Massaging scars

Marks on the landscape of my body.

We talked about scars, last Friday, in my writers’ group. Physical scars and emotional scars. Our seen and unseen proof of living.

Afterwards, I did an audit of my physical scars, marks that make up the topography of my body. Belly button aside, the oldest one I have is a tiny chickenpox crater, just on the curve of the bone under my eye. It’s always been there, one of the first distinctive things I noticed about myself.

There is a curved white line at the base of my right thumb. This was always the perfect scar for getting out in a pub show-and-tell, when we took turns around the table to share tales of dramatic incidents from our past. The story behind this scar was never the most gory, I wasn’t even hospitalised for goodness sake, because there was always someone who had split open their chin in a playground or broken a bone that had poked through their skin. Stories like this made my legs feel fizzy. Being on my hand, my scar was in a location that caused no embarrassment to reveal, and I thought it made an unusual story, because I got it from a gun. Not a bullet–thankfully–but the actual gun.

The scar is no bigger than the impression of a finger nail, and I got it by trapping my hand in an air rifle on a PGL activity school trip. I’m sure there is proper gun-terminology for what I’m about to describe, but I’m going to assume that’s not why you’re here. The aim of the activity was to shoot at paper targets, and between shots we had to break (cock?) the gun open, load a fiddly lead pellet (don’t put them in your mouth), then snap the gun shut again. It was surprisingly heavy and stiff, and the instructor warned us to watch our fingers when we snapped it back together. I must have been watching my fingers too carefully, and in doing so managed to cackhandedly trap the stretchy skin between my thumb and forefinger into the hinge. It hurt like fuck, but I felt silly and didn’t want to make a fuss, so I just tried not to cry while I watched the weight of the gun pull on this tiny piece of skin. Powerless to open the gun again with only one free hand, I waited politely for an instructor to come and release me, which he eventually did.

There are other inconsequential scars on my skin; bicycle scrapes, mosquito bites, and a more recent addition, the classic cook’s burn on my inner wrist, raised and still pinkish, where it kissed the scalding oven shelf. Of course these are mere fripperies in comparison to  my liver transplant scar. They call it a Mercedes Benz incision because it runs vertically from my sternum to my navel, then horizontally out in both directions to each hip. Covering my entire abdomen, it’s less pub friendly, although I am proud of it. It’s like my own personal Kintsugi, a break so significant that it shattered my whole centre, yet, wondrously, here I am. I do like showing it to people who I think will appreciate it. I always ask if they are squeamish, first.

My friend Jenny, a holistic therapist with the most beautiful soul, showed me how to massage my scar to improve the blood flow, healing and mobility of the tissue. She made a balm for me using essential oils, I would apply it to the cut in small, gentle movements, little circles of love spiralling across my abdomen. I could feel one line of stitching in the skin, sliding over another deeper line, in the muscle below. I had to time this massage right: obviously I didn’t want to do it while the wound was still raw, but if you leave it too long to touch your scar, the tissue can become stuck, restrictive and painful. It can go numb.

Surviving and transforming through my transplant has given me courage, and lately, I have been massaging some of my old emotional scars. I created a version of events about a relationship I had in my twenties which kept the scar numb for decades, but recently, it has become restrictive and painful. Twenty five years on, I now recognise this relationship was abusive, and the injuries that were inflicted on me at that time have left many unseen marks. It hurts to do this, it makes me squeamish to poke around in old wounds, facing up to the mistakes I made, and raging at the injustice of everything I gave and lost. Writing is part of the poking, and makes the scar feel a little bit softer, a little bit looser.

Behind every scar is an experience, some forgettable, others seared into our souls. Healing comes from integration, fusing our before and after selves back together with tenderness and acceptance, so we can celebrate our survival.