She Hulk by Katie Pukash

Genre: Slam Time:

When I was a child I only ever wanted to be strong. I wanted to be able to compete with

the boys and when I foot raced them at recess I won every time. They called me ‘She Hulk’

because of my muscular frame and from the way I only ever wore soccer t-shirts and sweat

pants. After that nickname was implanted into my brain like a growing weed, I’ve only ever

wanted to be feminine.

I started wearing skirts and dresses and in middle school they shrieked at the site of my

makeup and done up hair. But that weed inside of my mind only grew, and grew, and grew until

I became a mixed drink cocktail with one part anorexic and two parts lonely, because I thought

that the definition of feminine began with the word frail.

No one ever realizes how greatly words affect us, how a simple nickname can turn a

pretty girl into a skeleton. I stood at five foot two weighing seventy nine pounds, so cold and

frozen, yet I still considered myself a ‘She Hulk.’ You could see my ribcage through my t-shirt

and my spinal cord protruded loudly through my weathered skin, as if somehow my bones were

dirty knives just trying to cut through the flesh of judgment.

As I grew older I became the girl that was never enough. Not good enough to speak

poetry. Not good enough to lay paint on a canvas. Not good enough. Not tall enough. Not big

enough boobs for them. Not primped to perfection. Not undeniably straight. Not smart enough.

Not dumb enough. Not ditsy enough. Not cool enough or fun enough. And I began to believe,

too, that I wasn’t enough.

I never told my mother that I had been in madly in love with a girl. I never told anyone

about the night we first kissed because I was too vulnerable for the judgment. And parents

always justify saying that ‘kids will be kids’ But when we are kids our brains are still growing

and the smallest of seeds that get planted will one day bloom into one giant regret, will one day

affect the choices that we make, will one day influence us about the clothes that we wear, will

one day shape us into the person who we thought we would never be.

I only ever wanted to be strong, and as a child I thought strength was only about being

able to lift a bar stool above your head. I thought that strength was only about being able to beat

the boys in bare foot running races. I was told that strength was something only a man could

have. But as I’ve grown older I’ve realized that strength isn’t about muscle at all, but it’s about

weakness, the ability to overcome the social anxiousness. It’s about carrying around a lifetime of

baggage on your broken back because the ones that kicked you when you were down are going

to be the ones that were ultimately wrong.

I thought that the definition of woman began with the word disappointment. And I

became a mixed drink cocktail with one part freedom and two parts Sailor Jerry because every

girl needs a stiff drink once and awhile.

We are not disappointments. We will never be the ones who gave up on hope. We will

never be the ones who gave up on each other, or god, or our mothers.

We will always be enough; enough for the ones who shunned us enough for the ones that

cursed us enough for the ones the hurt us and destroyed us and beat us when we were covered in

bruises. But you see, bruises fade and the scars of our flesh are only stories things we have

overcame and there are things out there that we will overcome.

When I was a child, I only ever wanted to be strong. I hid my vulnerability. I hid the parts

of me that were true. I never told my mother about my girlfriend because I was afraid she

wouldn’t understand, kind of like all those people who never understood just how much words

affect us.

I can’t say that I can beat the boys at foot races anymore, because, well, I smoke

cigarettes now. And I can’t say that the nickname of my childhood didn’t affect me. But I take

that name now and embrace it. Because I am strong. I am the ‘she hulk’.

I am a mixed drink cocktail with three parts grateful.