September 13 2019 in Kansas City, Missouri.
Bee Love Slater, a black trans woman, was found deceased on September 1, 2019 in Clewiston, Florida. She was 23 years old.
Bailey Reeves, a black trans woman, was killed on September 2, 2019 in Baltimore, Maryland. She was 17 years old.
Tracy Single, a black trans woman, was killed on July 30, 2019 in Houston, Texas. She was 22 years old.
Bubba Walker, a black trans woman, was killed in late July in Charlotte, North Carolina. She was 55 years old.
Pebbles La Dime Doe, a black trans woman, was killed on August 4, 2019, in Allendale, South Carolina. She was 24 years old.
Kiki Fantroy, a black trans woman, was killed on July 31, 2019 in Miami-Dade County, Florida. She was 21 years old.
Denali Berries Stuckey, a black trans woman, was killed on July 20, 2019 in North Charleston, SC. She was 29 years old.
Brooklyn Lindsey, a black trans woman, was killed on June 25, 2019 in Kansas City, Missouri. She was 32 years old.
Zoe Spears, a black trans woman, was killed on June 13, 2019 in Fairmount Heights, Maryland. She was 23 years old.
Chanel Scurlock, a black trans woman, was killed on June 5, 2019 in Lumberton, North Carolina. She was 23 years old.
Chynal Lindsey, a black trans woman, was killed on June 1, 2019 in Dallas, Texas. She was 26 years old.
Paris Cameron, a black trans woman, was killed on May 25, 2019 in Detroit, Michigan. She was 20 years old. Her two friends - 21 year old Alunte Davis and 20 year old Timothy Blancher - were also killed in the incident. Alunte and Timothy were both black gay men.
Michelle “Tamika” Washington, a black trans woman, was killed on May 19, 2019 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was 40 years old.
Muhlaysia Booker, a black trans woman, was killed on May 18, 2019 in Dallas, Texas. She was 23 years old.
Claire Legato, a black trans woman, died on May 14th, 2019 in Cleveland Ohio after being shot in April 2019. She was 21 years old.
Ashanti Carmon, a black trans woman, was killed on March 30, 2019 in Fairmount Heights, Maryland.
Jazzaline Ware, a black trans woman, was killed on March 25, 2019 in Memphis, Tennessee.
Dana Martin, a black trans woman, was killed on January 6, 2019 in Montgomery, Alabama. She was 31 years old.
Layleen Polanco, was a 27 year old black trans woman.
Johana “Joa” Medina Leon, a 25 year old trans woman of color died after being released from ICE custody.
I’m sure you can pick up the obvious pattern here. For a variety of reasons, many having to do with racism and classism, transwomen of color, especially black transwomen are uniquely vulnerable to deathly violence. It is important to remember these people because they were people, first and foremost.
It is important for people like me, a queer woman, who experiences the constant benefits of white privilege, and what’s called “Passing privilege” to remember these victims and the many others who go unreported. In honor of the people I named and the many folks we do not have time to name or even do not know the names of, want to read a poem by UU minister Otto O’Connor, titled “On a Holy Night.”
On a holy night in 1969, in an Inn, also known as a bar,
Called the Stonewall Inn, A basement— which had no running water,
Nor safe fire exits— Queer people, of many colors and kinds,
Danced together, For it was the only place Where they were allowed to dance,
At least, permitted to, by the mafia who ran the Inn.
In those days, It was common for the police to frequent this Inn,
No to join in the dance, the underground celebration,
But to send the dancers home and make arrests.
When they would arrive, The lights would go on, The people would be lined up,
And then All those in drag, All those who were trans,
All those without proper identification: They were arrested and taken into custody.
But on this holy night, That early morning of June 28,
The people said “not tonight.” As they called to them to line up,
The transwomen refused to go. And as the police began to beat and arrest them,
And as the people spilled out from the bar on to the street,
Christopher St, A crowd grew to watch. And then,
As transwomen, lesbians, and gay men were getting arrested,
A yell came from the crowd: “Gay Power.” And as a transwoman was shoved,
She shoved back and the crowd began throwing bottles at the wagon,
And suddenly it erupted. For once the people didn’t line up;
For once the people said “no more; we've had enough.”
It was almost as if, that night,
being pulled out of the darkness of the underground at Stonewall Inn
One too many times, They said, “I’m ready to be seen.”
On this holy night, when the power of the oppressed rippled through
the streets of New York, When queer people said, No more
Our world would never be the same. Fifty years ago,
It was illegal to be gay, to be trans, to dance and to love and to celebrate.
And now, only fifty years later, Here we are celebrating at a church.
Gay and straight together? Queer and straight together?
Trans and cis together? All in this together.
And so as we hear these stories of life and love and defiance and celebration,
Let us also remember and pay tribute to our movement ancestors,
Many of them transwomen of color who led the first rebellion that night.
You see, Pride is a celebration of that anniversary:
the anniversary of that riot, at the Stonewall Inn in New York city. A holy night.
So Happy Pride. Welcome to this joyful celebration,
Bring your whole selves Your gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender
Queer selves Your drag queen Butch and femme Cross-dressing Nail-painting
Tutu-wearing Selves
Your Genderqueer Genderfluid Agender Pansexual
QUILTBAG selves And all the other identities That are and will be
And let’s have a celebration, Because joy is a rebellion, too.
And this church is Queer; Queer and fabulous.
Amen?
And in the spirit of being seen, I’d like to add an asterisk at the end of that poem: Transmen matter, too. This group - transgender men - is often silent, often silenced, often overlooked, even in this lovely poem. Enbys, we see you. Transboys, we see you. Questioning, undefined, people without labels, you are valid.
Studies have shown that just meeting with, just having a conversation with a transgender person can decrease transphobia and increase compassion in individuals. Many of us might say, oh, I don’t know any trans people, but the reality is that you don’t know whether you do or not. Because gender identity is often a very private thing. Anyone you know could be struggling internally with their gender without you being at all aware of it.
You might know and be unaware of countless folks who have completed transition. And this gets to the core of what I want to talk about today: Invisible disabilities.
Now, it’s not exactly right to refer to gender differences as disabilities, but I think within our current culture, folks who do not fall into the cisgender binary often can relate as well as anyone to Spoon Theory.
Christine Miserandino, the woman who came up with Spoon Theory is a sufferer of Lupus. She describes the frustration she felt when a friend asked her to describe what it felt like to have a chronic medical condition.
“I quickly grabbed every spoon on the table; hell I grabbed spoons off of the other tables. I looked at her in the eyes and said “Here you go, you have Lupus”. She looked at me slightly confused, as anyone would when they are being handed a bouquet of spoons. The cold metal spoons clanked in my hands, as I grouped them together and shoved them into her hands.
I explained that the difference in being sick and being healthy is having to make choices or to consciously think about things when the rest of the world doesn’t have to. The healthy have the luxury of a life without choices, a gift most people take for granted.
Most people start the day with unlimited amount of possibilities, and energy to do whatever they desire, especially young people. For the most part, they do not need to worry about the effects of their actions. So for my explanation, I used spoons to convey this point. I wanted something for her to actually hold, for me to then take away, since most people who get sick feel a “loss” of a life they once knew. If I was in control of taking away the spoons, then she would know what it feels like to have someone or something else, in this case Lupus, being in control.
She grabbed the spoons with excitement. She didn’t understand what I was doing, but she is always up for a good time, so I guess she thought I was cracking a joke of some kind like I usually do when talking about touchy topics. Little did she know how serious I would become?
I asked her to count her spoons. She asked why, and I explained that when you are healthy you expect to have a never-ending supply of “spoons”. But when you have to now plan your day, you need to know exactly how many “spoons” you are starting with. It doesn’t guarantee that you might not lose some along the way, but at least it helps to know where you are starting. She counted out 12 spoons. She laughed and said she wanted more. I said no, and I knew right away that this little game would work, when she looked disappointed, and we hadn’t even started yet. I’ve wanted more “spoons” for years and haven’t found a way yet to get more, why should she? I also told her to always be conscious of how many she had, and not to drop them because she can never forget she has Lupus.
I asked her to list off the tasks of her day, including the most simple. As, she rattled off daily chores, or just fun things to do; I explained how each one would cost her a spoon. When she jumped right into getting ready for work as her first task of the morning, I cut her off and took away a spoon. I practically jumped down her throat. I said ” No! You don’t just get up. You have to crack open your eyes, and then realize you are late. You didn’t sleep well the night before. You have to crawl out of bed, and then you have to make your self something to eat before you can do anything else, because if you don’t, you can’t take your medicine, and if you don’t take your medicine you might as well give up all your spoons for today and tomorrow too.” I quickly took away a spoon and she realized she hasn’t even gotten dressed yet. Showering cost her spoon, just for washing her hair and shaving her legs. Reaching high and low that early in the morning could actually cost more than one spoon, but I figured I would give her a break; I didn’t want to scare her right away. Getting dressed was worth another spoon.
I stopped her and broke down every task to show her how every little detail needs to be thought about. You cannot simply just throw clothes on when you are sick.
I explained that I have to see what clothes I can physically put on, if my hands hurt that day buttons are out of the question. If I have bruises that day, I need to wear long sleeves, and if I have a fever I need a sweater to stay warm and so on. If my hair is falling out I need to spend more time to look presentable, and then you need to factor in another 5 minutes for feeling badly that it took you 2 hours to do all this.
I think she was starting to understand when she theoretically didn’t even get to work, and she was left with 6 spoons. I then explained to her that she needed to choose the rest of her day wisely, since when your “spoons” are gone, they are gone. Sometimes you can borrow against tomorrow’s “spoons”, but just think how hard tomorrow will be with less “spoons”.
I also needed to explain that a person who is sick always lives with the looming thought that tomorrow may be the day that a cold comes, or an infection, or any number of things that could be very dangerous. So you do not want to run low on “spoons”, because you never know when you truly will need them. I didn’t want to depress her, but I needed to be realistic, and unfortunately being prepared for the worst is part of a real day for me.
We went through the rest of the day, and she slowly learned that skipping lunch would cost her a spoon, as well as standing on a train, or even typing at her computer too long. She was forced to make choices and think about things differently. Hypothetically, she had to choose not to run errands, so that she could eat dinner that night.
When we got to the end of her pretend day, she said she was hungry. I summarized that she had to eat dinner but she only had one spoon left. If she cooked, she wouldn’t have enough energy to clean the pots. If she went out for dinner, she might be too tired to drive home safely.
Then I also explained, that I didn’t even bother to add into this game, that she was so nauseous, that cooking was probably out of the question anyway. So she decided to make soup, it was easy. I then said it is only 7pm, you have the rest of the night but maybe end up with one spoon, so you can do something fun, or clean your apartment, or do chores, but you can’t do it all.”
I want to pause and say this clearly: I am NOT bringing Spoon Theory into a reflection on Transgender Day of Remembrance in order to tie together the ideas of gender nonconformity and illness. What I am proposing is that the idea of Spoon Theory can also extend to any and all of us who must spend extra energy every day doing internal emotional work. Many of us who are not ill, but who live in a world which pathologizes our identities. I cannot begin to imagine the number of spoons it takes from you in order to wake up in a body that not only I have a complicated relationship with, but a body which all sorts of other people feel entitled to have opinions on - some of them physical or violent.
When I word it that way, not only do gender-nonconforming people come to mind but everyone whose bodies and whose appearances make them more vulnerable to our culture’s ire.
Struggle, suffering, and pain is often invisible. Most of us are able to hide our vulnerable parts, the parts that ache. Sometimes we even hide them from ourselves.
I’d like to invite you to think about how Spoon Theory applies to your life. What causes you to wake up some days with very few spoons? Who in your life has less spoons than folks expect them to have? Are you a person who must prepare for the extra emotional work that you will be faced with when you leave your house and go out into the world? How might someone lessen this burden for you? How might you lessen this burden for others?
I’d like to end this message with these holy words from UU minister Sean Neal Baron:
Your body is welcome here, all of it.
Yes, even that part. And that part. And yes, even that part.
The parts you love, and the parts you don’t.
For in this place we come with all that we are
All that we have been, And all that we are going to be.
Our bodies are constantly changing, cells die and cells are reborn
We respond to infections and disease
Sometimes we can divorce them from our bodies,
and other times they become a permanent part of us.
Your body and all that is within it, both wanted and not wanted has a place here.
Our bodies join in a web of co-creation, created and creating.
Constantly changing, constantly changing us
Scarred and tattooed, tense and relaxed
Diseased and cured, unfamiliar and intimate
Formed in infinite diversity of creation
Your body is welcome here, all of it. So take a moment and welcome it
Take a moment to feel in it. Take a moment, to be in it.