Background.

My dad was diagnosed with esophageal cancer the day that I passed my first checkride at a major airline. By the time I finished OE, six weeks later (during which I was incessantly sexually harassed, but didn’t have the time or energy to report it), my dad had died. He left behind myself and my two sisters, a granddaughter, and my mother, his wife of over 40 years.

Don’t worry. This will be a positive story, but not without a few twists and turns - as life usually goes. 

It was after I had used my four allotted days of paid bereavement (but while the ‘DEATH IN FAMILY’ code was still staring me in the face on my schedule) that I learned my dad wasn’t exactly the person I thought he was. I never knew of his girlfriend or her name, in fact. I was told by management that I could take as much time as I needed away from work, but I had just come off of training pay and couldn’t afford it.

I continued working that year, with the steadfast support of my mentors and close friends. In hindsight, I did so rather gracefully. But as the ‘year of firsts’ neared its end, my dad’s birthday, the holidays, the anniversary of his death, and a difficult breakup all landed in close succession and my coping mechanisms were less than ideal for a while there. I imagine that’s a reality for many who have befriended grief. That said, I was never incapable of showing up to work with a smile on my face. In fact, flying was a beautiful teacher for compartmentalizing and putting one foot in front of the other. A fellow pilot advised me so succinctly,

“Recage. Remember that nothing is happening to you. It is just happening.”

I held on tightly to that mindset. At no point did I feel I required a diagnosis, although there were naturally very dark days. So the current support for mental health offered by the airlines of “we’ll help you from diagnosis until the time you get your medical back” was of no interest to me. But I did feel like a lot of my exuberance gave way to what the physical exhaustion demanded of me - hibernation. 

It’s worth noting that I’ve shared very little about me as a person thus far. I ask that you take note: have you drawn any conclusions already? Can you relate? Should I have stopped flying? Was I “in the green?” At what point should I have self reported my inability to carry the stress or added the financial burden of losing a medical to the mix?

That is largely why I am writing. The grief had nothing to do with me. It was an episodic event overlaying a life I’d worked hard to build and stabilize. Grief is not a mental illness; but its symptoms sometimes are, and that meant breaking my silence presented a risk of losing my medical - this is the obstacle for proactive self-care.  We, as pilots, are not in denial that life is hard, but we’ll check the box saying it isn’t before we’ll let a company pin events on us like pathologies that we have to fight our way out of with the federal government. 

About me.

If you’d like to continue on this journey… a little about me. My name is Katy. I’ve dealt with a lot of shit in life. My response? Dedication to getting comfortable with the very uncomfortable. It informs my flying, but also helps me show up for others who are moving through challenges - which is everyone. I enjoy that.

I am part of a training group, which meets weekly. We dive into Jungian psychology, and therefore our unconscious behaviors, amongst twelve other beautiful people and a supervisor. We learn by showing up to look at ourselves (especially the uncomfortable parts) which, over time, helps to take life less personally. If group has taught me anything, it is that we are only as sick as our secrets. Which might go a long way in explaining the state of an industry for which a motto I’ve heard repeatedly is: “lie or don’t fly.”

Another boulder I sometimes push uphill is that I, along with 1 in 3 other women, have had to figure out how to carry on after sexual assault. I was raped for the first time at 19 years old. That type of trauma, the invasion of my physical body, has been the hardest to heal. Not because I perpetuate the story as some form of melodrama, but because our bodies and unconscious behaviors hold on to those moments long after we mentally have tried to let go.

And that… was a little about me. Back to grief....

Relief.

At lunch a couple of months ago, just before that first Christmas without my dad, a girlfriend of mine sat with me. She watched as grief sat on top of me like a weighted blanket and suggested I put some attention on finding stability and safety in my own body. She told me about an online class she had taken, called Nectar. It was a class on vulvar mapping as a form of non-sexual tension release for women who had experienced sexual trauma. I had the immediate sensation of a big shining light bulb over my head. A spark. Finally. 

I immediately thanked her profusely. She replied, “Oh… yyyeah... None of us can get through this alone.” In a split second, she had handed me relatedness and a mode of healing for which I could set the pace and learn myself. Quietly. It felt like I was ready to peek out from under the blanket, but the next class wasn’t offered for a month. I didn’t want to wait that long to tend to the spark. So I picked up a book that was already on my shelf, “Pussy: A Reclamation“ by Regina Thomashauer. Let me tell you - that book will bring you back to life!

I had begun reading it years ago, until an immature boyfriend of mine picked it up and openly laughed at what it contained. That was it! I put it down indefinitely. At that time I was alone amongst men. I was the only female student in my flight school, and I was living with a man who just didn’t get it. So, just like I did after being sexually assaulted, I hid a part of myself. It seemed there was something wrong with becoming fluent in myself in the era when I was still engulfed in learning how to speak men. But this time, about two chapters into this book (round two), I had decided - I’m painting a giant pussy on my wall in my home. I live alone. There is no one to tell me ‘no.’ This is happening. Just the thought of it had me smiling inside and out for the first time in a long time. 

The art project.

For this next part of the story, I want to introduce you to two individuals I’ve encountered along the way. The first of whom is the supervisor for my training group. A beautifully radiant woman in her 70s, who we lovingly refer to as Mama Lynne. She is a tonic for your soul. She offers a prayer (and I say that in the least dogmatic way possible) in our community:

“We all have a direct arrow to the heart of the divine. It is our instinct, and it is our intuition, and it is our birthright.”

Lynne introduced me to the second character in this story named Kris D just over a year ago. It was such an honor, although Lynne didn’t know I’d had his art on my wall for more than a decade. Kris is an insanely talented artist and beautiful person. His patterning [depicted here], which he sometimes calls “cosmic braille,” immediately resonated with me because it looks like a visual depiction of a VOR. Kris works as a tattoo artist and only tattoos original pieces. You tell him your inspiration and he creates an image that is intuitive and always stunning. 

I was over the moon to request a tattoo inspired by Lynne‘s prayer. But Kris had been moving through a process of his own called macular degeneration. The eventual outcome of which can vary, and can sometimes amount to progressive blindness.

Kris takes the evolving symptoms surprisingly gracefully, but the fine lined detail of the work creates a strain on his eyes. And about six months after my request, he told me it proved to be too strenuous. When we saw each other recently, he explained that it is a scary process, building your livelihood on drawing straight lines, because lately his condition was causing straight lines to bend. Interestingly, my grandmother, who also has macular degeneration, recently told me that she had difficulty reading because the lines of text began to melt right off the page!

But I digress… I was amazed at Kris’s calm and acceptance in allowing the line-bending to bring an evolution to his artwork. I was also giggling inside at the synchronicity! I had arrived to our conversation intent on asking him to draw something that certainly did not involve straight lines. At the mention of the words ‘giant vagina’, he locked eyes with me, so as to say: that. Later noting how creating a large piece of art would also cause him to have to step back and refocus his eyes in different ways, which would be helpful. Thank you instinct and intuition.

The joy of creatively honoring the feminine and watching it nourish both of us in different ways is the passion behind the pursuit of this project.

Now, can I fund this project myself? Yes, and indeed I am. But I have a bigger intention for bringing this art to life. I want to honor the spark it gave me and pass it on… here, with you.

I have provided links to the resources that have inspired me and I have also created a non-profit, called Volar, through which I am developing a flight bag for female pilots and using the profits to fund a scholarship for future female aviators.

To fund the prototype of the flight bag, prints from this project will be available for donation through indiegogo.com. Half of your contributions will go to Volar and half will go to Kris, to use as he sees fit in his journey with his artistic and literal vision.

Meanwhile, I will wake up basking in the quiet subversiveness of this artwork as I make my morning coffee, don my masculine uniform and head off to work in the room labeled for everyone’s enjoyment: the cockpit. I hope you’ll join me by contributing.

Thank you for reading.