Sunday 30 December 2012

Latest creation: Magic Garden

I haven't had a lot of time to crochet recently because of the uni work piling on in third year *grumble* but whenever I get the chance to crochet it's a nice way to relax and try and forget that I'm drowning under a sea of books and journal articles...

So here is my latest creation for my friend Emily's 21st (@emily_rebecca), a magic garden complete with mushroom house, button-tree with a whimsical owl on top, two accidentally creepy looking rabbits and a golden sequin path. I made the flowers on the left hand side by crocheting three or four different sewing threads together using this pattern. To make sure it stood up (the circle base was a bit floppy!) I sandwiched a piece of card between the base of the garden and another circle made using double crochet, to give it a solid foundation.

And here it is!









I'm extra happy because this is one of the first things I've made that I have improvised, on the most part without any patterns. I did take inspiration from these amazing crochet houses by meekssandygirl on Flickr: 




Monday 22 October 2012

Anxiety, CBT & the quest for "normality"

So following on from my last non-wool related blog post, I finally went to my doctors and decided to ask about talking therapies on option.

It seems I definitely do have social anxiety. A catch-22 if you like, as the main issue I have is worrying about what other people think of me, and making a fool of myself. Therefore when I tried to seek help about my anxiety in the first place I downplayed it (worried my doctor would think I was silly) and made it seem like it wasn't an evil parasitic twin following me around and endlessly ruining my fun and happiness. 

I was put on anti-depressants to deal with my anxiety, and I can't really fault them. I needed a quick fix because at the time I finally sought help about my anxiety and went to my GP I felt like a ticking bomb that could blow at any moment. I was permanently anxious and the tiniest thing could tip me over the edge and render me useless for the next day or two. Obviously I didn't expect to be wrapped up in a blanket by my GP and for him to flip head over heels to make me feel less like I was going to blow up every time I encountered a troublesome situation, but the whole "here have these tablets they will make you feel better, now off you go" thing meant that I hadn't really addressed my problems at all, and simply had a quick fix for something that had been bothering me for most of my life, and would continue to so if I didn't do something.

While I feel that being put on tablets helped me out massively, it also drew me into a false sense of security. Anxiety is multi-layered and revolves around physical symptoms (breathlessness, cold sweats, feeling clammy, lightheadedness, butterflies...), thoughts and behaviours. The tablets pretty much eliminated the physical symptoms which made me think that I was miraculously cured of anxiety. Not having the physical symptoms was great, and allowed me to function somewhat normally in situations where I would normally turn into a quivering sweaty mess and want to adopt the fetal position in situations where it would  have been a bit inappropriate (buses, lectures, cinemas). However because I hadn't dealt with why I was actually anxious in the first place, the thoughts and behaviours were still there.

For example, things I have problems with: 


phone calls; being in quiet spaces; being in places where it's hard to leave without being noticed; getting off buses; having people in the house I don't know; going to new places, doing things on my own; being at the till in shops...

 While I would be able to manage most of these things now I'm on the tablets and am a lot calmer and don't physically feel like I'm going to invert with panic, there is still a mental block - the anxious thoughts are still there, which leads to anxious behaviours. In my case this involves avoiding a lot of situations, then getting really frustrated at myself, and then crying into a pillow once a month thinking the world is going to end.

So, I went to the doctor and expressed that while the tablets are great and please can I have some more, I also really want to come off them. Being on tablets doesn't really bother me because simply what I was experiencing before the tablets was hell on earth, but they have made certain parts of my genitals as responsive as a dead fox and also make me fall asleep after one pint. Not ideal. So I decided that I would try out CBT to try and combat the way I think and react to my anxiety, and then attempt to come off the tablets. In my head it doesn't make sense to come off the tablets without dealing with the mental aspect of my anxiety, as coming off tablets to me suggests some kind of end process and considering I panic and hide under my duvet whenever the phone rings, I don't think I'm quite ready yet...

The CBT!

I was referred to Self Help Services  (not sure if this is exclusive to Manchester or a national thing) and just had to confirm whether I wanted an appointment and which type of treatment I wanted (online, one-on-one sessions, or group sessions). I was given a practitioner and initially had an hour in which I was able to talk about everything I was bothered about. I was surprised at how easy it was, as I guess the woman was used to irrational anxieties and phobias, so hearing about my thought processes and the things I fear the most seemed pretty normal to her, even if they seem a bit odd to me and other people I've spoken to!

Then over the following weeks (going up to last week) we looked at what goals I hope to achieve, and how I'm going to achieve them. She sent me away with loads of things to read to better understand anxiety and also some information on muscle relaxation and breathing exercises - which I had always been too lazy to do but now I've tried them they actually have worked. Hooray! 

I then was told to keep a thought diary, which involves thinking fully about each situation that causes me anxiety, and to identify the thoughts and feelings I have at that moment and to give them a % rating of how anxious I felt (0 being the least and 100 being the highest). I then had to distance myself from the situation, and try and give evidence for and against what I was thinking, which was useful as it taught me to think rationally about a situation instead of in my panicky mindset which is usually along the lines of "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

An example:


(I hope this is actually readable...) 


Now I've started doing this for various situations, I've started to note a difference in how I approach certain situations as I become more aware of what I'm doing and can maintain a clearer head if I do start to panic. I'm really happy with how the CBT is going and finally feel like I'm actually making progress in getting the confidence to confront the situations I have always avoided. Before I started CBT, the only time I really got to speak about my anxiety was to friends or really briefly to my doctor in order to prove myself unstable enough to get more medication (fun fun). Talking is good and all, but actually doing these exercises to combat the way I think about things, and in turn how I react to them seems to be the key to finally sorting myself out.

 Next step is to actually implement this into gradually exposing myself to the situations I fear, taking little steps from the smallest worries to the biggest. Eek!

Tuesday 18 September 2012

The Big Woolly Crochet Moomin Blog

Over the past few months I've been crocheting moomins. I've made three, and every time I make them I forget how much time and effort they take and I want to cry before I've even gotten round to assembling them. However once they are finished I think they look quite impressive and are probably the most rewarding figures I've crocheted so far. 

After trawling the web, I found this pattern from Crochet Amigurumi Blogg. Unfortunately it's in Swedish so it took me a while to get the hang of the pattern and it took me forever to work out the pattern, but I worked out in the end that "tills" is the same as a stitch decrease (sc2tog) and as long as you make sure the number of stitches add up at the end of each row you should be dandy. If you plan to make a moomin I'd strongly suggest using a stitch marker and moving it as you crochet each row, as especially in the head, every row seems to be different and it's easy to lose track of where you are up to! As a result, the first moomin I made had more of a bulbous bulge than the cute moomin snout, and as much as people compliment me on it, I'll always look at it with a bit of disdain...

Although I occasionally post photos of the moomins in progress and after they are finished, I thought it would be quite nice to put them all in one place and explain a bit about the making of them, which hopefully will also be useful if anyone fancies having a go at crocheting one.


The first thing to start with is the head. The number of stitches, and most importantly where you decrease stitches, gives the head the moomin shape. This is why it's important to use a stitch marker, because if you miss out stitches then you might end up decreasing in the wrong position and your head won't be the right shape! Here the head is ready to stuff.


Next, to the start the body.
Here is the base of body (the black thread acting as a stitch marker). 
Unlike with most amigurumi/stuffed toys I've made in crochet, you start at the bottom of the body and crochet upwards.


Here I am continuing to crochet the body from the bottom upwards, to create a basket shape.


Eventually you will decrease the amount of stitches per row so the body gets a conical shape and will taper up to form the upper body and neck.


Once the body and head are finished, stuffed full of fiber filling and fastened off, the head is sewn to the body.


The ears and made and sewn on, and the limbs and tail are then made, stuffed, and sewn on.

Moomin II, made for my best friend Rach

Then it comes to the details!
 Yellow yarn can be sewn into the top of the head, and if you separate the individual yarn strands you get a lovely blonde fringe (great if you want to make a Snorkmaiden moomin!). 
The eyes can be embroidered on, and here I used black and brown embroidery thread. I originally tried to make the eyes out of felt but I didn't feel there was enough of a contrast between white or cream felt (for the pupils of the eye) against the white wool of the moomin. Safety eyes could also be used, but I don't feel they would make it look much like a moomin!

Moomin II posing on our radiator.

I was then asked to custom make a moomin for a fellow Twitter-er. I used a design similar to Moomin II which can be seen above. I call this one Moomin III (even though I based the last two on the character Snorkmaiden so they really should be Snorkmaiden I & II...OH WELL).

The back of Moomin III.

I based the details of Moomin III on this photo and I'm very happy with the result!




Ta-daaa!

For this moomin I changed the position of the arms and stitched them into the body so that they appeared to be more closed. I was then able to create some tiny flowers using this easy pattern by Jodie Kundhi and stitch them together and to the front of the arms, to give the appearance that the moomin is offering flowers. I stitched a bit of the same coloured yarn as the hair to make the flowers look a bit more exciting.

I also changed the embroidery of the eyes to appear closed, as I felt it made the moomin look cuter than embroidering on wide open eyes.



So there we have it. Woolly crochet moomins!

I am happy to custom make moomins, however they do take quite a bit of time and effort, and as I'm starting back at uni on the 24th September I need to start balancing crochet with uni stuff (sad face). 
However if you'd like me to make you a moomin, please DM me on Twitter (@shutupcaf) 
:)

Tuesday 4 September 2012

Up, Up & Crochet!

A few months ago I got sucked into the addictive hoover that is crochet and I haven't been able to emerge since. I don't really mind though, it just means my house is covered in bits of wool and every day a new stuffed animal makes it onto our TV cabinet to obscure the view of the screen a little more. I planned on blogging about it from the start but due to general laziness and being too busy with...er...crochet, I never quite managed. So here I am, three-ish months later attempting to do my first crochet blog!

I gained an interest in crocheting when my mum bought me the Cath Kidston Crochet Book for Christmas which included a crochet hook, a few balls of yarn and an instruction manual. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. The wool is bad quality, there isn't enough of it to complete the project (a granny square cushion) and the written instructions were impossible to work out, not just for someone who has never crocheted before, but even my mum (who has crocheted in the past) couldn't work out the basic stitches from the sketches in the book. I also felt it was also massively overpriced at £20, as you can get a crochet hook for £1-2 on the high street and a huge bundle of wool (not amazing quality but significantly better than those in the kit) for about £1.60 (Wilkinsons, Dunelm Mill and Abakhan Fabrics are my favourite places for wool, but you can also sometimes get cheap yarn in places like The Works). The tin was nice for decoration, until the lid fell off...so yeah.


Ms Octopus knows her shit.


I found the instructions in the Cath Kidston kit stupidly confusing, and so turned to Youtube for some tutorials. Thankfully, Youtube is full to the brim of EVERYTHING and has plenty of excellent crochet tutorials. I wanted to begin with granny squares, and stumbled across the user Bethintx1 who has some brilliant videos covering all sorts of crochet patterns and stitches. I found the tutorial for granny squares particularly good as you can clearly see what she is doing as she crochets, and it's slow enough for someone who has never crocheted before to pick up. After stopping and re watching the videos on granny squares constantly for four hours getting the stitches wrong over and over again, I finally got the hang of it, and I was off! To be fair, I haven't learnt many different stitches since I started, but the more you do it the better you get at getting neater, more even stitches (or I was just a shit beginner crocheter, haha).

Below is part 1 of the granny square tutorial. (The video uses American crochet terminology which is different from the British terminology, in case you want to learn the British terms. They are pretty easy to translate across, I just prefer the American terms as most of the patterns I use are American).


I also wanted to have a go at crocheting some small crochet animals (they are also known as amigurumi) so I found this tuturial on crochet pigs. I won't lie, it was a ridiculous amount of effort, took 8 hours and my first two attempts looked more like deformed bumble bees with legs, but the third one came out quite cute so I wasn't too arsed. Just following that one tutorial was enough to get the jist of written patterns too, which has meant I've been able to create a load of different animals fairly soon after I picked up my crochet hook for the first time.




Ta-daa!

Why you should give crochet a go? 

It's ridiculously satisfying, and once you learn the basic stitches (there's only really three or four) you can make most things...I've already made hats, door knob cosys, iPod pouches, cuddly tiny animals! It's all about keeping count of the amount of stitches, and trust me, once you start it's a really easy hobby, plus when I look at the things I've made I think they look so good compared to what I had to do to actually make them. It's a ridiculously rewarding hobby, just requires a lot of time and patience.

Anyway, I'll definitely be posting more about crochet in the near future so keep an eye out! :)

Monday 9 July 2012

My anxiety in a (slightly-big) nutshell

So tomorrow morning I have booked a doctors appointment in which I intend to confront my social anxiety once and for all, and hit my anxiety on the head instead of tip-toeing around it like I always do.

For as long as I can remember I've always felt very uncomfortable and awkward in certain social situations. Not as in shyness, but as in having a sense of dread so large that I felt like I could throw up at any moment, and not about situations which warrant such a reaction. I'd have these reactions to the thought of having people I didn't know in my house, going for meals with family friends I barely knew, answering the phone, answering the door to pick up a takeaway...the list goes on. In my second year of college I developed IBS, partly due to a lactose intolerance that no one suggested might be the most obvious cause of me being ill every day for two years, and with that sprang extreme anxiety and depression. As a result I would have numerous days off college, a lot of which were because I was too emotionally tired to deal with the emotional effort of having to cope with both the pain and the anxiety that I knew would flare up during the college day. I was constantly having to leave the classroom to go to the toilet, I would have almost permanent crippling stomach cramps and my stomach would always make weird noises in class. I was so embarrassed about my IBS that I didn't tell any of my teachers which made the whole thing worse, because along with constantly having to leave the room, the embarrassment of actually leaving the room multiple times every lesson and knowing that I was drawing unwanted attention to myself devastated me. I thought that everyone would think I was weird or would question my behaviour. The embarrassment manifested itself into very extreme anxiety, to the point where I not only avoided college but also social situations, as even the thought of my close friends knowing I had IBS filled me with shame. I got even more despondent about the situation because I would miss college and get moaned at by my teachers, all the while having no control over my body physically, or the way I mentally reacted to it. I loathed myself and my body for removing me of my freedom. I ended up having a massive panic attack in an A level exam because my IBS was acting up and I was told I couldn't leave the exam room, and as a result I now can't sit my exams in exam halls, or even be in quiet, busy spaces unless I know I can leave easily and discretely at any time.

So, that was college. I then moved to Manchester to start university and the combined stress of moving, not getting on with my flatmates at all and having a bad diet full of dairy (still not knowing I was lactose intolerant) made my IBS incredibly bad. I started missing lectures, being constantly anxious and getting worked up about everything. There were a few times when I couldn't even bring myself to leave my room because I felt so anxious about what could happen if I was ill - which there was a high chance of happening - and have to deal with the anxiety that came with it. I ended up avoiding everything. So, I thought. Enough is enough. I dragged myself to the university doctor - I should say at this point that I didn't even realise my anxiety was anxiety, and attributed to just being IBS - and said something along the lines of "I have IBS...it's making me panic a lot...I can't cope with exams etc..." At this point I hadn't mentioned my IBS or the anxiety to a single person, and so I felt like I confessing a huge secret (and source of crippling embarrassment) and I expected to be reassured that it was okay, that I was normal and for my doctor to give me options to deal with it. The whole affair took an incredible amount of effort on my part. It turns out that I had booked an appointment with the grumpiest, rudest doctor I've ever encountered, who didn't even look at me once throughout the whole appointment, and simply repeated to me what I had said, asked if I had any questions and then ended the appointment. Nothing at all happened, and I was absolutely devastated. I felt like an idiot, I felt like I was making up everything I felt, I felt completely alone and I ran home (bursting into tears before I even reached my halls to further increase my embarrassment) and cried for the rest of the day. After that I felt ashamed of my anxiety and gradually felt even more hopeless and more anxious, partly because I didn't have a clue what was happening to me.

Attempt #2 to get help came shortly after with a doctor I had at home. This was slightly more successful, however I mentioned that I thought I had social anxiety (I've had issues long before the IBS developed, but I think the IBS was a trigger for the extreme frequent anxiety I felt) and my doctor offered to put me on anti-depressants. Great, I thought. And I must say, they were absolutely amazing. They made me feel free of panic and I could finally do things I wanted to without panicking and wanting to run away from wherever I was and curl up into a ball before it felt like the universe was going to implode on me. 

And here we are now. A year after starting on Citalopram, the symptoms of my general anxiety are pretty much gone. I have wobbles now and again - everyone does - but generally I feel pretty good. However I can't help but feel that while they've helped me massively, the tablets have only masked the problems. You see, I might feel okay most of the time, but there are still situations which terrify me to the core and which I still completely avoid, and it's getting in the way of my life. Phone calls are one of my worst phobias, as I can't answer the phone except on very rare occasions, and I can only make calls when I know the call is structured and there is little room for the conversation to wander and for me to make a fool of myself, i.e. making a doctors appointment. In my head I know that I won't embarrass myself, but by habit I react to the phone ringing with panic, and it seems like it'll take a fair bit to sort it out.

I want to get a job, and yet I can't answer the phone to a) inquire about jobs, b) answer the phone once I've submitted an application and they ring me back and c) the sheer thought of having to answer the phone at work terrifies me so much that I have avoided even applying. The other week I was feeling particularly anxious, went into Manchester city centre, and then had to get the bus straight out again because the thought of the two minutes of standing at a till opposite another human being nearly gave me a panic attack. Hilariously tragic.

So, I can only really hope that tomorrows doctors appointment allows for some progress at least. I'm a bit less bothered about talking about my anxiety because I've realised now that it's not a fault with me personally, it's a fault with my somewhat dysfunctional headspace. I basically need to explain that although anti-depressants have helped the symptoms, they haven't dealt with the root cause of the problem. I need to ask if they could possibly refer me to some sort of talking therapy to actually allow me to try and combat the cause of the anxiety, not just the symptoms of anxiety.

Ah well. Wish me luck.

Wednesday 20 June 2012

Hung up - Phone Phobia

(Photo by dissent_is_cool)

I'm trying to blog about my mental health a bit more, as despite knowing how common some mental health issues are, I still cringe talking about my own issues. I suffer quite badly from anxiety (not so much anymore from the physical feeling of anxiety thanks to tablets, but the thoughts are still very much there) and I am aware that some of the things I have anxieties about are absolutely ridiculous. I could even laugh at them if they weren't so crippling.


One of the many things I hate: phone calls. I hate phone calls a ridiculous amount. I hate answering calls, I absolutely despise ringing people. The only person I can ring without panicking is my mum. It makes me feel pathetic. Scared of phone calls? How ridiculous.


My landlord frequently rings and I ignore it. I just tried to apply for a volunteering placement, but then I panicked and realised they had my number and would probably ring me to talk about my enquiry for the position, so I didn't apply. When I say I hate phone calls, it's because every time my phone rings I get a sinking feeling in my stomach, I feel like I'm going to throw up and sometimes I even get dizzy because I get anxious so suddenly. It's completely ridiculous and yet I feel completely out of control of it. In the past my mum has tried to force me to make phone calls because she sees it as me just being awkward, when in reality I honestly feel like I'd sometimes rather chop off my own leg than call someone.


I get pissed off with myself all the time because of it. There are certain situations which I associate with extreme anxiety, and they remind me that despite generally feeling free from anxiety since I started on anti-depressants, deep down I'm still very much a puppet to my anxiety. The hardest thing for me is the anxiety being internal - it's not something external that I can eventually work my way up to battling...it's basically me working myself up to confronting myself, and my anxiety itself has a habit of making me try to forget about things bothering me. So I get confronted with the fear, try my best to forget about it, and push it to the back of my mind. Then each time the anxiety gets brought up again it gets more severe and makes me feel even worse about myself.


So ultimately, at the age of 20, I still avoid phone calls as much as possible, which is really beginning to interfere with things. I struggle to ring my friends so I find it hard to stay in touch unless I see people face-to-face or contact them over Facebook or by text. I struggle to make doctors appointments and I just went a week without anti-depressants because I had run out and was so nervous about ringing up my doctor and changing my appointment to an emergency appointment that I simply didn't do it, and instead made myself ill for a week.


On the rare occasions when I absolutely have to make a phone call it'll probably take me about half an hour to prepare myself before I can even pick up the phone. I'll have to have the things I want to say written out word for word and I'll probably have to say the words over and over again until I'm absolutely positive of what I'm going to say. Sometimes I read over the words so many times that they lose their meaning and I end up mincing my words anyway. However obviously phone calls are not scripted, and so the more off track a phone call goes, the less prepared I am, and the more uneasy I start to feel. Without exaggeration, when I'm on the phone to someone I feel about as tense as if I was stood on the edge of a 50 foot building and could fall off any minute. It's an absolutely horrible feeling, and made even worse by the fact that I know it's completely irrational and ridiculous, and that because of this I'm constantly told to stop being lazy and just make the call. No one really understands that when I say I'm scared of phone calls, I mean I am actually terrified of them, and at the moment, as has been the case for many years, I feel completely unable to do anything about it.


When it comes down to it, I think the thing that frightens me the most about phone calls is an immediate worry about sounding weird/coming across rude or awkward/mincing my words.  I've always been ridiculously shy, self-critical and very conscious of what other people think of me and I think that plays a huge part in it. Despite overcoming my shyness considerably in other situations, the fear of phone calls has always remained. The thought of coming across as rude whenever I'm anxious makes me worry, as I would end up feeling disproportionately guilty and due to anxiety, would think about it over and over again and end up feeling more and more guilty. The fact that I have nothing other than the sound of my voice to communicate panics me, as I can't use my body language or smile to communicate, and thus I feel like anything I say could be misinterpreted and reflect badly on me, or even offend whoever I'm on the phone with. It frustrates me that it bothers me so much, but I find it impossible to not worry.


The point is that when I'm anxious I feel vulnerable, and despite being 20 and supposedly independent, trying to overcome this has seemed like such a massive task to do on my own that I've simply avoided doing it at all costs. I feel like I would need someone to hold my hand the whole way, and yet to me it seems like such a ridiculous thing to be scared of that simply asking someone to help me to get through it would seem unnecessary. I think ultimately I won't try and confront this ridiculous fear until someone forces me too, or at least checks up on me and makes sure I'm actually doing it. I suppose I could start by ringing up friends and family and then work my way up to people I don't know, but the thought worries me so much that instead of wanting to face up to it, I just end up cowering away each time.


As for now, I'm stuck. At the moment I want to volunteer and yet the prospect of one phone call scares me so much that it's putting me off. It frustrates me to high heaven so I can only hope to somehow get over this damn thing. Until then I'm going to sit here on my arse and regret not doing anything about it. Hmph.



Sunday 10 June 2012

Hairy Pits

(2 & a bit weeks worth of fuzz...)

About three weeks ago I decided that as a little experiment - and frankly because the exam period is a long, boring one and I wanted something to do - I would grow my armpit hair.


Why? From the moment I developed armpit hair, I'd never considered doing anything with it other than shaving it off and pretending that it didn't exist. It's hammered hard into girls from a young age to deal with "problematic" body hair, because if you are hairy you don't fit into the polished expectation of what it is to be female. I don't see hairy armpits in magazines. Every female I know (as far as I'm aware of) uses some form of hair removal on that area. If you have hairy underarms you'll probably get plagued with "eww"s from the opposite sex, and your mum might even beg that you shave it off because it's not ladylike to have hairy underarms. You are not acceptable as a female unless you modify your body, as apparently the female body in its natural state is not good enough. Isn't that a bit...odd? It's not so much a choice between shaving or not shaving - for the majority of women the only real option is to shave or be deemed disgusting, unfeminine and unattractive. Without the male-dominated view of female beauty as dainty, pristine and hygienic, would women even shave their underarms?


Now I look back I feel sorry for my 13-year old self for feeling pressured into shaving, but I think doing something like this would prove to myself that I can still feel confident without shaving my armpits and more important, not feel like I'm compromising my "sexiness" by doing so. I hoped to prove to myself that next time I go to a festival, instead of worrying  about how on earth I'll stay fuzz-free for a week I'll instead worry about more important things, like running out of vodka. I don't particularly care about having hairy armpits, and I can't quite believe it's taken me this long to realise that if I don't want to shave...well...I don't have to.

Why just armpit hair? Basically because I frequently don't shave my legs for extended periods of time anyway (I'm lazy and I don't really care) and I only started altering my pubes when I become sexually active (what a term, ha). For me personally there's a lot of debate about whether to shave/wax/trim/vajazzle your pubes but no one ever discusses whether to shave or not shave armpit hair. Some people go wild over hairy vaginas and yet I don't think I've ever heard one person say "Armpit hair? Mmm, yeah, that's hot!" It seems that armpit hair is one of those things that's always been seen as inherently unfeminine or unhygienic. 
Even the word "armpit" seems so repulsive that we often replace it with "underarm" because it sounds a bit nicer.


So anyway, I haven't shaved for three weeks-ish and I have a nice little armpit bush growing. Not so much like the Australian bush, a bit more like a slightly feeble Manchester bush that's struggling to grow in a garden after a harsh winter and not a lot of rain - I blame fine hair and being naturally blonde - so it's a bit pathetic, but it's a bush nonetheless. I've found the whole process surprisingly easier than I thought it would be and I don't really know why it never occurred to me to try it before, especially as in the past year I've come to the radical conclusion that my body is my own and I can do whatever the hell I want to it. Obviously no one is chaining us up with our armpits in the air and mowing the fuzz off with a Bic disposable razor, but if you're a woman and you feel that you have to shave your armpits otherwise you'll feel unfeminine, ugly, disgusting and face similar negative comments, then someone is essentially chaining you up and making you shave, and you should be really quite pissed off at being made to feel that way.


The big test was last week, as I went on a night out in a top that allowed me to get my fuzz out in public, and I was pretty nervous about doing so. Obviously when you're dancing you're going to put your hands in the air and do some pretty embarrassing dancing - if you're me, anyway. No one mentioned anything despite the fact that I tried to get my armpits in every photo and was dancing with my arms in the air and pointing to them and generally trying to get them out at every possible moment like a proper drunken idiot. I felt great. Either no one mentioned anything because they were being polite, they didn't notice, they just didn't give a fuck, as it should be. Either way, I felt good for it and I know that if someone did confront me about it, or insult me I'd be confident to unleash a can of feminist rant on their ass. We're all allowed preferences, for example on a guy I absolutely despise soul patches and deep V necks but I don't go round expecting all lads to stop having soul patches and wearing deep V necks just because I don't like them. If you don't like underarm hair it doesn't make you a bad person, and that's perfectly fine, just don't think you should expect me to shave to please you.


Verdict? 


I didn't feel any less "womanly", I felt about as sexy as I always do, and if anything I felt more confident. At the end of the day, probably the most important thing I learnt is that it's only hair. It really shouldn't matter, yet body image expectations are such a massive source of unhappiness for many that it suddenly does matter. It's not really about whether or not you shave, it's about feeling comfortable to do what you want with your own body and to realise that it's okay to not fit in with expectations. I think often people get so hung up in the shaving/not-shaving argument that they miss the point. Shave if you want to, and if you don't want to shave...don't shave! The thought that anyone should actually care about a bit of hair coming from your body to the point where they feel like they can get you to change your body to suit their needs? Tell them to fuck off. The most important point is to do what you want. I could decide to shave, I could decide not to shave. I could dye my armpit hair turquoise and plait it and sew sequins onto it. What do it matter to anyone, honestly? Is it even that big a deal? 


[If you want to read more on the subject of body hair alongside body fascism I would massively recommend this post by Nyika.]

Wednesday 23 May 2012

Hey love, nice tits!

(Illustration by Sina Becker)


There’s a garage at the bottom of my road that I have to walk past if I want to get pretty much anywhere, and several times a week up to several times a day (depending on how often I walk past) I get wolf-whistled at, stared at, or have something muttered at me as I walk past. There have been occasions where a man stood outside the garage has completely stopped what he is doing purely to ogle at me for a good 30 seconds while I walk towards him. Last week I heard a wolf-whistle, looked behind me and several men had come out of the garage to stare at me as I walked down the street, with one man actually gestering with his hands the shape of an arse at me.

And you know what? I absolutely fucking hate it. It makes me feel awkward, exploited and downright annoyed. I get fired up every time it happens and I get the usual same bullshit responses:

1. Stop moaning.
2. You’re nitpicking.
3. You shouldn’t wear clothes that make men want to shout things at you.
4. You should stop being a female.
5. You should chop your breasts off.
6. It’s a compliment. Why can’t you take a compliment?
7. IT’S YOUR FAULT FOR LOOKING NICE.
8. STOP HAVING A BODY!

    Etc…


You know what I have to say to you? Honestly? Fuck. Off.

Fuck. Right Off.

The sheer fact that I have to justify how awkward/uncomfortable/pissed off/dirty street harassment – and yes it is harassment because I consider it to be so, so fuck off on that issue also – makes me feel is just ridiculous. “But they’re only being nice! You’re so ungrateful! They’re just acknowledging your body!”

Ah yes, I need to have my body validated by a group of men on the street. I think I’ve even had someone tell me to be thankful they weren’t groping me or following me down a back alley (kind of blocked that one out of my memory though). I’ve had someone else ask me “well Caf, what else are they going to do?”

Er, well, I don’t know. They could just NOT SAY ANYTHING, PERHAPS?

Not to generalise but the overall consensus whenever I mention anything is females agreeing, sympathising and getting angry. An equal amount of men do the same, but I then I always get more than a few men who ask me why it’s bad, why I don’t get flattered, why I complain.

I get it. You don’t get wolf-whistled at or objectified on a daily basis. You don’t generally get asked to suck someone’s dick on the way to a bus stop at 8.30 in the morning, and then called an ugly slut when you roll your eyes and decline, be it politely or not so much. Silly me for misinterpreting that as offensive when it’s actually a compliment! Do you often have a group of guys on the other side of the road shout something odd at your friend, only to result in you laughing and having “Who said you could laugh? Ugly bitch!” yelled at you? You probably don’t do you? So I understand that you don’t get it, and that you might even think street harassment is made up or that it never happens. Oh I can assure you, it does. And please, if you don’t get it, PLEASE, don’t pretend that you do.

You can go as far as trying to understand an issue, but if you aren’t the victim of that issue then it’s not your place to decide how that issue should make someone feel. You just don’t get to do that. I can do my best to understand racism and homophobia and ableism but I’m not necessarily a victim of them so who the fuck am I to say that a certain insult doesn’t hurt a certain person, or to try and explain how someone feels for them? In the same way, if you don’t get subject to street harassment on a daily basis, who the fuck are you to tell me what I should get angry about, or what should make me feel flattered, or what should make me feel uncomfortable?

I don’t hate men, and I feel like I have to tread on eggshells whenever I talk about a certain group of men who do wolf-whistle; call me a slut as I walk past them on a night out; feel it’s alright to grope my arse at the bar and then call me “uptight” when I tell them to fuck off.

Apparently if I dress a certain way, anyone is allowed to pass judgement on the way I dress. So if I wear a short skirt, I’m obviously inviting you to wolfwhistle and shout “sexy!” at me, in the same way that I suppose having large breasts warrants men to shout “TITTIES!” at girls with large breasts and think it’s okay because, well it’s womens fault for having boobs, innit? Next thing we’ll be saying that it’s acceptable for women wearing low-cut tops and short skirts to be sexually assaulted because by dressing that way they’re basically just “asking for it”….oh….wait.

But then it’s not even that, because I’ve been wolf-whistled at hungover, wearing my scruffiest clothes. Some days I’ve opted out of wearing a dress and going for jeans instead because I’ve wanted to blend into the background as much as possible, and have still had obscene things shouted at me. I’ve been tempted to turn around and shout “Seriously?! Even NOW? But I look like dog shit today!” but I just cannot be arsed because I know I'll only be subject to more degrading comments. In the comments section of ­this article a girl explains a man who shouted suggestive comments at her “tried to justify himself by saying I was wearing jeans which made my bum look nice, and if I was going to do that, well he was perfectly within his rights.” Sigh.

From the comments I’ve gathered, I’ve come to the conclusion that the only resolution is to stop being female, to walk around in a full body sack that hides any indication that I am in possession of a body, and which could possibly convince people that from my neck to my knees I’m actually made of Milkybars and jam. I also should carry around a taser gun around with me and shock anyone who “compliments” me.

By wolf-whistling at me you’re just confirming to me that you basically think I’m a walking ornament. I’ve called street harassment ‘objectification’ because well, it’s a pretty common form of objectification surely? Since however long back in history, women have been admired as nimble objects, as things of prettiness, of ornaments that just so happen to move and breathe and think (but not for themselves, because we’re still not allowed to do that without being told to “stop being stupid”). In many countries, women are still only allowed to undertake “feminine” jobs in factories and are hired on their attractiveness over their technical abilities. I know some people will say “but Caf, you’re overanalysing things, you’re just nitpicking, you’re just making an issue when there isn’t one” but there IS a fucking issue, and stop telling me that I shouldn’t feel uncomfortable, or WORSE that I should start taking absurd, crude and downright vulgar comments on the chin and be thankful for the validation of my attractiveness by my male counterparts? It's hard to even laugh it off anymore because it's endless, tiring and frustrating. I imagine a good deal of men don't realise the effect a few words can have on someone, and judging by the response I've had from a few individuals when I've mentioned it on Twitter, I can only hope that by actually discussing the issue I can make some people aware about how much of a big deal street harassment is to a lot of people, so at least even if you aren't carrying it out, you can stop making a woman feel stupid for getting upset over something she has every right to be pissed off at.

I guess I should just learn to accept getting “TITS!” and “ARSE!” shouted at me as I walk to the bus stop, as obviously having the presence of certain parts of my anatomy pointed out to me by random strangers is quintessential to my existence, just in case one day my tits fall off and get lodged down a drain and I have to ask some heckling buffoon to help me retrieve my breasts from the Manchester drainage system. Where would I be without being reminded that I have a reproductive system, eh? God forbid that I actually forget I have a body one day because I’m sure without having certain parts of my anatomy pointed out to me on a daily basis I’d somehow forget that I’m actually human and implode. Haha, imagine that. Sigh.


Wednesday 8 February 2012

Sedimentation of the soul.

So it’s 1.46am with an extra “FUCKING WHAT TIME IS IT?” in there somewhere. I’m currently writing about sand. Yes, my geography degree is not just about colouring in and standing in rivers and climbing up hills, I also have to analyse sand. I have to spend hours in a lab looking at sand through a microscope, looking at the colour and shape of sand, and I have to describe in technical terms how round or pointy the sand is. This sand is white, it is very pointy. No, no, good heavens that will not do. I have to explain in several pages why the sand is pointy, how pointy is this sand compared to that sand, what sand is sand and sand the sand sand sand.

To survive the sandy pit of hell that is currently my degree – hell, I don’t even fucking like sand, I fucking hate beach holidays because I burn in the sun like a roast chicken in the oven and I’d rather go on a city break anyway so my melatonin-deficient decrepit body can rest in the cool air-conditioned realms of cool air-conditioned buildings instead of burning like yes, a roast chicken– I have started to drink tea. Today I alternated between Yorkshire tea, green tea and peppermint tea. I drank so much tea that my wee practically turned clear which never normally happens because I don’t drink enough. Every time I burp my mouth tastes of Polos and I’m slightly worried to go to bed in case my blood actually turns to peppermint tea and my body bursts and tomorrow morning my housemates find a deflated minty wreck of a corpse where my usual lively – well actually no, I’m practically comatose when I’m asleep anyway – but where my body would normally be happily sleeping and they’ll find me and look at each other and sigh.

And all of this. All of this minty death because I have to talk about sand. My actual mind is now set in a sandy desert – all of my thoughts are set out on camels running across the desert that is my mind. Desert as in full of sand, and also deserted, because all other rational thoughts think “SHIT THIS SAND IS BORING I’M OUTTA HERE” and do a runner but here I am, my physical body, at my laptop at 1.51am, talking about sand. 

Friday 3 February 2012

Eye of a Tornado

There are some days where being awake hurts. The sheer thought of existence causes you so much distress that you wish to sleep more than anything in the world, because sleep is the closest you can get to not existing. The closest to escaping from having to be, to think, to act, to eat, drink…go out. To go to university, to get dressed. To move. The banality of existence is so plain to you that you wish to take no part in it. Communicating with yourself is too much, let alone with others.

Emotions run away from you, your brain substitutes. This is what makes people happy, your brain tells you. This is funny, now you need to laugh. Did you laugh? You weren’t paying attention. The whole thing is just a personal struggle of will, to function. A greyish drone shrouds your thoughts, someone holds your head under water. You don’t struggle.

You could be halfway through making your breakfast and you stop – your batteries have expired. They don’t properly recharge like everyone else’s. You never quite recharge. You wake up and repeat the cycle of telling yourself how to exist. Must walk upstairs, must open shower door, must wash hair, must get out, must dry hair. If you stop for a moment you resign to emptiness, staring blankly at the wall.

You are living in your own head apart from it’s not really you – you is buried somewhere deep inside, locked in a vault miles away from the part of your mind that deals with the practicalities. Eat. Piss. Shower. Sleep. No emotions, the only way of expression a sigh or the odd utterance. The couch becomes host for the shell of your half-dead body as it surrenders to its half-dead existence. Head is silent yet whirring. You drag yourself to bed in the hope that you’ll manage to fall asleep and not exist for a few more hours.

I feel depressed occasionally, but today I woke up and felt the most depressed I’ve felt in two years. The last time I felt like this is somewhat un-documented; I lost months. I can’t remember anything for what I did from November-March, can’t remember if I did anything, said anything. Can’t remember the places I went to, the only thing I remember is the stomach churning feeling I felt one morning as I woke up and had to continue living. In a dream you go into autopilot and float. And here I was, having to live again. The only thing dragging me through the day was the countdown until when it would be time to go to bed and not exist for a bit longer. Being asleep was the only time I didn’t fucking ache.

Existence dominated by lack of existence. It comes and goes. I’ll probably be okay in a couple of days. I need a cuddle.