Hello, it’s me.
Do you truly recognize the face staring back at you in your reflection? Because I don’t. The person looking back at me now is more of an enigma, a complete stranger whose story I can’t quite unravel. I don’t get her at all. She’s shut down every part of herself that once mattered, locking away the pieces that made her whole. The shell of a human that stands before me is an anxiety-riddled, sleep-deprived, perimenopausal hermit who can’t seem to quite get her shit together no matter how hard she tries. It might not seem that way on the surface—I have pulled off quite the convincing hoax—but underneath it all, the cracks are deep and real.
The loss of myself is what I cannot comprehend or reckon with. At what point did I lose her? and more importantly, where did she go? I have had countless doctor appointments and have spent a small fortune chasing her, chasing Mandy. After many rounds of trial and error I feel that perhaps there are unwanted bits of me that are losing their stranglehold and allowing her to seep in. Like a ghost, she haunts me, only coming close enough to whisper, “let me in.”
Society places expectations on women, on mothers, to abandon who they were before marriage, before the kids. We give up our surnames, our autonomy and our dreams turn into memories as we assimilate. We barter for our survival and slowly become the proverbial ball and chain. The catch is caught and bolted to the wall, their trophy to gaze upon. The pursuit is over, the deal signed and maximum effort abated. Then what? Drown ourselves in wine, coffee and reality TV? Or, hear me out, stop the goddamn merry-go-round. Stand on your business and find a way to crawl back to yourself. We can have what we need and hold on to a piece of ourselves. Anyone that says otherwise is only buying into what the patriarchy has sold us, a sham bill of goods. We have been handcuffed to this rotting corpse of a lie for too long.
My hope is that I can find a way to be mostly Amanda and sometimes Mandy. A conglomeration of both parts of me, the bookworm and the bitch. The mama and the milf. A real life embodiment of June Moone and her alter ego, the Enchantress. Holding hands with myself, my dark and my wild, allowing my shadows to linger long after I walk out of the room.
Inspiring and terrifying all at once.
