Dancing Eyes
No matter how loudly I blast Lizzo in the morning or how many body positivity campaigns I share on my social media, I don’t always love myself- who I am or what I look like. There are days that I can’t help but criticise myself in the mirror and there are days that I can’t bear to look in the mirror at all.
The funny thing is, we don’t change that much from day to day so what is it that makes me “fat” one day and “slim” the next? It’s all in my head and sometimes, no matter how many times I remind myself, that voice is always there. No matter how hard we try, we will have “bad” days and days that you struggle to remember to be kind to yourself. We underestimate how difficult it is to do.
We all have issues with our appearance and it’s something I have touched on in a previous post. I have always felt self-conscious and a little out of place at the best of times particularly through my awkward stages and fashion choices. Eventually we all grow out of it — learning the hard way that some things are just not meant to be — RIP to my fringe which I got once, realised I hated it and five years later I got AGAIN! Talk about tragic. Some of our insecurities are a permanent feature in our lives. They aren’t the ones we laugh about years later when we know better. Or at least I haven’t been able to yet.
I was born with a condition called Nystagmus, otherwise known as “dancing eyes”. In terms of my health, it’s no big deal and barely affects my day to day life. It basically means that my eyes move back and forth without me controlling them or even being aware that it is happening. In my case, it mildly affects my eyesight and I often have to hold my head at a specific angle in order to focus. Doesn’t sound like a major hindrance on my life, right? You would be right. The majority of the time, I forget I even have it. The people around me are so used to it that they hardly even notice it anymore.
Nystagmus is relatively common, affecting 1 in 1000 people at various levels of intensity. I should consider myself pretty lucky, I have a very mild case and many people are often far more affected than I.
Nonetheless, ever since my childhood it has always been in the back of my mind. I have definitely learned to adapt to it over the years as anyone would. It used to be really obvious in photographs, I could never stare straight at the camera because it was pretty painful for instance. As you can imagine, class pictures were fun. I used to get in trouble in class for “not paying attention” since my head was always turned to the side. For a goody-goody like myself, it was frustrating because I genuinely couldn’t help it. I have always got embarrassed when people have brought it up, it’s a reaction that I can’t seem to shake. Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather people asked. The majority of people are just curious which I can’t say I blame them for. That being said, not everyone has been like that. I have had a lot of people ( from teachers and students) making fun of me over the years, telling me that it actually unsettled them and once someone even begged me to stop since it “freaked them out” so much. Whoops. My bad.
My Nystagmus tends to flair up when I am feeling a wide range of generally negative emotions: anything from anxiety, tiredness, hunger, illness- you name it-makes my “dancing eyes” that more obvious to everyone around me. It was particularly prevalent in my first few years of high school and then again when I came to university- otherwise known as the times that I was at my most awkward and vulnerable. As I said, most of the time I don’t even think about it but I think that’s because I have adopted some really bad habits. I tend to not look anyone directly in the eye when I am talking to them, preferring to look at my hands or around the room instead. It’s nothing personal, there is just less chance you will notice if I do. I think that’s why I always insisted on a horrendous fringe and would never tuck my hair behind my ears as a child ( even though it was really long and frequently got in my face) because I didn’t want anyone to see them.
In the bigger picture of everyone’s insecurities, it seems pathetic to obsess over such a miniscule thing. That’s what insecurities really are though. They are things that we criticise ourselves for, tear ourselves apart over and for what? Nobody else cares. Let’s be honest, they are probably focusing on their own insecurities that you don’t care about.
I did remind you all that we all have bad days where all we can see are giant flashing lights pointing out our every insecurity. I know it’s going to be a long process to finally embrace my “dancing eyes” but I will. Besides, considering what I want to do for a living, I kind of have to.
From a young age, my mum always encouraged me into public speaking. You’d have to ask her but I think it is a major motivation why she did since she never wanted my Nystagmus to hold me back or question that I could do anything I wanted. Turns out I love it. So, one day when I get up there- it won’t just be for me but my mum too. Besides, I like the poetry of a broadcaster that can’t look at the camera.
