People often ask me how I have survived it all. I was born into contrary circumstances and a lineage of family traumas on both sides. But when I look back across the trajectory of my life story, the first thing I reflect on is how beautiful the journey has been. I’ve had so many wild, otherworldly adventures and experiences that I wouldn’t trade for anything. Survival breeds creativity. I can say with certainty that having my daughter and being a mother, writer, and an artist have been the most redemptive parts of my life — the silver linings running through it all. They have saved me so many times. It hasn’t always been easy, but I have faith that these loves will continue to give me reasons to thrive.
Most of my intimate relationships have been challenging: a repeating cycle from generational trauma and subsequent patterning in my youth. I grew up in an environment where I didn’t really feel I had anyone in my corner, so to speak, and I was not allowed to have boundaries; boundaries were seen as an attack or an offense. Because of that I didn’t really know how to express my needs. I blindly accepted a lot of abusive and/or violating behaviors from others. This mostly came in the form of opportunistic people who found they could easily take advantage of me.
Raising my now nineteen-year-old daughter, on my own, since her father left in 2003 has been rewarding and difficult. I’ve been a sole guardian single parent for seventeen years. Throughout those years, I've tried to bootstrap my way to a seemingly unattainable success. It’s not even the rags-to-riches of the blatantly impossible ‘American Dream’ that I’m after — it’s just enough ‘success’ to relieve the constant fear that our house of cards might come tumbling down at any moment. I hit my first wall in 2010 — a complete breakdown of my health. Doctors diagnosed me with fibromyalgia and various neurologic issues. Now, ten years later, I've been diagnosed with and medicated for high blood pressure (I’m only forty-one). Stress can really take a toll on one’s health. Sometimes I feel like I have lived many lives, like a cat, and I question how many feline fates I have left. I hope to live a long, creative, and vibrant life. I want to become a grandmother someday. I’m not responsible for fixing other people or catering to toxicity anymore. I’ve begun to take better care of myself by keeping better boundaries. These days I hold others accountable when they cross the line. I recently started working with a personal trainer, too, to help regain my health. The artist’s statement that Anastasia wrote about this project aligns well with my healing path. Perhaps that’s part of what drew me to it as well.
The first time that I heard about Nothing but Light, my friend Isobel had participated in the project in 2016. They were going through a difficult time when they were photographed and even had a catheter bag attached to their leg during the shoot. I remember seeing the photos and thinking they looked so lovely, soft, brave and tender. It made me think, just momentarily, about joining the project. I’d want to change so many things about my body before participating in something like that, I thought. In the past, when I felt better about my body, I had posed for life drawing classes, boudoir shoots, and more.. In these instances I participated in elective nudity in exchange for money. There’s a different feeling to that, when you’re poor, and when nudity can equal income. It’s been four years since I first saw Isobel’s photos. I hadn’t thought about Nothing but Light for some time when another friend on Facebook reposted a status update from Anastasia requesting more participants for the project.
The past four years have been gnarly. I fought my way through an MFA program while working and raising my incredible, spirited teenager. The whole time I was enduring an abusive relationship (longer than I should have been — as is usually the case). I’ve gained close to fifty pounds, and the stress of the past is written all over my face. I feel much more reserved in my interactions, so I surprised myself when I reached out to Anastasia to volunteer. Anastasia was warm and welcoming. We scheduled the shoot immediately and left it at that. It was almost as if we were scheduling a coffee date. I asked my daughter to take a look at the site and make sure it wouldn’t make her uncomfortable if I participated. She thought it was an incredible project and gave me the go ahead. Everything was looking good, but as the week of the shoot approached, I began to feel all of my traumas resurface.
We didn’t really talk about it, I thought, How many bad situations have I entered into thinking they felt like easy coffee dates, when I should have watched for red flags? I couldn’t help but question if this photo shoot could unfold similarly to the way some of those unhealthy relationships had. After years in therapy with an amazing EMDR specialist, working through feelings that arose in those dynamics: worthlessness, shame and powerlessness, to name a few, I’m finally able to start recognizing this and protecting myself. I sent Anastasia an email explaining what was coming up for me. She said it’s really common — most of the participants feel this way in the week leading up to the shoot — and she reminded me that I was under no obligation and could back out at any time. This helped me relax, and it was sufficient for a few days, but the day before the shoot I was increasingly strained. I hadn’t slept much the night before, so I reached out to Anastasia again to let her know that I was having reservations. I asked if we could reschedule. She wasn’t able to do that because of her timeline and the number of shoots on the calendar, but she offered to call me right then. It was 12:30am.
Since ending my last intimate relationship two years ago, I haven’t been intimate with anyone, I explained to her. Though I am an incredibly sensual person, and my love language is touch, I just haven’t found anyone I feel I can trust. Naturally giving and warm in most of my interactions, I often found the same generosity was not extended back to me, or sometimes it was completely overlooked. Now I make sure there is reciprocity and mutual respect established with any endeavor I embark on, or I simply retreat and offer less of myself. I explained that not only will this be the first time I get naked in front of anyone since that painful relationship ended, but in essence, I’m allowing these raw, honest, and vulnerable images to become available to the general public (for the first time in my entire life) — a far cry from the cocooned, protective state I had been in..
Listening attentively to my concerns, Anastasia was accommodating and understanding. She reassured me that I have full agency in the process. It was clear she had no judgements about my past and fully respected my story. She said many of the participants had backed out last-minute and for this reason she had no attachment to whether or not I showed up the next day. Because Anastasia would accept my decision either way, offering me an unbiased, compassionate container to express my fears, I was reminded that my consent was paramount. This ultimately helped me feel safe enough. My initial interest in the project was reinspired. Not only was it about people being photographed in the nude, it was about two interdependent acts, “respect” and “surrender”.
The next morning I felt mostly like staying in bed, but I got up and made coffee, resolute and determined. After my coffee I stood in front of the mirror gazing at my naked self, something I usually avoid. I felt bloated and sad, longing to reach outside of myself. I looked at my hands first, worn but strong, and thought about all they do, the art they create, the stories they tell, the babies I’ve held, the bodies I’ve soothed, the domestic work, their ability to offer pleasure and warmth. I looked at my olive colored eyes, obviously sleep-deprived, and my hair with its Arab-Luso curls going every which way, my breasts and belly so much rounder than before, my muscly legs, and the broadest shoulders that sometimes make me feel like such a dude, and then I thought about the photos and the light touching all of it. I grabbed a black linen kaftan dress and covered up, ordered an Uber because I was too afraid I’d turn around if I drove my own car, and I went to Anastasia’s studio. She greeted me with good conversation, toast and eggs, and an offer of tea. We talked about the friendship, art, and lush plants in the studio space, and then eventually eased our way into the room where she would photograph me.
Anastasia puttered around watering and fertilizing the plants while I mustered the courage to get undressed. I explained that I felt so strange with all the weight I gained, "I don’t recognize myself." Her reply was in line with something I already knew about myself, she said, “Sometimes we have to put on a layer of protection, to not be so noticable, the body is intelligent, it knows how to protect itself.” My first instinct when naked was to curl up in the huge leather chair with my back to her, and I did, but she said we couldn’t do the shoot if I was going to be in a ball the whole time. We laughed as she threw a blanket over me, saying, “I’ll give you some more time.” When she came back I was ready. We talked about our bodies, mothering, queerness, BDSM, consent, health, community, money, generational traumas in our respective families — the camera went on clicking in between. Unclothed for that long, in a room with another person, felt like a completely new experience for me: I felt wound up and serious, different from the open and receptive feeling one has when naked with a lover, and I worried about how I would handle seeing the photos afterwards, knowing I look nothing like I used to.
When we finished the shoot, Anastasia handed me the camera and told me to look. I sat down in the big leather chair again, this time almost completely oblivious to my nudity. She sat on the floor with her back to one of its arms, not looking at me, but staring off beyond the plants that covered the walls and most of the ceiling. I started scrolling through as I heard her let out a massive sigh. I imagined that single, heaving breath meant that she felt tired and worn from holding so many volumes of stories connected to our bodies, and that she knew this part would be the most difficult for me — it was.
Initially I was afraid that I’d look at the photos and be overwhelmed and bothered by my weight gain, but in the end, that wasn’t what upset me most. Instead it was the pain and exhaustion I could see in almost every photo, the visible effects of stress manifest in my expressions bathed in the eerie silver brightness of the skylight. When I had looked at all of them I told Anastasia, “Wow, I can really only see myself publishing four or five of these, maximum.” She sounded a little concerned, “I’m hoping for ten to fifteen from all of the new participants,” she said, “but I’ll make an exception and work with you in this case, or you could elect to back out and write a statement as to why you don’t want to share them.” We parted with a tired but warm embrace. Anastasia was sure not to hug me across the threshold of the door, “It’s bad luck,” she said as she pulled me back inside to wrap her arms around me before I left.
Ironically, when I returned home I felt nothing but darkness. I closed the blinds and made sure every light was off. I canceled my evening plans and coiled in bed in my black kaftan. Angry and tired, shameful and afraid of everything, I cried and cried and held my whole self there, all alone, until sleep came. For close to twelve hours I was in a deep, dreamless sleep, but I woke in the morning feeling more positive, dimensional, and strangely free. Not only had I faced my own shadow, and witnessed her pain in a new way, but I took on a larger, societal shadow. Today’s society says women must be small, skinny, attractive, smiling, happy, modest in some environments but sexy in others, always perfect, symmetrical, alluring, behaved. These contradicting regulations and stipulations placed on our bodies and attitudes are often correlated with our value and translate to our self-worth (or lack of). When put in this context, the project begins to feel like a radical artistic act of resistance and self acceptance — one of the many ways we can change things. I hope it helps people feel freed from the shackles of shame and objectification.
Anastasia shared the folder with me and I saw something new in the photos. Each time I looked at them in the days that followed, I saw a more whole, prismatic and dynamic human. When I shared the pictures with my daughter, I was further encouraged by her enthusiasm; she liked all of them and even participated briefly in the meeting with Anastasia where we discussed the next phase of the project. In addition to the pain, weight, sadness and exhaustion, I was beginning to see a new self emerging, ready to continue bringing light into the world. Every time I would look at the pictures I’d end up adding another photo to the folder for publishing. That folder only held four photos at first. My favorite photo is the one where I am sitting up tall on the wooden chair, hands on my knees, looking resolutely at the camera. I think I look like a fucking queen in that one, or like an empress or a priestess, full of abundant love and power and owning it all, and I never thought I would feel that way about my body in its current state. Thank you, Anastasia, for Nothing but Light.
Note: I'm mostly a poet and normally write with more space between my words, but this process felt complex and involved, and somehow it warranted a detailed exploration. Thank you to those of you who read to the end. Thanks for seeing and witnessing me in this tender, raw, and consensual space. I hope on some level you feel more empowered and liberated. I sure do.