I have to keep going, no matter what. Whether the waters be still or rough I know I cannot give up now.
I have all the reasons to in my head, crystal clear and sharply defined. The reasons to eat and let my body be what it naturally needs to be. The reasons to recover. Te reasons to ignore the screaming demands of the voice and carve my own ilittle path.
I have all the reasons. I have all the infomation and knowledge. If there was one thing that Emmy can claim to be fairly savvy on, it’s anorexia. I know all about the different ways in which it can affect the body as well as I do the shape of my own face in the mirror. I can recite the factors which can come into play in developing the disorder, and could easily give you a concise account of the signs and symptoms to look out for. I know it so well, after all. ed and I have been friends for a long, long time.
So now it’s time to act and use that knowledge as power.
But with me there is always… a but after the if. If I choose to recover I will help to improve my osteoporosis. but then the sly voice breaks in.
But you’ve already caused enormous damage. Your bones are already ruined. Your short and titchy and have an abnormal frame. The damage has already been done, Em. It’s too late to start making changes now.
And I always tend to listen to the last part more than the first, to fixate on what it’s saying. You’re already short and ugly. That’s the one that repeats itself more recurrently these days.
I guess it’s because I’m so constantly reminded of it. Being within a group of thirteen girls in my accomodation here, no prizes for guessing who is the shortest of all of us. I feel it whenever I am stnaidng beside someone else or when we take a picture out in the snow.
This morning downstairs in the little warm room where we dry our clothes, I stood and stared at the mirror for a very long time. My eyes travelled from the short legs to the small torso and then to the head. I particularly studied the roundness of the face. Another thing that I hate. Why do I have a face that is so fat and round? I thought to myself bitterly. Self-loathing swept over me in an icy wave, chilling me to the bone.
I do feel it here; the constant feeling of inferiority. It’s not something anyone here has caused through actions or words. Rather, it’s just me and my thoughts. The thoughts that have the potential to kill my happiness and rip it to bloody shreds. Im The shortest one, the ugliest one. I compare myself every day to everyone else and ruminate miserably on my own deficiencies. And what makes it worse is knowing that I could have changed this. Well, maybe not the face, but most certainly my height, and perhaps my frame. For to me it is all just so ugly. Repulsive and unattractive. I search and search but I cannot find a fragment of prettiness – let alone beauty- there.
Part of me wonders as to why I care so much. Why this, in the face of everything I’ve been through, is liable to make me so, so unhappy.
If I could escape these thoughts, I would do so in a heartbeat. But it’s not so easy when they’ve been there for as long as I can remember.
I remember the last time I thought I looked “pretty”. Standing in front of the silvery length of glass which we all know as a mirror, but to me, as much an instrument of torture as the hated scales are.
That was a moment in a past life, before the transition that changed everything. I was twelve years old and was performing in a school play. I had on a blue dress that twirled about when I spun and emphasised my then newly budding breasts.
That was the last time I felt pretty. Ever since that day, I slowly sank into self-hatred, a deep and murky sea out of which it is not so easy to pull oneself out of.
If only I could find the way, because I know that these feelings of inferiority are getting in the way of my recovery. All those ifs and buts. If I gain weight I will help myself but…I don’t really see the point, because I am ugly, and putting on more will simply serve to augment the ugliness which is already there.
Why has my happiness always been so tied up in how the world sees me? I could so easily sink now but I know I will not let myself. I have to kick hard and fight to stay afloat, as I know that these waters which I have to swim through, are rough.
