Skeleton Woman on the Seabed

I have spent 2 years on the floor of the ocean. I have bled excessively during this time like I am releasing a lifetime of pent-up emotions. From years of “masking”, bracing myself, being stubborn, headstrong, over-functioning and pushing through to meet the demands of others; partners, children, people in need, friends and family instead of myself I have got seriously out of balance. I did not listen to my body. I did not honour my body enough. I did honour her somewhat but not nearly as much as I should have. This is something I am paying for now. I abandoned myself instead of having the courage to be myself and free myself from the shackles of others' expectations, instead of being unapologetic about my chosen life path and choices.

Examples include; fighting with partners and wasting precious energy giving them a defensive manifesto as to why they needed to give me space instead of just calmly and firmly setting my boundary and taking my space regardless of their issues with it, taking on a project or a job and then not taking a day or two off for myself around my moontime, being accommodating when I wanted to be alone, ranting with other women about my PMT and refuelling the anger instead of taking my power in all areas of my life – (though offloading with other women was a very helpful release, I must admit), drinking wine to deal with PMT (definitely not a good idea), not cancelling a dinner date or social event when I was bleeding and wanted to cancel etc etc. 

The only ones over the years who honoured me were my children because I taught them to. I explained to them that “mummy needs some space now because mummy has her period” and they were sweet little stars. I am encouraging my son to be sensitive to the needs of a woman during her moontime and I am encouraging my daughter to honour her body and herself during her moontime. I just wish I could have done it more for myself as this would be the best education for my daughter. This education is sorely lacking from our culture. An excellent book on the stages of a woman’s cycle can be found here https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25569078-moon-time and a good article on the woman’s cycle can be found here https://risingwoman.com/4-archetypes-of-the-female-cycle/ 

So what is it like on the floor of the ocean? I got this analogy from listening to an excellent podcast on the Sacred Womb series of talks here https://www.thesacredwomb.com/how-to-manifest-with-the-menstrual-cycle-2-resting/ 

The bleeding cycle is Winter, the Crone. It is like meeting Hekate. If you think of our menstrual cycle as waves, the wave has to reach the bottom of the ocean to gain the momentum to rise back up again, as we must with our menstrual cycle. From this place we are rejuvenated, replenished and ready for the new (Sacred Womb podcast). Except that I got stuck on the floor of the ocean bleeding oceans of blood and not rising again. During this time I became Skeleton Woman again as I had in my twenties during my breakdown. Except in my twenties I lost my bleeding time altogether. Perhaps I was bleeding out those lost two years now.

Skeleton Woman is based on an old Inuit love story retold by Clarissa Pinkola Estes in her wonderful book (my bible) Women Who Run with the Wolves (Contacting the Power of the Wild Woman). Listen to it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sfz5y5rMQcI My descent to the floor of the ocean coincided with meeting my life partner. We had an instant connection and a deep yet turbulent chemistry in part due to us both being burnt out and a bit broken by life. In many ways he was the fisherman and I was Skeleton Woman on the seabed. So many synchronistic and unusual phenomena occurred which was beautiful and yet it was also a dark and difficult time mostly due to the circumstances of our lives and our traumas colliding. Out of this though we managed to alchemise our creativity and a new project was born. Either way I as I descended to the floor of the ocean my brave fisherman managed to haul me out and give me new life as I also did for him, I hope. This is a beautiful piece of writing on the power of a man giving his whole heart and how it be transformative for both a man and a woman here https://www.bedlamfarm.com/2015/07/14/the-story-of-skeleton-woman-when-a-man-gives-his-whole-heart/ 

And here how the soul is ready for love but the man might run and put up defences https://foxrivermamas.com/2015/06/29/when-the-soul-is-ready-skeleton-woman-and-the-fisherman/ 

Transforming scars https://artoftransformingscars.wordpress.com/2018/09/17/skeleton-woman-as-told-by-clarissa-pinkola-estes/ 

Here is a beautiful piece of music and spoken word by Daniel Lanois on the theme of the fisherman and the sea https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOXVL1INq28 

Here is a song by Mark Lanegan called The Floor of the Ocean from his album Phantom Radio  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BkMifNY3pY 

Moon in Your Mouth by Goldfrapp https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFCqp6I2lcs