For Those In The Back... You Are Not Bad For Feeling or Finding Your Sexuality.

To everyone sitting in the back ready to judge away. Go. Give it your best shot. Please.

Since I was little, I have been raised to be “good.” What is good though. According to one culture it can be XYZ. To another LMN. There are so many different books of religion giving you the definition of what “good” is. Everyone tries to live up to this good quality. Whatever they define that is.

I grew up in the church. Where everyone is taught save yourself for marriage. Anything outside of a marriage is a sin. Anything sexual is a sin.

I hit puberty in the summer going into 4th grade. I had just moved to Texas from California. I was desperate to have friends. The first place I found some were at a church. Cool. No big deal. What I quickly realized was I was not like many of the girls my age. I thought differently than they did, and I started to look different than they did too. My thoughts were a little older.

I had a crush on one of the boys. Not a big deal. Fourth graders have crushes all the time. I was told by his father, a leader of the church, that he “did not want anyone like me near his son.” We were at a church event. I do not remember what I felt specifically, but I remember thinking something was wrong with me. What was I? Why was I so bad? Why was I so frowned upon. I was not the most loved and favored in the church setting. I was loud. I was a female and I made friends with older people… aka boys.

As an adult now, yes, I see how that can look. But as a child I did not. I had people whispering behind my back and wondering if I was XYZ… It hurt. But I did not know how to deal with adults talking about me, kids talking about me. So, I went with the flow. I allowed whatever anyone said about me to become me. I became that girl that would screw up her life. I became that girl who would get pregnant. I believed everything. Losing any sense of identity I had.

Mid junior high rolled around I was known as the school slut although I never had really done anything yet. I was being molested. Everyone at church thought I purposefully wore pants with a big hole on my ass to get attention. (They ripped when I was playing volleyball with my dad). No one came up and told me. So, I became the girl who showed her ass all the time.

I was told going into 8th grade by someone who should have been a spiritual mentor that at 16 I would get pregnant. 18 married. 21 divorced. 25 I would die. Those words pierced me more than anything. I still fight those words in my head.

At 16 I felt relief knowing that I wasn’t pregnant. I proved him wrong. But I got pregnant at 20. Of course, this came with shame. People looked down on me. I was told I ruined my life. On several occasions. Even after my divorce I had someone come up to me and just say “I just had so much hope and potential for you… but you are just this.” What is “this.”

Those words were said to me this past June. On one of the hardest days of my summer.

My entire life I have been sitting here trying to prove words wrong that were said to me. I have believed I am a disgrace. I have believed I am not worthy of anybody. I battle the thoughts “everyone has left me in some form or fashion.”

Words are powerful. It is amazing how words spoken to you as a child linger in your mind over 20 years later.

This summer I did something to try and heal myself. I did a boudoir photo shoot. Not for anyone. Just for me. I wanted to do something that made me feel beautiful and have control over something sensual since I have a lot of sexual traumas. But I have been hiding everything in fear for the backlash of what people will say.

This is what I have to say. For the people in the back, for the woman wanting to lose some weight… just do a damn boudoir shoot. It is the best feeling ever. You are not a bad person for doing them!!!

I have been told I am beautiful by men on so many occasions, but they are always trying to get something or end up saying “you are the most beautiful person I have ever seen… but I am going to choose someone else”. So, I really never appreciate that word anymore. But when I saw the raw images the day of my shoot. I felt beautiful. I did not recognize the woman that was behind the camera.

In one outfit I had on, my insecurities started creeping in. Although I am tiny now, I have had 2 kids and was once 185 pounds. I have an umbilical hernia from the pregnancies that I am super self-conscious about. I am a woman who has grown two bodies inside hers. My body is not perfecto anymore.

In the outfit I was sitting down, and my first thought was I do not want my stomach to show… but then I thought to myself absolutely not. Show that beautiful skin of yours and those were some of my favorite photos of mine.

No one is ever comfortable in their own skin. We all have insecurities. We all have demons we battle from childhood into adulthood.

So yes, I will show some of these photos (some I can not due to my profession). Not to be like “OOOOOO look at me,” but to encourage others to love every part of you. We all struggle with it. We all struggle with things from our past.

As an adult, I am having to tell myself I am not a bad woman for taking these photos. I am not a disgrace to mankind because I chose to take beautiful pictures of myself. I needed to find my own sensuality without a man defining it for me. It is crazy how hard it is to change the way we think and the battles that we encounter mentally all due to comments that were made at you as a child/ and or acted upon you from childhood through adulthood.

The beautiful thing about this battle is that every day you tell yourself you are good… you win that battle. You win the war inside your mind.

If this is a blob of confusion and mess. sorry. If this makes any sense… cool. If not… I curtsy in awkwardness as I look crazier than I already did.

Just keep fighting the battles every day. And ladies go get a boudoir photo shoot! FOR YOURSELF!

Peace out from the perfectly imperfect queen.

Photo's taken by SHINEON BOUDIOR