We all have them. Plural.

I am a woman.

I am a daughter.

I am a sister.

I am an aunt.

I am a public servant.

I am a sexual assault survivor.

In my last post you learned of another one of my identities.

I am bulimic.

When I’m struggling this feels like my only identity. I know it isn’t, but it feels like it. When I’m hurting, my rational brain doesn’t soothe my bleeding heart. Knowing doesn’t take away the feeling. As much as I try.

In college I took a course titled “Us vs Them”. This was probably my first real introduction to identities. Obviously I knew at some level they exist, but I had never put much thought into it. How do they form? When do they matter? Why do they matter? When do they go to the extreme?

I think most would agree they matter a whole lot. Wars have been raged based on identities. Violent wars. Cultural wars. Wars within ourselves.

They seem to be growing in importance or at least that is how I perceive what I’m seeing on the news or on social media. This feels especially relevant today of all days. It is the day after election day. We still do not know who our next President is. Who is going to win? You or me? Democrat or Republican?

Yesterday I felt anger. Your identity made me angry. How are there still so many votes? How are so many people still identifying with him? I’ve been struggling a lot with the bulimia, but yesterday this other identity took over. Political affiliation. Its importance amplified. Suddenly my brother-in-law more of an enemy than the day before. Suddenly my best friend and I felt worlds apart.

It is hard to feel this anger. I hate it in fact. I feel guilty for writing what I did about people I really love. But it is also the truth. The truth about how I felt. There was an anger that I could not shake.

If I really sit with it, the anger, the discomfort, the emotions, I know the feelings are deeper. I think acceptance and our identities go hand in hand. At least I think mine do.

When you vote for him and I vote for the other guy, I feel threatened. It feels like you are disapproving of me, of my way of life. It feels like your vote condones his behavior. All of it, even the stuff we’ve previously agreed on. I go back to living in these extremes. I go back to the us versus them. How are you doing this to me? Don’t you care about me? Your identity is an attack on mine.

Rationally I know your vote was not about me, but it feels like it was. And again. My rational brain does not exactly always win. I can’t speak for everyone, but it seems like a lot of us may be feeling this way.

One of my deepest desires is to be truly and fully accepted. All of me. The good and the bad. When I’m happy and when I’m sad (yes I just rhymed). I’ve never felt accepted and I’m terrified I won’t find it. I’m terrified that I’ll find it and lose it.

If I feel threatened, like you don’t accept me, I wear my identity as a coat of armor. I wear it to cover up the pain. I wear it to protect myself. I find others whose coat of armor matches mine so I can feel part of something. I’d rather be on a side than alone.

With the election, I want my side to win. I do. But what I want more than that is to wake up tomorrow and to remember that political affiliation is just one of my identities. The next time I spend time by the toilet purging my food, I want to remember that being bulimic is not all that I am.

I am lots of things and I am enough. And you are too.

Because on November 4^th in 2020 I could use this song right about now…

Cue ‘You Need to Calm Down’ by Taylor Swift