Hagitude and Latitude

In one of my many old lives, I did some campaigning for the NHS. It started off by accident (which is how I do most things) attempting to save my local GP surgery from closure. I ended up trying to save the world. I stopped when I realised that saving everyone else meant losing myself.

En route I did a lot of things that terrified me. I did television and radio interviews, stood on stages, confronted angry men (always angry men) and found confidence through my rage. Liars were getting to hog centre stage and that was unfair. It is still unfair. So I stood up and did a lot of shouting.

I learned some valuable things about myself but I did it in a way that was also quite harmful. I learned that if I wanted to sustain something long term, it would be better not to do it at a thousand miles an hour in the white, hot heat of fury. The fury was rocket fuel to me, but it also burned me quite badly and left horrible, enduring scars.

Part of the reason for using it then was that I had a lot of rage to go around. As someone who it later transpired, had a unique and peculiarly damaging form of PMDD, I carried some hefty lakes of incandescent anger that had to go somewhere. It was far better that it went towards legitimate targets than my poor, blameless family. When I went through menopause and became a husk of a hag, most of that excess rage drained away.

Not riding the choppy waters of lake fury 24/7 has meant I have had time to reflect on how I would like to proceed in the world in future. I can still summon up a good head of steam when required, but it is something in my control now, rather than controlling me. Over the years since my surgery, I have had to learn myself again, navigating what’s left of the old me and figuring out how to shape the new me to suit myself.

Suiting myself is a new thing. It arrived with menopause and has been one of the most difficult but rewarding things to learn. Hagitude has been a time of gathering the pieces of myself in, rather than sharing the pieces of myself out. It feels very much like coming back to my core self. I have always loved this quotation from Beloved by Toni Morrison.

‘She is a friend of my mind. She gather me, man. The pieces I am, she gather them and give them back to me in all the right order.’

I used to think I would like to meet someone who gave me that feeling, but now I realise the value of gifting it to myself.

I have less time for other people now. I still have friends and family I love to see. I still have a thriving social life. It isn’t about slamming the door in people’s faces (although some days that is a blessed dream). It’s more about listening to myself and retreating when I would previously have surged forward. It’s acknowledging that I need quiet space and time to think, where in the past I would have done all that on the go. Some days I don’t ‘go’ anywhere and that’s good. Those are the days I go into myself and move the mental furniture about a bit, see if things need dusting and chuck out that hideous lamp that someone gave me that I have always hated.

There are different things that motivate me now. I’m still never going to go quietly into that good night. It isn’t in my nature, but I am working on changing my motivation. Rather than fueling myself with rage, I’m allowing myself to become curious about what’s possible. I’m allowing myself to become interested and playful. I’m thinking about whether what I’m doing will refuel me rather than burning me out. After all, I’m a husk now. One of the risks of hagitude is that it’s quite flammable.

I try, these days, for more balance. I know that if I spend a day with my friends I will need time the next day for quiet regrouping. I know that if I am trying to do something new that scares me, I will do better if I approach it in short bursts and take time between those to fill the gaps that work has taken out of me. I am beginning to notice the signs when I push myself too far and begin to tilt over into unhealthy practices. I can feel my brain ratcheting up a notch or two and my mind racing. Sometimes, particularly when there is something awful that has to be endured, or a deadline to meet, this can be good, but there is always a price to pay afterwards. Mostly I’d rather duck that bill and find a way to slow myself down and re-centre.

It doesn’t always work. Life is a lot and circumstances and human error play their part in tripping me up. I have moments of frustration and despair when I realise that I’ve tipped over the edge again. I just pick up and start over. It’s better than the alternative.

Yesterday, my old world and my new world met on the pontoon outside the boat. I got a message from a friend I made while I was campaigning. She’s a radio producer and was a real help to me during that time. She asked me if I would do a radio interview about life on the boat, so I did. Speaking to her in my ‘radio’ voice led me back to thinking about that life, what I’ve left behind and what I’ve taken forward.

I did the interview on the pontoon because just before it started, a man from the boat company arrived to balance the boat. When you buy a boat it sits in the water beautifully when it’s empty, but as you fill it, depending on what you put where and how much stuff you have, it begins to list to one side or the other. Once you’re settled and you decide not to put that grand piano in after all, you call the boat builder and a nice man drives a giant van full of weights down to the marina for you. He comes along, strokes his chin and makes humming noises for a bit, then staggers backwards and forwards to the van, chucking bits of metal into the engine bay and shovelling them round until he’s satisfied that you’re all trim again.

It seemed like a good metaphor to me.