Her Right to Choose
Written by Alecs Kakon
Photos by Jen Fellegi
Choices. The notion that we all have choices. A hard concept for me to wrangle. So here I am thinking about choices and whether we really do, in fact, have control over how we feel and think—some sort of governance over our behaviour and thoughts—or whether we are, by and large, products of our upbringing, our experiences, and of course, our biological makeup. I hear people talk about how they choose to be happy, choose to be positive, choose to see the good, and while all of that sounds lovely, I don’t know that I have that kind of control over my emotions. Sitting down with Carly, I learned that although our life experiences might point us in one direction, it is ultimately the way we choose to perceive the events we live, how we process them and choose to repurpose them that walks us down our path. Some stories define us, if we let them. That’s one resolute fact I have come to terms with. So I guess choice does have a vital role in the way we interact with the world. It might just be word play, but I always thought it was more perspective than choice that released moments of their power. Jury’s still out on that one.
Growing up in a home that had as much light as it did darkness, Carly described a childhood filled with creativity and adventure. Her mother fostered curiosity, and independence, and challenged her and her sisters to express their passions with an unwavering pursuit for higher intellect. “If we were interested in something, my mom would encourage it through books and adventures,” Carly explained. “She challenged us to go deep with our curiosity so that we could eventually learn and do on our own.” With unconditional love and support, Carly became self-reliant early on in life and has grown up to be a successful lawyer, mom of two, and committed partner to her husband. So many poignantly impactful moments in her life, the overarching sense, in retrospect, is that there was much strength to be drawn from her upbringing.
The ominous side of the coin presented many instances of trauma, life finds balance that way, I guess. In the shape of illness and eventually the passing of her father, Carly learned how to deal with loss at the young age of 18. As the conversation went on, multiple episodes of sexual misconduct and workplace harassment were brought up. “It’s a blurry line because so much happened back then that was acceptable in those times,” she explains. “I was a ‘cool’ girl, and cool girls don’t make a scene if bad stuff happens. You just accept it and never do anything about it.” Never quite internalizing the traumas, Carly emphasized that she chose to move on rather than to attach pain to the events. It’s a curious superpower to be able to let the trace of trauma slide off so as to come out without a hitch, but the more we spoke, the more Carly explained that the anger and sadness were in fact there, but she has since chosen to shed the darkness. Meeting her husband, having children, and now, in light of the #MeToo movement, Carly’s positive outlook is hinged on significant moments that have transformed her and helped her use the source of the pain to create meaning and social change.
The blurry line between what was then considered “appropriate” behaviour is now under scrutiny; boundaries are being redefined and a new culture is being created. Protecting our bodies and understanding what feels comfortable versus what is criminal is still up for debate, but safeguarding our bodies against violence is a tool we are more mindful to impart as parents in today’s age. Once we can unpack everything that goes into gender politics, maybe then we can move toward dismantling the imbalance of sexual pleasure. Yes, I said pleasure. Recalling a moment in her summer camp days, Carly remembers a talk given by a doctor after an incident occurred between two young kids in her section: “It was something bad and non-consensual, and this doctor came in to explain it to us and he basically said that ‘girls need a reason and boys need a place’.” The message was that boys have sex for pleasure and do it whenever they possibly can, while girls have sex to feel accepted and loved; girls should protect their sex and not just hand it out. It’s hard for us today to think back at how that was a common sentiment and a normal way to teach kids about sex and pleasure. And for Carly, a woman who even at a young age prioritized her pleasure despite the social ramifications, this normal pill was even harder to swallow. The fact that girls are taught all of the negative aspects and potential dangers of sex is what perpetuates the power imbalance. “There is a reckoning, and after the reckoning, after the sexual violence and trauma has been dealt with, we need proper sex education so women can derive pleasure from sex.” Placing the accent on social injustice and sexual power imbalance, Carly’s insight into her bodily violations were understood as “the way things were”; choosing to move on, her body was absolved of the traces, but her mind continued to carry its weight as she fights the good fight and chooses to be a part of the change that will revolutionize the way women interact with sex and with their bodies.
It’s a state of mind really, to choose to embrace life. “I guess it could’ve gone either way when you go through so many bad things in your life. You can choose to embrace life or be terrified of it,” Carly says. “It could all be gone tomorrow, that invigorates me.” Taking the bad, allowing it to shift something inside of you, and then choosing to let it go… I don’t know that I’m capable. I know that I have chosen to forgive, I’ve chosen to let go of the anger, and I know I want to move on, but I don’t know that I have that kind of control over my body to simply choose happiness. For Carly it is about choice: this conscious decision to let the light brighten the darkness; to find meaning and project it. Genuine moments of happiness are not to be overlooked, and when you have all to be grateful for, it would be a sad to choose to live in the past. That’s how you can choose to look at it… perspective.
