Touch Me

Engaging with my sensuality as a disabled person is...self-love, celebration, resistance.

Kelsey looking at the camera with two arms framing her face. A shot from above of Kelsey’s bare back with legs in butterfly in a seated forward fold.

Touch me with strong, tired hands 
Wring out the hours in my hair
With a salty upper lip
Down me like sweet tea on a hot summer day
Condensate on the surface of my skin
And leave easy dew drops like pieces of you 

Touch me delicately
But know that I won’t break
Wake me with whispers
Sprinkle sugar crystals to rest on my pores like proof that you were here
And I will survive by the sweetness you leave behind

Touch me with intent
With a knowing
Touch me without fear or doubt
Touch me as if I feel every single thing
Watch me breathe, just like you, and know that I do
Feel
Everything
Touch me as if you wake every neuron
Fire every synapse

Touch me with longing, eager hands that yearn for me 
Touch me like wildfire 
Consume me
You can have these trees
Feast on the creatures that live here
And leave your glowing embers behind 

---

Engaging with my sensuality as a disabled person is a way for me to acknowledge my embodied existence. It is an act of self-love, of celebration. It is a form of resistance. Resistance against ableism. Resistance against harmful narratives and stereotypes. Resistance against judgement. Resistance against the assumptions that people with disabilities live disembodied or desexualized lives. Our bodies belong to us. Our bodies are worthy, sexy, and enough.

Sensualizing (pretty sure I made that word up) my Self, my daily life, even my care routine, is a big huge YES to my beautiful, wild, dynamic disabled existence.

Many of us crave a more embodied experience. And we deserve that. But sometimes our bodies can feel far away. I lost a lot of my sensuality and sexuality for a long time. I didn’t move as much, I couldn’t find as much pleasure in my body, I didn’t delight in my senses and my body as much as I had used to. I didn’t know how! But I found my way back, bit by bit, and that connection keeps deepening the more I explore practices of self-love, sensuality, movement, breathwork, and embodied living. And all of this brought me back to myself as a sexual being. 

After trauma or profound change, our bodies can feel far away. Being marginalized can make us feel disconnected from our bodies, because we’re told that they’re not enough, they’re wrong, or they don’t belong. And when our bodies feel distant, our sexuality can feel lost. Maybe we’re scared of our bodies, scared of what’s inside of us, scared of what we might release. Maybe it hurts. Maybe we feel like we don’t know or understand our body. Maybe we feel lost and hopeless. Maybe we don’t have a partner, maybe we aren’t ready to. All of this is valid.

But maybe, just maybe, we still feel pulled to explore, despite the fear. We still want to feel more. And there’s something there worth peeling back, gently and with mindfulness and compassion.

Because it is always within us, if we want to uncover it—our ability to feel pleasure—whatever that is to us.

This is the beginning of self-love. Committing to the practice of loving our selves actively. Finding ways to engage with our sensual selves within our daily lives. We can find sensuality everywhere. Finding ways to MOVE that feel good. Our human existence gives us so many senses to explore the delicious sensuousness of life.

It’s absolutely incredible.

It’s a gift.

And it is limitless.

Sensual and sexual are not the same thing. Sure, they’re close friends, and they complement each other quite well…but sensuality can exist without being sexual. I hope that makes it less daunting to ease into the whole embodied experience, and to enjoy it, without the pressure or necessity of sex or being sexual, especially if that’s scary or intimidating or just not where you’re at. 

Relax. And just enjoy yourself. Ask your body to dance, like a cute little awkward teenager, and just go for a little spin on the dance floor. NBD. 

Maybe that’s just a nice hot bath with a blissful or sexy or chill playlist—pick your flavor.

Maybe you just pick out a piece of fruit you normally wouldn’t next time you’re at the store, and you go home and eat it slowly, mindfully. Taste the juiciness, bask in the flavors, close your eyes, breathe it in deeply.

Or maybe it’s going for a walk in nature and just observing your world. Take it all in…

And if you’re feeling frisky, remember, self-pleasure is self-care (thank you Liberal Jane) 

I mean, it is Spring…Just sayin.

;)

KP

P.S. New Moon Alert!

The next New Moon is on Tuesday May 7th! We’ll be setting intentions, embracing our sensual selves & moving and celebrating together at Care Collective’s New Moon Liberation & Love Movement Meditation Class. To access this and other resources to deepen your connection to yourself (like our monthly healing guide) update your membership.

Wanna go even deeper? Reach out to me about a 1:1 coaching