Today's word is FAT.
F-A-T, the thing no one wants to be and yet thinks they are. All the time. Turn this way — FAT. Turn the other way — FAT. Suck it in, in, in a little more. Better, but you can't breathe. Exhale — FAT.
I can't make myself look skinny today. It's probably because all I've done is eaten and eaten and eaten. I am weak. I am the sound of a thunderstorm when I run down the stairs. BOOM BOOM BOOM.
I try on my grad dress and I want to cry. Suck in — okay...can't breathe! Exhale — FAT. Again. I don't want to face the world knowing that all those photos that will be taken of me tomorrow will sit on mantles and and shelves as a horrible reminder of my failure. That's HER? But she looks so fat! I would just die if my parents kept those pictures on the wall. Look at how wide she is. It's a wonder she can even stand up. Poor, fat, ugly, stupid bitch.
BITCH
I am a bitch for complaining about myself all the time. I am vanity and self-indulgent self-pity. There are real people with real problems hurting more than me. My friend on my pro-ana site is struggling and I don't know how to help her. She lives on the other side of the country and I just want to reach out, reach out and grab her hand. Stop! Don't do it. It'll be okay, I'll say. It doesn't matter how many people in your life don't seem to love you. I love you. Don't go.
Why can't I help? Why won't my arm stretch across the land that separates us so that it may reach hers and lift her up? Why am I weighed down by my own native suffering? It's impossible to help someone when you can't even help yourself. We're paddling tirelessly in our boats.
She's drowning.
I am the boat stranded in the middle of a nameless sea, calling out for no one to hear. Is she still there? I call and call and hear nothing in reply.
I check my email over and over. Refresh refresh refresh. DAMMIT. Answer me. Answer me! I am helpless. I am weak. I am scared it might be too late. Real people live on the other side of an email, winding through the great World Wide Web. They have real problems. They are hurting like I am hurting. And there's nothing I can do. NOTHING I can do!
But I want to help.
I am the desperation that gets a person nowhere. Stranded. Floating. Calling out for no one to hear.
I wake up today with a weight in my stomach. It pulls me down, further and further into the blankets. No, it's not a weight. It is my own inability to put down a fucking sandwich, which drags me down.
I need to look pretty today, if not just for my sanity than for my job. I need a new job. I need more hours, more time, more money for next year. How much money have you saved up so far, the father asks. I shrug my shoulders. (None. I spent it on an iPod to replace the one you don't know I lost, only to lose the new one in less than a month.)
I am a failure.
I am a failure who must dress like a slut in order to get an interview. A local restaurant is hiring hostesses. People go to their restaurant for the scantily clad waitresses. It isn't like a Hooters. It's just a restaurant run by vain people for vain people.
Will I be pretty enough for them? I don't have cleavage, just bumps and lumps all over the place. I've tried to hide it. Do I look glowing and dolled up? Or do I look like a transvestite?
I am crawling in my skin.
They will laugh at me and never call me back for an interview.
I go on my job hunt. A flowery hotel is hiring cleaning ladies. I try to be charming and clever. I come off meek and unqualified. My resume has a horrible dirt stain on the second page. I am pathetic.
Subway isn't actually hiring, the manager says, but I fill out an application anyway. I take the "stupid test" on the back page. What would you do if this happened? What would you say if a customer told you this? What is the change you would give from a twenty dollar bill?
I am an idiot
But above Subway standards. Next stop is the restaurant. I have suffered hours of prancing in heels and ignoring the ogling eyes of half-blind, horny men. All for this. I check myself in the reflection of a store window. I am bloated and wide. I scrunch up my unwashed hair and walk in the restaurant with confidence. I feel like a lie.
Is your manager in?
No, not right now.
(Oh....)
I fill out an application anyway. I'll stop by tomorrow after graduation to see if he's there. I am desperate for work. The juicy temptation of full-time employment and an added self-esteem boost. Those half-blind men are the ones that make you roll your eyes and smile inwardly at the same time.
Dirty slut. You like it.
Then it's the grad barbeque. I am a circus performer juggling the father and the preggers lady on one hand and the mother on the opposite one, while the grandparents toss fiery batons of truce at my face. I tend to my friends, the mother, grandparents, father, mother again, preggers lady. I finally sit down. My friend's sister has newly dyed hair — blue. I say she looks like a blueberry was thrown at her head.
I come home to an email from my friend saying her sister went home and cried, washing her hair ten times to get it out.
I am an asshole. I am the jerk who makes little girls cry. I am the role model who doesn't deserve to be admired. The things I say. My mouth is the reason I hate myself. One of the reasons.
MANY reasons.
I get another email from my pro-ana friend. She tells me to smile and not to worry. She calls me her thinspiration. I feel undeserving. I am not what she sees. I am so much less. I am nothing.
I cry knowing that she is doing better. My heart feels relieved. I stare at the clock. Past midnight. I have to get up early for hair and makeup tomorrow morning for grad.
I pray that I will be thin and beautiful tomorrow.
My green tea pills are definitely helping with my appetite. I go all day without even feeling hungry and then force down some salmon and veggies at the barbeque. I eat a chocolate covered strawberry and scold myself.
This why I am weak.
This is why I am so
FAT
Friday, June 26, 2009
Monday, June 22, 2009
SCARED
Today's word is SCARED.
Don't believe me? crawl inside my paranoia and take a look. Everything is terrifying.
I'm scared to die, scared to live, scared to feel and care. I lie in my bed pretending to sleep and wait for the world to end outside my door.
I can't sleep.
I have five layers of clothes on and two blankets. Everything is so warm. I'm drowsy, but painfully aware of surroundings. I get up and decide to go shopping. Therapy, if only I had the money. I find some old American bills and a couple gift certificates. I'll exchange the money downtown.
My eyebrows still feel smooth and vulnerable. I am a naked mole rat, plucked from the nocturnal earth. It was my first waxing, but I barely flinched and the war wounds were hardly as red and puffy as I had imagined. The mother came out looking like a bird had pecked away her forehead.
SERVES HER RIGHT
Serves her right for forcing me to go to family counseling, where she can cry about how I've ruined her life and I can shrug my shoulders, because what else can you do? I didn't ask her to care. I didn't ask to be sick. I didn't ask to be treated like a five-year-old
Every day she asks me something about my eating disorder or tells me something about my eating disorder. Every day. Every day. I could explode.
Or weakly and defeatedly, implode.
The mother is a walking "concerned parents advertisement" that I can't turn off. Can't mute. Can't smash into a million pieces.
She dropped me off at the father's house and we argued about the graduation BBQ. She left, offended. I walked up the newly painted "concrete moss" steps, muttering
STUPID BITCH
under my breath.
My dry and rotten breath. I smell like a compost bin, decaying and pungent.
Downtown I set out to spend every dollar I had acquired. My gift certificates bought a cute little summer dress. Size extra small. It felt good. So good. My American-exchanged money bought jewelry for graduation and a plaid shirt. And the money I stole from student council, my last act as Treasurer, bought sixty beautiful little green tea diet pills.
I hid in the bathroom of the mall and took two pills at once, chugging them back with diet Redbull. The package said to take two at different times of the day with a full glass of water, but I figured why not get a head start?
Why not?
Because you'll feel like death on the way home from shopping, that's why. You'll become nauseous, you heart will palpitate a billion times a second from the extreme rush of caffeine. The nothingness that's been sitting in your stomach will wrestle with the foreign energy source until you can barely stand. You'll clutch your stomach and repeat
I WILL NOT THROW UP
I WILL NOT THROW UP
Over and over and over again until you finally reach your stop. You'll want to collapse on the ground and never wake up again, but you'll trudge up the path and make it home alive anyway.
On the bright side, they work. I go to the kitchen and take the food I packed for me to take work out of my bag. Another shift canceled because the theatre is never busy anymore. Code for they think I'm a shitty employee who tarnished their Mystery Shopper reputation. I have a big BAD written under my evaluation. I need a new job.
I take out my dinner and plop it in the microwave.
BEEP BEEP BEEP
I'm not hungry. I eat my tofu dog (60) begrudgingly. The zucchini (60) and potatoes (179) are scorching hot. I choke down half the container and put the rest back in the fridge. I feel like I might explode.
I am 299 calories.
I am empty.
I am full.
I am the strength I didn't have yesterday.
I will not fall victim to the temptations of food.
I will win my stupid little game.
I will make it out of this horrible trap alive.
And I WILL NOT go to Crazy Camp for Crazy Little Girls.
Don't believe me? crawl inside my paranoia and take a look. Everything is terrifying.
I'm scared to die, scared to live, scared to feel and care. I lie in my bed pretending to sleep and wait for the world to end outside my door.
I can't sleep.
I have five layers of clothes on and two blankets. Everything is so warm. I'm drowsy, but painfully aware of surroundings. I get up and decide to go shopping. Therapy, if only I had the money. I find some old American bills and a couple gift certificates. I'll exchange the money downtown.
My eyebrows still feel smooth and vulnerable. I am a naked mole rat, plucked from the nocturnal earth. It was my first waxing, but I barely flinched and the war wounds were hardly as red and puffy as I had imagined. The mother came out looking like a bird had pecked away her forehead.
SERVES HER RIGHT
Serves her right for forcing me to go to family counseling, where she can cry about how I've ruined her life and I can shrug my shoulders, because what else can you do? I didn't ask her to care. I didn't ask to be sick. I didn't ask to be treated like a five-year-old
Every day she asks me something about my eating disorder or tells me something about my eating disorder. Every day. Every day. I could explode.
Or weakly and defeatedly, implode.
The mother is a walking "concerned parents advertisement" that I can't turn off. Can't mute. Can't smash into a million pieces.
She dropped me off at the father's house and we argued about the graduation BBQ. She left, offended. I walked up the newly painted "concrete moss" steps, muttering
STUPID BITCH
under my breath.
My dry and rotten breath. I smell like a compost bin, decaying and pungent.
Downtown I set out to spend every dollar I had acquired. My gift certificates bought a cute little summer dress. Size extra small. It felt good. So good. My American-exchanged money bought jewelry for graduation and a plaid shirt. And the money I stole from student council, my last act as Treasurer, bought sixty beautiful little green tea diet pills.
I hid in the bathroom of the mall and took two pills at once, chugging them back with diet Redbull. The package said to take two at different times of the day with a full glass of water, but I figured why not get a head start?
Why not?
Because you'll feel like death on the way home from shopping, that's why. You'll become nauseous, you heart will palpitate a billion times a second from the extreme rush of caffeine. The nothingness that's been sitting in your stomach will wrestle with the foreign energy source until you can barely stand. You'll clutch your stomach and repeat
I WILL NOT THROW UP
I WILL NOT THROW UP
Over and over and over again until you finally reach your stop. You'll want to collapse on the ground and never wake up again, but you'll trudge up the path and make it home alive anyway.
On the bright side, they work. I go to the kitchen and take the food I packed for me to take work out of my bag. Another shift canceled because the theatre is never busy anymore. Code for they think I'm a shitty employee who tarnished their Mystery Shopper reputation. I have a big BAD written under my evaluation. I need a new job.
I take out my dinner and plop it in the microwave.
BEEP BEEP BEEP
I'm not hungry. I eat my tofu dog (60) begrudgingly. The zucchini (60) and potatoes (179) are scorching hot. I choke down half the container and put the rest back in the fridge. I feel like I might explode.
I am 299 calories.
I am empty.
I am full.
I am the strength I didn't have yesterday.
I will not fall victim to the temptations of food.
I will win my stupid little game.
I will make it out of this horrible trap alive.
And I WILL NOT go to Crazy Camp for Crazy Little Girls.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
FUCKED
Today's word is FUCKED.
Don't believe me? Let me give you a recap of my day, and we'll see if we still disagree.
I am fucked.
SO FUCKED.
About a week ago the mother came across my pro-ana site and confronted me. It was a terrible tearful and snotty conversation. My eyes were puffy all day and I had a horrible migraine. I downed my sorrows in shitty, horrific beer and energy drink. I spun in the summer darkness of a park playground until I felt like throwing up. No one knew why I was so sad. I didn't tell anyone. I just pretended to get a CAT scan in the little plastic tube, and melt away from reality. I convinced the mother not to tell the father and I said I would work on it. Work on it, like it was a homework project.
I thought, how nice. She's being so supportive and patient.
Fast-forward one week. We have another talk. I cry more. everything falls apart.
I've been looking online for a group. Remember, we talked about that?
Oh.
I found this summer camp in on the mainland.
(Great. Crazy Camp.)
And I want to book an appointment next week for family counseling.
(Double great.)
And I'm afraid I'm going to have to tell your dad.
YOU CAN'T!
You're sick and he needs to know...blah blah blah statistics...blah blah blah you're going to die.
I have to go. I'm going to be late for dinner.
She made one giant mistake. When you have an eating disorder...You. Don't. Care. If. You. Die.
I don't.
So, that's the verdict. I have to tell the father and ruin his Father's Day, his new-family-new-baby-new-life plan. I have to call my old clinic and book an appointment. With a new psychiatrist. A new one. I hated the old one. She would look at me like I was weak. She told me my ideal weight was too low and that I should eat more and stop purging. As if I didn't already know.
It doesn't matter what statistics you throw at me. I. Don't. Care. If. I. Die.
And that's how it was this morning. I woke up exhausted, weak, hungry. It was 5:59 am. I couldn't sleep. Tried to close my eyes. Woke up again half an hour later, and again and again and again. Dammit! Can't sleep. The phone rings. Shift tense.
RING RING RING
My fate awaits me. It's the mother and when she says come over, we need to talk, my day takes a sharp turn for the worse.
I hide out in my room all day. When was the last time I hung out with my friends? Went outside other than to exercise? Watched a movie? Laughed? Had fun? I am the hermit who sings low and pitiful songs of regret in his cave. I am the bacteria that grows on a Sloth's back. I clean out my closet and purge all my crap. Not my food. I don't do that anymore. I can't. I'm not allowed. It's minus 500 points in my stupid little game.
God, how pathetic was I to believe that this "game" would make everything better again? I poisoned the meaning of fun with my filthy disease. I am repugnant.
I am the side effect of every drug, whose only intention is to make things better, but whose sole accomplishment is making things worse.
I am the shame of my mother.Her fear. Her worry. Her guilt.
What will happen? What can I do? How did this happen?
I want to be a dog. Crawl under the porch and die alone. Die alone. As fate wrote it out for me in cheap scrawls.
What can you do?
Just leave me be.
PLEASE
If I make it through tomorrow I will be one lucky little shit. Happy Father's Day! I ate ice cream and lunch just for you today. I tried to wrap your present, but the damn FUCKING fat on my stomach won't detach. But, I let it grow just for you, like a big fucking pumpkin.
Happy Father's Day.
I'm going to Crazy Camp.
Have fun with the new baby.
I hope he gives you hell. That way I can blame this all on genetics.
That way people will finally stop caring and paying attention.
That way I can be free.
To be a dog.
Don't believe me? Let me give you a recap of my day, and we'll see if we still disagree.
I am fucked.
SO FUCKED.
About a week ago the mother came across my pro-ana site and confronted me. It was a terrible tearful and snotty conversation. My eyes were puffy all day and I had a horrible migraine. I downed my sorrows in shitty, horrific beer and energy drink. I spun in the summer darkness of a park playground until I felt like throwing up. No one knew why I was so sad. I didn't tell anyone. I just pretended to get a CAT scan in the little plastic tube, and melt away from reality. I convinced the mother not to tell the father and I said I would work on it. Work on it, like it was a homework project.
I thought, how nice. She's being so supportive and patient.
Fast-forward one week. We have another talk. I cry more. everything falls apart.
I've been looking online for a group. Remember, we talked about that?
Oh.
I found this summer camp in on the mainland.
(Great. Crazy Camp.)
And I want to book an appointment next week for family counseling.
(Double great.)
And I'm afraid I'm going to have to tell your dad.
YOU CAN'T!
You're sick and he needs to know...blah blah blah statistics...blah blah blah you're going to die.
I have to go. I'm going to be late for dinner.
She made one giant mistake. When you have an eating disorder...You. Don't. Care. If. You. Die.
I don't.
So, that's the verdict. I have to tell the father and ruin his Father's Day, his new-family-new-baby-new-life plan. I have to call my old clinic and book an appointment. With a new psychiatrist. A new one. I hated the old one. She would look at me like I was weak. She told me my ideal weight was too low and that I should eat more and stop purging. As if I didn't already know.
It doesn't matter what statistics you throw at me. I. Don't. Care. If. I. Die.
And that's how it was this morning. I woke up exhausted, weak, hungry. It was 5:59 am. I couldn't sleep. Tried to close my eyes. Woke up again half an hour later, and again and again and again. Dammit! Can't sleep. The phone rings. Shift tense.
RING RING RING
My fate awaits me. It's the mother and when she says come over, we need to talk, my day takes a sharp turn for the worse.
I hide out in my room all day. When was the last time I hung out with my friends? Went outside other than to exercise? Watched a movie? Laughed? Had fun? I am the hermit who sings low and pitiful songs of regret in his cave. I am the bacteria that grows on a Sloth's back. I clean out my closet and purge all my crap. Not my food. I don't do that anymore. I can't. I'm not allowed. It's minus 500 points in my stupid little game.
God, how pathetic was I to believe that this "game" would make everything better again? I poisoned the meaning of fun with my filthy disease. I am repugnant.
I am the side effect of every drug, whose only intention is to make things better, but whose sole accomplishment is making things worse.
I am the shame of my mother.Her fear. Her worry. Her guilt.
What will happen? What can I do? How did this happen?
I want to be a dog. Crawl under the porch and die alone. Die alone. As fate wrote it out for me in cheap scrawls.
What can you do?
Just leave me be.
PLEASE
If I make it through tomorrow I will be one lucky little shit. Happy Father's Day! I ate ice cream and lunch just for you today. I tried to wrap your present, but the damn FUCKING fat on my stomach won't detach. But, I let it grow just for you, like a big fucking pumpkin.
Happy Father's Day.
I'm going to Crazy Camp.
Have fun with the new baby.
I hope he gives you hell. That way I can blame this all on genetics.
That way people will finally stop caring and paying attention.
That way I can be free.
To be a dog.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
COMPETITIVE
Today's word is competitive.
Don't believe me? Follow the rules I post below and join me in a new game I created for the mentally conflicted non-eaters of my ana realm. It's a monetary fight for the slimmest body, a fight to the death. In a world where money is as seductive as food (I'd choose the former over the latter any day) this game is highly appropriate. Highly high stakes.
The breakdown.
5 dollars: throw away any tempting food; 15 minute walk
10 dollars: walk the dog; no food before 6 pm
20 dollars: not finishing all of dinner; 500 situps
50 dollars: less than 500 calories consumed (in one day); 1 hour cardio
100 dollars: fast for 24 hours straight; 1 lb lost
TAXES
- 5 dollars: food before 12 pm
- 10 dollars: eating before checking calories
- 20 dollars: food after 8 pm
- 50 dollars: no sit-ups
- 100 dollars: consumption of over 1000 calories (in one day)
- 500 dollars: purging
Every day you tally up the amount of "ana dollars" you earn.
At the end of the week the loser has to pay.
THE.
ULTIMATE.
PUNISHMENT.
The loser has to post a photo of her stomach on my pro-ana site for everyone to see.
I will win.
I must.
No one can see my fat belly, especially not in the state I'm in today. This competition is the motivation I need to shed that perpetual stomach that clings on to me no matter how hard I try to shake it off. Hangs there like a ghost, tied down with heavy stones and broken promises.
I will not lie.
But I lied.
I can't get better.
Not now.
I'll wait till I'm REALLY thin. Then I'll get help.
Then I'll be worthy of getting help.
Today I lack willpower. Today I lack substance.
Tomorrow I will be worthy enough to post the grievances of my day, drawn out in melodramatic poetries, sadly (or perhaps not) not embellished. The double negative scares you, like I am scared of my double chin. Haunting. Haunting, creeping when I lie in bed, head drooping towards the sheets. Inch inch inch further. And then it's there. A horror movie flash. The violins attack. Close up on my trembling failure.
I lie in the most full and lonely bed there is. I rely not on the comfort of another human being or even a stuffed animal. I lie among textbooks, backpacks, novels, old laundry, hidden food wrappers, crumpled homework, flashcards, quarters and nickels, and power cords. I fill my metaphorical emptiness with very physical and very real substitutions.
My room is an extension of my mind. Chaotic.
I am my own metaphor.
I am both a person and a representation.
Some days I am present. Other days I am lost in the roomy chaos of my mind, a portrait of my other self, one less tired and worn-out. A portrait of my ideal self.
I am thin.
I hang on the wall by the tinniest thread. One more day like this, one more day of failure, and I will fall. I will crash on the floor and lie next to myself. Next to the textbooks and shameful food wrappers. I scrape the surface of my reality. It's heavy and mountainous.
I am an arduous climb.
But the journey will be worth it.
Tomorrow the competition begins.
And I WILL win.
I MUST.
Don't believe me? Follow the rules I post below and join me in a new game I created for the mentally conflicted non-eaters of my ana realm. It's a monetary fight for the slimmest body, a fight to the death. In a world where money is as seductive as food (I'd choose the former over the latter any day) this game is highly appropriate. Highly high stakes.
The breakdown.
5 dollars: throw away any tempting food; 15 minute walk
10 dollars: walk the dog; no food before 6 pm
20 dollars: not finishing all of dinner; 500 situps
50 dollars: less than 500 calories consumed (in one day); 1 hour cardio
100 dollars: fast for 24 hours straight; 1 lb lost
TAXES
- 5 dollars: food before 12 pm
- 10 dollars: eating before checking calories
- 20 dollars: food after 8 pm
- 50 dollars: no sit-ups
- 100 dollars: consumption of over 1000 calories (in one day)
- 500 dollars: purging
Every day you tally up the amount of "ana dollars" you earn.
At the end of the week the loser has to pay.
THE.
ULTIMATE.
PUNISHMENT.
The loser has to post a photo of her stomach on my pro-ana site for everyone to see.
I will win.
I must.
No one can see my fat belly, especially not in the state I'm in today. This competition is the motivation I need to shed that perpetual stomach that clings on to me no matter how hard I try to shake it off. Hangs there like a ghost, tied down with heavy stones and broken promises.
I will not lie.
But I lied.
I can't get better.
Not now.
I'll wait till I'm REALLY thin. Then I'll get help.
Then I'll be worthy of getting help.
Today I lack willpower. Today I lack substance.
Tomorrow I will be worthy enough to post the grievances of my day, drawn out in melodramatic poetries, sadly (or perhaps not) not embellished. The double negative scares you, like I am scared of my double chin. Haunting. Haunting, creeping when I lie in bed, head drooping towards the sheets. Inch inch inch further. And then it's there. A horror movie flash. The violins attack. Close up on my trembling failure.
I lie in the most full and lonely bed there is. I rely not on the comfort of another human being or even a stuffed animal. I lie among textbooks, backpacks, novels, old laundry, hidden food wrappers, crumpled homework, flashcards, quarters and nickels, and power cords. I fill my metaphorical emptiness with very physical and very real substitutions.
My room is an extension of my mind. Chaotic.
I am my own metaphor.
I am both a person and a representation.
Some days I am present. Other days I am lost in the roomy chaos of my mind, a portrait of my other self, one less tired and worn-out. A portrait of my ideal self.
I am thin.
I hang on the wall by the tinniest thread. One more day like this, one more day of failure, and I will fall. I will crash on the floor and lie next to myself. Next to the textbooks and shameful food wrappers. I scrape the surface of my reality. It's heavy and mountainous.
I am an arduous climb.
But the journey will be worth it.
Tomorrow the competition begins.
And I WILL win.
I MUST.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
STUPID
Today's word is stupid.
Don't believe me? Look up my exam results next month. The only thoughts that flooded to my head in those two and a half hours spent in that ridiculously cold gym were those of panic and defeat. I wrote on my hand.
FAILURE
I couldn't study. I couldn't do a simple thing like studying or not eating. I couldn't even sleep. I just lay in bed on my side, lifting my legs. One two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen twenty.
Flip over.
Again and again and again until I feel a little less a guilty.
But then you wake up and it's morning. Is it? You can't tell. It's grey and cloudy and the covers pull you in. You don't want to get up. You want to sleep forever, not dead, just suspended in a dream.
It doesn't take as long as I expect to get dressed. Too depressed to care how fat I look. The fabric touches my stomach and I barely flinch. My stomach is sore. But I always hate when the fabric touches my stomach. Touches my stomach. Touches, brushes up against my fat. It makes me queasy.
I was hungry today. So hungry. I stared at an apple while I forced productivity out of my tired body. Finish leadership homework. Must finish. Need to turn 30% into 90% in two hours. Rush rush, glue here, tape here, an ugly poster stitched together in thirty minutes on how wonderful of a leader I have become this year. Pure, rotten, oozy bullshit. Whatever. It's everything they want to hear and more.
Then it's the bus ride home. The bus is a game where you measure yourself. First bus: I win. I am the skinniest person on it. The girl at the back is wide and loud. She throws around "dudes" and "retardeds" in a whiny high-pitched voice. Her laugh makes me almost jump in my seat. Her laugh is the sound my thighs make when I walk. BOOM BOOM BOOM. Not that much competition with only a handful on it. Second bus: I lose. She's built like a model. She's wide, but slim, like a wafer. She has long legs and tiny arms. Her hair is long and wavy and my jealousy radar peaks.
I'm overflowing.
Who gave me this body?
Who imprisoned me in the body of a 25-year-old fraternity slacker, a beer gut with no beer in it, love handles for nobody to love, thighs holding on to the hope that there's still some athleticism in me.
I don't want muscles.
I want bones.
I get off bus number two, defeated. She'll go home and eat a cheeseburger and wake up like it's just another day. I'll go home and eat dinner with the family. The preggers lady will get her healthy pregnant meal. Meanwhile the father and I will scarf down something fatty and regretful.
I go online to my ana chat. The whole world is on today. Somewhere between Kaya Scodelario and calories in an apple I find myself smiling. This is my food. This is the comfort no macaroni and cheese could ever provide me.
And then it's a gift from above, a heaven that I refuse to believe in, even when it grants me such blessings as the one today. Family dinner is no more. I get to eat alone. I go downstairs. Just half a piece of plain salmon, I promise. I promise.
I PROMISE.
I spread ketchup on a bun and stick a tangy pickle in the middle. I put half the salmon inside and half I leave out. I pick at the abandoned half of salmon, while occasionally wrapping my burger in paper towel, tucking it between my underwear and the elastic in my tights.
I am devious.
I am 156 calories.
BUT
I broke my promise. I ate two pickles and a quarter of my thintini bun. It could be worse. It could be much worse.
I could be the lady who rides in her scooter at the grocery store, picking up tubs of lard and deep-fried everythings.
I could be the lady who throws it all away for a cheeseburger.
Don't believe me? Look up my exam results next month. The only thoughts that flooded to my head in those two and a half hours spent in that ridiculously cold gym were those of panic and defeat. I wrote on my hand.
FAILURE
I couldn't study. I couldn't do a simple thing like studying or not eating. I couldn't even sleep. I just lay in bed on my side, lifting my legs. One two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen twenty.
Flip over.
Again and again and again until I feel a little less a guilty.
But then you wake up and it's morning. Is it? You can't tell. It's grey and cloudy and the covers pull you in. You don't want to get up. You want to sleep forever, not dead, just suspended in a dream.
It doesn't take as long as I expect to get dressed. Too depressed to care how fat I look. The fabric touches my stomach and I barely flinch. My stomach is sore. But I always hate when the fabric touches my stomach. Touches my stomach. Touches, brushes up against my fat. It makes me queasy.
I was hungry today. So hungry. I stared at an apple while I forced productivity out of my tired body. Finish leadership homework. Must finish. Need to turn 30% into 90% in two hours. Rush rush, glue here, tape here, an ugly poster stitched together in thirty minutes on how wonderful of a leader I have become this year. Pure, rotten, oozy bullshit. Whatever. It's everything they want to hear and more.
Then it's the bus ride home. The bus is a game where you measure yourself. First bus: I win. I am the skinniest person on it. The girl at the back is wide and loud. She throws around "dudes" and "retardeds" in a whiny high-pitched voice. Her laugh makes me almost jump in my seat. Her laugh is the sound my thighs make when I walk. BOOM BOOM BOOM. Not that much competition with only a handful on it. Second bus: I lose. She's built like a model. She's wide, but slim, like a wafer. She has long legs and tiny arms. Her hair is long and wavy and my jealousy radar peaks.
I'm overflowing.
Who gave me this body?
Who imprisoned me in the body of a 25-year-old fraternity slacker, a beer gut with no beer in it, love handles for nobody to love, thighs holding on to the hope that there's still some athleticism in me.
I don't want muscles.
I want bones.
I get off bus number two, defeated. She'll go home and eat a cheeseburger and wake up like it's just another day. I'll go home and eat dinner with the family. The preggers lady will get her healthy pregnant meal. Meanwhile the father and I will scarf down something fatty and regretful.
I go online to my ana chat. The whole world is on today. Somewhere between Kaya Scodelario and calories in an apple I find myself smiling. This is my food. This is the comfort no macaroni and cheese could ever provide me.
And then it's a gift from above, a heaven that I refuse to believe in, even when it grants me such blessings as the one today. Family dinner is no more. I get to eat alone. I go downstairs. Just half a piece of plain salmon, I promise. I promise.
I PROMISE.
I spread ketchup on a bun and stick a tangy pickle in the middle. I put half the salmon inside and half I leave out. I pick at the abandoned half of salmon, while occasionally wrapping my burger in paper towel, tucking it between my underwear and the elastic in my tights.
I am devious.
I am 156 calories.
BUT
I broke my promise. I ate two pickles and a quarter of my thintini bun. It could be worse. It could be much worse.
I could be the lady who rides in her scooter at the grocery store, picking up tubs of lard and deep-fried everythings.
I could be the lady who throws it all away for a cheeseburger.
BITCH
Today's word is BITCH.
Don't believe me? Read my stomach. It took forever to get the red and scratchy letters to stick up on my skin. I need something better than a safety pin. I wanted it to show in the mirror, but of course I fucked that up. It's backwards.
I fucked everything up. One bite and I'm gone. My brain goes in a world where food won't destroy you, make you fat, make you weak, and then it's too late. It's in you. I'm over the toilet. I don't run the water cause I'm paranoid. They'll hear it run too long and know. They'll hear my fingers search the back of my throat for the release button, sloshing with saliva and know. They'll hear me lift up the toilet bowl and know. They'll smell my failure ooze through the paint in the walls and know. They'll know I only flush down the dinners they make me eat.
But of course they don't know.
I'm staying with the father and the preggers lady right now. She used to be the dad's wife, but she's pushing a baby out in less than 3 weeks, so she gets a new name. A new name for a new life with new challenges and new blessings. If they knew what I was still doing I'd ruin everything. The burden of caring. The guilt of being concerned yet annoyed all at once. Why now? they'd ask. What with the baby and the paint that still smells and the website for the book. We don't need this now. But she's sick. You have to care. You have to want to care.
You have to want to get better.
That's what the father told me. I'm not forcing you to get help again. I'm not dragging you to the clinic. You're going to make the call.
But I don't want to.
I don't want you going off to college without sorting this out. (Like it's a fucking clerical error)
So, you're not forcing me? You're just...passive-aggressively forcing me?
I know someone who's daughter died of a heart attack. She was going for a run. I don't want the same thing to happen to you.
(She was weak. She wasn't drinking enough water. I'm not that stupid.)
But the father does this all the time. He doesn't fake it. He's a 100% genuine caring kind of guy. Until he has to focus on something else. The book, the baby room, the baby, the wife, the old wife who wants to take away his precious money that he needs for his new family, new life, new patio furniture.
I am the invalid in bed all day, doing "homework" and "studying for exams" while refreshing my browser over and over and over. Nothing changes. I type a new Facebook status.
FUCK FUCK FUCK FAT FUCK STUPID UGLY WORTHLESS PIECE OF FLAB WHY DOESN'T ANYONE SEE WHY WON'T THEY STOP FORCING ME TO EAT WHY CAN'T I LIVE IN MY BED FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE THEY'RE JUST FUCKING PIGS
Delete delete delete.
Refresh again. Nothing's changed.
Go to my pro-ana site. Calories, help me, stay strong, fast fast fast, keep it up, new diets, new thinspos. My brain fills with the same emptiness. As hollow as my stomach.
I ate too much today. I ate like a normal person. I had apple sauce, cookies, lemon cake, trout, asparagus, and a baked potato with butter and sour cream. Purged some, but not all. Not enough. Paranoid. Are they coming up the stairs? They'll hear. They'll know. Footsteps creep up the stairway. I'm frozen, food mulch drenched in saliva dripping from my filthy hands.
I am a failure.
Go on my pro-ana chat. Talk to a friend without a face. I do five hundred crunches and fifty lunges. She cheers me on the whole way then goes to bed.
I can't sleep. I have an exam tomorrow that I didn't study for. I laid in bed all day, worrying the hunger monster would snatch me if I went anywhere near the kitchen. Of course it did. Family Dinner is its wicked minion. Once I start I can't stop.
I am a failure.
BUT
Tomorrow will be better.
It has to be.
Don't believe me? Read my stomach. It took forever to get the red and scratchy letters to stick up on my skin. I need something better than a safety pin. I wanted it to show in the mirror, but of course I fucked that up. It's backwards.
I fucked everything up. One bite and I'm gone. My brain goes in a world where food won't destroy you, make you fat, make you weak, and then it's too late. It's in you. I'm over the toilet. I don't run the water cause I'm paranoid. They'll hear it run too long and know. They'll hear my fingers search the back of my throat for the release button, sloshing with saliva and know. They'll hear me lift up the toilet bowl and know. They'll smell my failure ooze through the paint in the walls and know. They'll know I only flush down the dinners they make me eat.
But of course they don't know.
I'm staying with the father and the preggers lady right now. She used to be the dad's wife, but she's pushing a baby out in less than 3 weeks, so she gets a new name. A new name for a new life with new challenges and new blessings. If they knew what I was still doing I'd ruin everything. The burden of caring. The guilt of being concerned yet annoyed all at once. Why now? they'd ask. What with the baby and the paint that still smells and the website for the book. We don't need this now. But she's sick. You have to care. You have to want to care.
You have to want to get better.
That's what the father told me. I'm not forcing you to get help again. I'm not dragging you to the clinic. You're going to make the call.
But I don't want to.
I don't want you going off to college without sorting this out. (Like it's a fucking clerical error)
So, you're not forcing me? You're just...passive-aggressively forcing me?
I know someone who's daughter died of a heart attack. She was going for a run. I don't want the same thing to happen to you.
(She was weak. She wasn't drinking enough water. I'm not that stupid.)
But the father does this all the time. He doesn't fake it. He's a 100% genuine caring kind of guy. Until he has to focus on something else. The book, the baby room, the baby, the wife, the old wife who wants to take away his precious money that he needs for his new family, new life, new patio furniture.
I am the invalid in bed all day, doing "homework" and "studying for exams" while refreshing my browser over and over and over. Nothing changes. I type a new Facebook status.
FUCK FUCK FUCK FAT FUCK STUPID UGLY WORTHLESS PIECE OF FLAB WHY DOESN'T ANYONE SEE WHY WON'T THEY STOP FORCING ME TO EAT WHY CAN'T I LIVE IN MY BED FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE THEY'RE JUST FUCKING PIGS
Delete delete delete.
Refresh again. Nothing's changed.
Go to my pro-ana site. Calories, help me, stay strong, fast fast fast, keep it up, new diets, new thinspos. My brain fills with the same emptiness. As hollow as my stomach.
I ate too much today. I ate like a normal person. I had apple sauce, cookies, lemon cake, trout, asparagus, and a baked potato with butter and sour cream. Purged some, but not all. Not enough. Paranoid. Are they coming up the stairs? They'll hear. They'll know. Footsteps creep up the stairway. I'm frozen, food mulch drenched in saliva dripping from my filthy hands.
I am a failure.
Go on my pro-ana chat. Talk to a friend without a face. I do five hundred crunches and fifty lunges. She cheers me on the whole way then goes to bed.
I can't sleep. I have an exam tomorrow that I didn't study for. I laid in bed all day, worrying the hunger monster would snatch me if I went anywhere near the kitchen. Of course it did. Family Dinner is its wicked minion. Once I start I can't stop.
I am a failure.
BUT
Tomorrow will be better.
It has to be.
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