I’m here,
I am here.
Not back.
But here, enough for now. Deciding whether to stay or go, to keep running in a headlong pursuit of pain, punishment, passing judgements on myself over and over, harsh and swift, and a summation of the injustices in a single word: unworthy.
I am unworthy.
Sentenced to pain and confusion. Sentenced to be still, stuck. Sentenced to an inability to pursue happiness. Sentenced to hunger, cold, exhaustion, shaken nerves, slashed confidence, cruel self-reflections. Sentenced to stand in front of the mirror, not allowed to look away from the vilest versions of myself encased in the glass, their errors and faults held within the thick layers of skin and they are huge.
And it is all too much, just simply too much. I don’t know if death is preferable, but I can’t take that chance.
So I turn the mirrors around. I listen to music to drown out the cruel voice. I take my medication. I take the elevator, I cry through dinner, but I am still eating it. I sit at work, sometimes, I eat dessert, sometimes. I sit on the couch and knit instead of doing leg lifts and planks and jogging the stairs.
And this is far from over. My weight hovers just under the doctors’ safe range, and I didn’t eat lunch or breakfast today, but I’ll tell Joe about it and we’ll eat dinner together, and he’ll hug me when I start crying in fear and exhaustion. And he’ll hide the mirror for me, and distract me when the cruel voice becomes loud enough to spill out my mouth. We drown it out, for a time, and it retreats to crouch in a viscous mass on the edge of everything.
I am host to a multitude of parasites, but sometimes I’m strong enough to begin peeling away their fleshy holds, one by one, and it hurts so much. It rips me open. People say this will all be worth it because I’m so strong and incredibly brave and have depth and experiences beyond my years and will be able to help people because of all this, and I wish I could say those things about myself and believe them. I wish I had that gentle quality, I wish I felt compassion for myself.
I just know that I’d rather try to live than not.
