I started writing ablog about all the songs that ever held meaning to me, but it turned into one big, contrived yapfest. So instead, I'm just sharing a song a day. Maybe. If I remember to. Some hold meanings to me, others don't.

Everybody Scream feels like a targeted album. It's about Florence Welch's own experiences, but most of the songs resonate with me and other women on a level that none of us ever expected. At first it shook me to my core. But after a while, I realized that it's because there's no such thing as a uniquie experience, especially for women. Societal standards and expectation, relationships, religion, abuse, self reliance, reflection. We've all felt the same thing at some point. We're all human, after all. Even if these songs tell a certain story about Florence's life, they still tell the story of our lives, as well.

I miscarried about a year and a half before I gave birth to my living daughter. It was so early on in the pregnancy that I didn't even know I was pregnant (I didn't know I was pregnant with my living daughter until I was 3 months in, but that's a story for another time.) So early on that there wasn't much to pass. There was less of her in my underwear than the start of one of my regular periods. So early on that the pee test came back inconclusive and the doctor at the clinic didn't believe me when I told her how bad the pains were, the same pains I later felt when I went into labor with my living daughter.

So early on that I didn't allow myself to grieve because I felt like I didn't have the right to.

Later came the push for certain people to define womanhood and femininity strictly with biological functions, namely concieving and giving birth. A push to discredit the existence of trans women, but also question the womanhood and worth of cisgender women who can't or don't want to get pregnant or live by society's (rightfully) diminishing gender roles. After that, my womanhood was questioned or denied by other women for how my living daughter came into the world. For revealing that I got an epidural. For the fact that I couldn't breastfeed her. For the fact that I'd had a miscarriage previously, and in having one as well as having a child with a birth defect, my genes were weak and I shouldn't have had any children who might "taint the genepool."

You Can Have It All felt like the universe's expressed written permission to grieve, and I did.

I grieved, I screamed, I yelled, I punched my pillow and cursed the women who condemend me first for not having children then condemned me for not having children in the right way because god knows I got enough condemnation from men my entire life for the stupidets little things, so why did I need to hear it from other women?

So yeah, this turned into a yapfest again, but at least it's not a hundred paragraphs long with like 4 videos in between runon sentences.