The overindulgent anorexic

She ate too many 

Of those creamy

Hershey kisses. 

She said it wouldn’t matter,

That she was going to a place 

Of too much everything,

And not enough joy. 

So here she sits

In a hospital dining room

Picking slowly at her food. 

The constant chatter

Of manic patients 

Surrounds her. 

Adding to the constant torture 

In her own mind. 

She chose all of this. 

She could have just listened,

Make a meal plan 

Just eat. 

Don’t be so stubborn.

And above all, don’t throw up. 

But she faltered. 

She thrilled as numbers fell on scales

Of clothing falling off hips. 

She didn’t mind this part of disorder,

She liked to be fragile. 

And then somehow,

Her appetite grew

To obnoxious proportions. 

She constantly held 

Thoughts of food in her mind,

And stuffed candies 

In her mouth. 

There was this constant hunger. 

Don’t think,

Just eat and purge. 

She almost didn’t notice 

The width of her thighs expanding. 

She is now suffocated,

Trapped beneath layers 

of fat and flesh. 

Gasping for air. 

She knows they are talking,

Asking how she gained so much. 

Now she feels so unworthy,

Like she’s taking space

From someone more skeletal. 

Bones equals discipline. 

Bones get people to the top 

Of waiting lists. 

Emaciation has always been the goal. 

So why did she choose to eat.

She could no longer comfort herself

By running fingertips 

along protruding collarbones. 

Her hip bones disappeared 

Under the weight of overindulgence. 

She is a failure to her goal. 

I have let her down. 

I now carry a heavy burden 

For I never meant to do this to her. 

I know I don’t look like

Anyone deserving of help. 

I have let her down. 

I is she. 

And she is sad.

The In Between

,
Not as far
Down the rabbit hole I fall.

Just halfway between dark and light.

I can either crawl back up

Towards the light that shines

From the world above,

Or I can sink

Ever deeper now,

Towards that cold dark place

That holds familiarity. 

I’m stuck here in between. . 

I reach out a small purple hand.

It’s cold and frail,
I whisper to God above. 

I wait for signs,

But if I they come

Will I know what they mean?

I feel like I’ve lost 

The ability to understand 

Good from evil. 

Like that apple in the tree. 

It’s glossy red. 

My mouth waters,

But I don’t want to eat alone. 

I guess I’ll pray to make it through 

one more day. 

Until I find

The answers here 

In Between. 

It still hurts.

I can't stand you.
You're fucked up.
I love you...
But I don't like you.
The words sting
Coming from someone
You want to adore you.

Words can punch you in the gut.
Often harder than a physical blow.
I’ve internalized these feelings
A lonely and sad little girl.
I still feel inferior,
Incapable of love,
Terrified of taking up too much space
For fear of being that annoying,
Little girl you never wanted.

You don't think I'm trying.
You don't know my daily struggle
Just to face myself each day.
It's scary when your childhood
Flashes forward to adulthood
And I still feel like that little girl.
Absolutely devastated by your words.

That day last year.

To the sick girl
With the hollow eyes,
I see your pain.
I see your grief.
You very nearly disappeared.

The voice of lies,
Had become your own,
You almost lost your soul.
Those stick thin arms,
That dark limp hair.
The graying of your skin,
All somehow
A twisted victory
To a destructive disease.

Today I write
From my own comfy bed.
Today my cheeks are full.
My skin is bright,
My bones wear the padding
Of nourishment,
Of meals I dared to take.

But do not be fooled,
For I still grieve.
I often miss
That cold cocoon
That hid my fears,
And whispered secrets in my ear.

For now,
I feel exposed,
Laid bare.
This fat.
It pains me.
I feel suffocated
By my own flesh.

Anorexia,
She tells me
Between each breath I take,
That I have lost.
She takes my hand
And leads me away
From the grave
In which she is meant to lie.

Today I must choose
How to honour
That day last year
When an IV
Dripped life
Into my veins.
Do I grieve?
Or do I listen
To that alluring whisper
That wants me empty
Once again.

Dear God,
I pray for mercy.
I pray for grace.
Please help me lay
This disease to rest.
I can no longer stand
Before this grave.
This place feels unbearable now.

The tears have fallen
As days drew near
To that day
I let them
Lead me down a sterile hall.
Towards a hospital room
Where I would begin
To say goodbye.

Dear God,
Help me to release these chains.
Let me leave roses at her grave.
Let me say one last farewell,
Shed one final tear,
Kneel before the tomb
Where anorexia
Can now be laid to rest.

I choose life.
I choose flesh.
I choose hope.
Goodbye
Bittersweet disease.

I wear purple. 💜

I wear purple

For the girls 

Who stare out hospital windows

As they bring spoons to mouths

And briefly smile

At the girl at the table beside her. 

They eat to stop

The purple creeping up their hands 

When their heart beats slow. 

I wear purple 

For the girl

Who wrote me a note

In that little prayer room

Haunted by sanctity 

And ghosts of souls in pain. 

We are united in this suffering

But also soldiers in our courage. 

They do not know our strength

For it is hidden. 

Our limbs may be shrunken 

At our most afraid

But our hearts are ever beating

So strongly

Our bodies can not contain them. 

I wear purple

For the hand upon my shoulder

When tears begin to fall

And land in bowls of cornflakes. 

I wear purple for girls 

Who close their eyes

And open their hearts

To something different

Than they used to do

To survive a day

In a world

Unaccustomed to their sensitivity. 

💜

My Addiction

I have an addiction. 

Some are addicted to drugs.
Some to shopping.
Some to gambling.
My addiction is to numbers
That fall downward on a scale,
To bones that protrude,
To ridges,
To hollows beneath collarbones. 

I feel so much discomfort
In a body padded with fat.
I miss the ridge that forms
At my cheekbones.
I long to press my fingers
Into the spaces
Where fat now resides. 

I am a girl addicted to thinness. 

I don't write these words for sympathy,
Or for attention.
I wish to delete them,
To destroy every word

Like the torn pages of journals

I once dared to fill. 

I write these words
To bring understanding,
To help you understand 

Why some of us,

Become addicted. 
Prisoners to anorexia,
Or bulimia,
Or some combination of both.

Our neural pathways have become
Rigid and scarred
With the damage of starvation.
Food has become the enemy.
It brings immense fear.
Our heartbeats dance with sharp irregularity,
And our minds spin with self hatred

With every bite we take,

And with every glance in a passing mirror.  

You are fat.
You are ugly.
Disgusting.
Pathetic.
Selfish.
You have no self control.
You are shoveling food
Down a throat already raw

From your addiction. 

You're losing the game 

You thought you once played so well. 

So you long to purge.
And may be,
You do. 
Even after months
Of mind numbing boredom
In a hospital bed.

Somedays,
You just can't tolerate
This immense pain. 
The pounding of your chest
Brings you to your knees. 

Mom.
Dad.
I can never hide from you.

Even when I am strong,
You will still fear.

For now you will always wonder.
Suspicion is now the lense
Through which you see me.

And now the world knows my

Once tightly held secret. 
I hid under smiles 
And eyes that blinked back tears.
I would laugh,
And brush off your concern.
I'm fine.
I'm better.
Don't be so dramatic.

I miss having secrets.
It was easier to play this game
When you didn't know the rules. 
Now I can not hide so easily.

I can try.
I can roll my eyes.
I can smile reassuringly.
But now you know this game I play.
And now I feel the pain
Of disappointing you.
Of causing you to worry.
I'm so sorry that I stumble.

 

All I can do now,

I guess,

Is try to explain.
I can try to expose the cold,
Ugly shadows of this disease.

If I must suffer with this,
Let it not be in vain.
I will write so that you can understand
How I got here.

How a little girl,
At the age of twelve,
Began to hate her body. 
And counted sticks of carrots

While she calculated calories in her head.
How at thirteen she did 200 jumping jacks
After food touched her lips. 

I need you to understand 
Why her hands turned purple in winter,
And she no longer wanted to go outside. 

Anorexia changed her.
And it still plays tricks in her head.
No one chooses this addiction,
This disease.
It is not fun.
It hurts.
And sometimes it numbs,
But it always ends in pain
And terrifying loneliness.

All I ask is for you to try.
Try to understand
This strange affliction,

This misunderstood addiction. 
Please try not to hate me

When the voice inside my head
Won't let me sit beside you
At the dinner table,
Just know that the prayer I utter before meals
Is much different than yours.

Let me dampen your sweater
With salty tears.
I am so tired of walking this alone.
Please don't punish me
With angry silence.
Please just hold my hand.  

Please just try to understand. 
This inglorious addiction. 

My birthday.

God wanted me to see today. 

35 feels strange. 

This day forces me to reflect 

Upon the life 

I have been granted.

This life I live,

With each day a battle,

To nourish,

To eat,

To feel.  

I remember the dream

As I so often do, 

I remember 

It's heaviness,

So clearly. 

I fell and could not wake up

I passed from this earth

In that moment,

And it felt so real,

Yet so strange,

My heart beat loudly,

Erratically,

In my chest. 

I wasn't ready. 

As much as a part of me 

Wished to disappear. 

God wants me here today. 

I don't know all of his plans 

For my life now. 

I just know that

I have been given

A second chance..

To live. 

The future brings anxiety,

But also a tentative,

Breath of hope,

A small shiver,

of excitement. 

I am still struggling. 

I still long to crawl out of my skin

After meals. 

I still find pleasure in numbers 

Decreasing on scales. 

I still hate the thick liquid of ensure. 

I sometimes miss the 

Security of a hospital bed. 

Where I have little opportunity 

To obey the lies

Of anorexia. 

It is scary somehow,

To write from the heart,

While I am outside of 

Sanitary hospital walls. 

I feel exposed,

Afraid to admit my flaws,

And the truth

Of how many times

I fall each day. 

But I will not give up. 

Each day is a gift. 

And moment by moment,

I remain present 

On this earth. 

Kept here to learn,

To breathe this air,

To interact 

With others,

To join hearts,

And to hold hands. 

God please guide me. 

I stumble. 

And I fall. 

But carry me forward. 

Lift my eyes 

To what I am meant to see. 

Open my heart

To what I am meant to feel. 

I am here for a reason. 

I trust you 

For keeping me here. 

You give me the courage

To type these words 

In a warm bed 

I do not want to leave. 

I am alive today. 

I have fat beneath this skin,

Nutrients 

Keeping my heart beating,

And my mind alert 

And aware. 

I am here today 

And I will not give up

Or give in. 

I have things left to do

People left to see,

And moments left to live. 

Ghosts.

I'm out of the hospital. 

I'm back in a house,

Where my demons nearly destroyed me. 

I find myself staring in utter sadness

At the photos I took towards

What felt like the end. 

This is hard. 

This is painful. 

I'm devastated by my eyes,

The pallor of my skin,

In those photographs. 

When I was in the hospital

Just last week,

I forgot. 

I was focused on the heaviness

Of a body I now inhabit. 

I wanted so badly to shed layers of fat

And with it,

Layers of shame. 

But now I lie,

Alone in a bed,

I slept in months ago. 

The memories are painful. 

I am so lucky to be alive. 

I feel terrified. 

I truly do. 

I'm in a new body

But my mind can still revisit

The thoughts,

The darkness,

of those frightening 

And torturous days. 

I am reading my first entries

As if i was not the one

Who typed these words 

Into the small keyboard

Of her phone,

Several long months ago. 

Tears fill my eyes. 

Sadness pierces my soul. 

I'm afraid. 

I can never go back there,

If I truly choose life,

I can never go back there. 

I have two options today. 

Life...

Or the path I took before,

The one that carried me

On a slow descent to death. 

I'm in shock 

It seems. 

I forgot this place. 

And now I'm home.

I'm lying in a room

Haunted by the memory,

The horrific pain,

Of those last days. 

I look in the mirror

And then look at the photos

And I am so afraid. 

I can't go back there. 

I have two very different paths to choose. 

One is life. 

The other death. 

I forgot for a moment,

During those boring,

Long and dragging 

days in the hospital,

How incredibly 

Lucky 

I was to be saved. 

Dear God,

Give me strength. 

Show me the determination

I need right now,

Please slay the ghost

Of anorexia 

So I can move forward 

Toward a future 

That is bright 

And full of promise. 

Help me to have compassion

For that sick girl

I was,

And for the recovering

One that I am today. 

Heartache

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The days are long. 

I am now trying to maintain this weight. 

No longer meant to be gaining. 

Instead I must learn 

That this number on the scale...

These jeans that will not fit,

If I dared tried them on,

Is okay. 

It's healthy, 

they say. 

As if the words do anything more

than make me cringe. 

Healthy has never been the goal. 

Thinness. 

Whisper thin so that no one 

Could ever say that

I take up too much space. 

The heaviness feels unbearable. 

It truly feels like my heart is sinking 

With the weight of my body. 

Once again,

I find myself wishing,

Longing,

To see my bones protrude. 

I glamorize the past 

As if I was happy

At that place. 

These days are hard. 

They are long. 

They hurt my heart,

And my soul cries out 

To be heard. 

I need a hug,

A strong embrace. 

A hand held tightly,

In your own. 

Please wrap your arms

Around me

Without boundaries

That must be maintained. 

These sterile white walls,

These fluorescent lights,

The nurses that guard the trays 

Before meals,

They all serve to make me feel alone. 

Separate. 

A patient. 

A number. 

A last name on a chart. 

I've been struggling 

More than I thought I would. 

Being housed in this body 

Still feels so foreign and strange. 

Once again,

I find solace in knowing 

That prayers have been sent up for me,

Prayers to help set me free.

Free of this disease. 

My body is healing,

It is nourished and full.

My mind has yet to catch up,

Please send up more prayers.

This journey is long,

And my heart is aching 

To be healed.