As I sat in the bathtub last night a sudden fear consumed me. You are swollen, swollen with accumulated triglycerides. Maybe I am speaking of the wrong kind of molecules. It has been some times since I have last faced chemistry. But last night was a simple observation of the fear that consumes me. And yet failure feels so tangible and so peaceful.
Tick tock goes life as I sit contemplating. The tick tock never stops unless I am asleep. Even then I wake to the beep beep beep. Wake up! Wake Up! Maybe in eight more minutes but then I have to rush everything. The one thing that takes priority is stepping on the scale. How many joules of energy are in a kcal? I need to burn more energy than I consume but how then can my body not be stressed. I am already stressed by school. Reading, reading, talking, writing, I push buttons at work, I cut tomatoes, I put cheese onto bread. My life feels so insignificant.
There is no one. They have all left so I pester mother five times in the day. I’m happier when I’m alone anyway but solitude is chosen and loneliness is not. Lately my solitude feels like loneliness.
I walk in the street and I suddenly see people, beautiful people who can wear shorts and skirts and not feel inadequate nor judged. I crave to be them and yet my appetite begs me for food. So I walk around choosing the one thing that will make me fail again this week. Do you want more? Any dessert? I want to say yes. I want to not care. Instead I become frustrated and walk away. Too many options. Food is pleasure but I just want to fit into the jeans from last year. And yet I cave to hunger, I cave to anxiety.
Every decision that I make has some weight. Weight is the problem. I won’t even go to the doctor because I don’t want my current weight acknowledge and documented. It is just shame and failure. How many cakes did I eat? And still I cannot make the decision to stay away from the extra pastry, the diet soda, all the foods that should be banned from my life.
I can’t handle living. “I would lust more after you if you were thinner”. “You should lose weight so that the next guy in your life likes you for your body because no one is going to like the real you.”Except the real me doesn’t care about anything but her body. “look at her honey, her things are bigger than mine, we have to do something, she has to lose weight.” The last quote was made by my father. I was much younger and sitting next to him. “You look like such a doll.” “Laura you look so thin.” “Are you eating enough?” “You get thinner every day, it’s sickening”. ” How much weight did you lose.” Calculations of why I suddenly just felt dizzy all the time. “I can’t eat or sleep.” “Here are some pills.” “They make my stomach flush itself out”. “Here are some others”.
It’s torturous to live in the shadow of a fragmented self. The real self who lies behind the self-hatred who is beautiful and the self that dominates within one’s life that is the self-hatred. It isn’t easy.
Here are some things that I refuse to do because of my self-hatred:
Swimming ( Being in a bathing suit is damnation).
Socializing ( If there’s food or alcohol leave me out).
Wearing whatever I like ( Because like certain clothes just make you look fatter right?)
This list is vastly long but I can say that I can’t even enjoy vacation because all rooms have mirrors, and mirrors show flaws. And also because I can’t control the food that I eat and I cannot exercise which destroys everything.
I guess I just needed to say something. This is somewhat superficial but it needed to be written because inside of me this lies deeply and affects me every day.
QuietReflections 