Each morning, I get-up and take my asthma medication, a quick puff, a rinse of the mouth and I am good to go. Fit as a fiddle. Strong as an Ox. Healthy as a horse…

My fit, healthy self, went to fill-out some insurance paperwork, and as I read their definitions of “excellent health”, I saw I didn’t qualify. With asthma, a chronic condition, the best I can be, according to the insurance company, is in “good health.”

But wait wait wait a second there…I am a woman who takes care of my body. I work-out, I diet, I take my vitamins and drink my water and get a check-up at least once a year. I am young, vibrant, active. In my mind, I am in “excellent health.” How could you, insurance company, who doesn’t even know me, say otherwise? Wait wait wait, why am I, Alana, so damn upset about this?

The thing is, this body is my ultimate tool to prove who I am. Because it is always with me, its what I focus on the most. I bathe it, I dress it, I pierce and decorate it. Choices as seemingly small as not shaving my legs, or letting my feet get calloused are choices that prove WHO I AM (an independent hairy woman not confined by male-centric beauty trends, or a woman tough enough to wear no shoes even on rocky ground). I CONTROL MY BODY, I need to be in control of my body, BECAUSE BEING IN CONTROL OF MY BODY MEANS I AM IN CONTROL OF MY LIFE.

But as much as I love to play make believe, to dress-up this body and peacock it around, the truth is I am not in ‘excellent health’. I have asthma, without medication I can’t even control my breathing. I have had stomach problems since I was a kid and there I times I can’t control the need to run to the bathroom. I get kidney stones and the pain is so severe I can’t control the shaking and crying. I have a hip injury, terrible teeth, I wear glasses, have a vitamin D deficiency, eczema…

My minds uses the fact that my body is ‘always there’, changes ever so slowly from one day to the next, to convince myself that the body is the answer to my preservation dilemma; with proper care and feeding I can preserve it and it can in turn preserve myself. But for all my effort, this body keeps breaking down. If I can’t even control this sack of skin, how can it prove I am an ‘in control kinda gal’?