Near the end of last year, I was under a lot of stress because I had been laid off, my roommate had moved out suddenly leaving me weeks to find a new one, and I had the entire responsibility of finalizing a divorce to handle. I was red-lining on stress, even for me. Curly decided he wanted to do something that would help me manage this stress. Unfortunately, he picked an activity guaranteed to make me grind my teeth – a partnered breathwork session for calming and centering oneself while connecting with a partner. Not how I wanted to connect with people at the time. Racquetball or a kick-boxing lesson would have been a better option. Given my temperament, entering me into a martial arts tournament like Blood Sport would have been closer to what I needed.
So, this outing was far outside my comfort range and every interaction between the two of us before we got there made it worse. Curly had forgotten that we needed to bring food to share, our own blankets and pillows, and he hadn’t gotten directions to the place yet. I try to use my phone to find the place and get told to “put my cute toy away” and let him do it. About then, he realizes that the location wasn’t in the Central District, it was somewhere in West Seattle. Jumping in the car, we try and fly but get jammed up by an eerie traffic snarl started by CSI-type vans investigating something on the railroad tracks. So, I pull out my cute toy phone, look up the number and call the place, asking if we should keep heading their way or reschedule for a different session.
Robyn, a co-facilitator answers the phone. "We'll just fold you in...oh wait, let me ask my transforming partner to see if he confirms my solution," she says. I’m personally glad that eye-rolling is silent. Any hope that I can avoid this evening is now dashed.
When we showed up, Robyn hugged me while asking if it was okay to hug me, right after Tim just finished his hello hug. I often wonder if there is a polite way to say no to that question but I haven’t found it yet and not from a lack of trying. Then I get asked if I want to change into something more comfortable...I’m wearing a t-shirt and jeans which
*is* comfortable. I say as much and then get “folded” into the circle already in progress.
The group is sharing something that was an ecstasy and an agony for us; topics around the circle ranged from fear of failing as a parent to regaining repressed memories of a father. Everyone here is working on “processing” their current “life obstacles”. I don’t want to share personal feelings with total strangers so I mention that I had to stop playing soccer and that I was going back to college. I’m apparently not fit for this commune. Like a television cue, my talk of college draws another another couple to the door over an hour and a half late. They hadn’t called, they made no apologies and they were both Fairhaven students. (the college I’m returning to)
Now we moved on to the actual breathing/hyperventilating work and Curly informs me that I’m going first to “get it out of the way.” I’m close-minded and skeptical but I figured I was already there and should try to make the best of this experience anyhow. As I lay down on the table and started hyperventilating as instructed, the facilitators flipped on the Enya-triphop-birdsong-sampling-hell music and began wandering around the room “laying hands” on prone participants.
It is officially impossible for me to relax at this point as random people keep touching me while my eyes are closed. “You’re in a cocoon, you are safe,” they tell me. To make matters more like a bad sitcom, the guy on the other side of me is sobbing like someone made him kill a puppy with his bare hands and instead of being concerned for him, I’m wondering how he keeps managing to breathe like an old truck with a bad carburetor through it. A table down from him, a woman is screaming “NO” and continually rehearsing the orgasm scene from When Harry Met Sally. Distantly, I hear more moaning. As for me, all I’m feeling is blinding pain heating up in every part of my body that has ever been damaged (most of it) and the need to pee.
Eventually, I throw in the towel and sit up to use the restroom. The facilitators instruct Curly to go with me into the bathroom in case I pass out; he seems surprised when I shut the door in his face.
For the sake of brevity, I won’t share the sights I saw while he was on the table but at least it was interesting. (demon possession, dry humping and more screaming orgasms) Or detail my struggle not to crack up laughing. Eventually, the music stops and so does the breathing.
Finally, I think the night is over and we can leave but not before we gather back together to process our joint experience. The circle shares stories like gaining back repressed memories of dad, transcendental spaces created between the 3rd eye and heart-space only experienced during tantric sex, standing in the fear of not loving your children enough (crying guy),and flying from peak to peak climbed last year in Nepal (possessed dude). Then there is me, with nothing to share but pain and snark. I try to channel my mother who always manages to be polite and use her name like a mantra to help me spin my painful and awkward experience into positive reinforcement for taking time off of soccer.
Near escape velocity now I get interrupted as Tim, one of the facilitators, pulls me aside (literally) to tell me the following, "I know you're still grieving about giving up you athletics. You'll come through that to a calmer space without them" and gives me another unsolicited hug. I manage not to punch him in the nose and leave with a cheery wave.
Suffice to say that the ride home was silent.
