Yesterday I didn't throw up. Millions of people didn't throw up yesterday. Maybe billions.  But for me, it was momentus.  The day before that, I ate until it hurt and threw up. I did that over and over the day before that.  The day before that I threw up.  The day before that...

My life is in ruins because i have made it so.  I have lost my job, my health, my looks... I am starting today.  I am starting to care.  I am starting to look at the sun and not dread the warm weather.  I will feel its warmth and be glad.  Be glad that I am alive.  I will be glad that this is an illness I CAN CHANGE. i don't have cancer, I am not shot or stabbed or paralyzed or a million other classifications that would give rise to hopelessness.  I am hopeful.  I am a gem.  I can save myself! I don't have to wait for a cure, I don't have to hate myself.  I don't have to look at myself in a mirror and think I am a monster.  I am not a monster. I am not a monster.  I am not a monster.  It's just so hard to actually believe that.  This fat, this layer of skin on top of bone and muscle and what i perceive to be beauty makes me feel like a hideous deformed monster that no one could love.  Only once i shed that layer do i deserve any sort of respect or good fortune or most of all love.  This fat is worthlessness.  this fat is terrifying.  it sits there. it sits there and stares back at me.  it sits there and lets me touch it and grab at it and defies me.  it won't go away!!!! it's brave and it's ugly and it's fucking stubborn.  It's not afraid of me.  I am not it's worst enemy. it is reversed.  I am scared of it.  I am supplicant to it.  I listen to everything it tells me i am. it defines me. 

Yesterday I ran.  I ran and ran and ran.  I came home and i was so happy. I felt beautiful and thin and in control.  Then I took a shower. FAT FAT FAT.  It happens every single day of my life.  I catch my reflection in a store window and i look at my face.  it is wide it is a double chin it is chubby cheeks it is disgusting.  I catch my silhouette in a shadow.  My butt is jiggling.  I think oh my god, how disturbing.  everyone can see my fat.  My fat is hanging over my pants.  I should have worn a potato sack.  I belong in a fucking circus.  I want to crawl into a gutter where no one will find me and no one will notice that I am fat.  That woman just looked at me. she can't stop staring at my fat- she must feel sorry for me or wonder how it is that I walk around with my head up.  That man didn't look at me.  He must be averting his eyes.  I make him uncomfortable because i am so incredibly ugly.  It happens everyday.  20 times a day. sometimes a minute.  Just when you thought you were beautiful, nope! you silly idiot, you are not.  that girl at the next table that you are SURE your boyfriend is picturing naked is the beautiful one.  Look at how you can see her bones.  She is so much skinnier than you.  Look down at your fat.  look at it. LOOK AT IT.  your stomach folds over your pants. your thighs. jesus christ your thighs.  rub your love handles.  ha. love handles.  just grab them.  You were having a good time at dinner weren't you.  you were laughing and having fun.  Thought maybe you could eat a normal meal. ah ah ah! you will finish this food- even when you are full- you will order the biggest most decadent dessert. you will get angry at your boyfriend for no reason so that he leaves you alone.  you will walk over to the grocery store and you will buy as much food as you can carry so that the checkout boy doesn't look too hard at you.  then you will eat it.  you will eat it and you will feel better. you will forget. you will forget that you are fat that you have bills that no one loves you that the woman at the other table was beautiful.  You won't think! for as long as that food is in your mouth, you will not think. about anything.

Yesterday I didn't throw up.  I ate "too much".  I ate more than will allow me to lose weight.  I finished that spaghetti. But i didn't throw up.  Small step.  I still feel fat, i still hear that voice that tells me "imagine,  imagine for a moment that you had- your stomach would probably be flatter, and you could probably see your ribs a little bit clearer. then you'd feel better today. you could've had a good day, if only you'd have thrown up.  you better not eat anything.  You will prepare dinner tonight and serve it to your family.  But you will not lick your fingers. you will tell them you had a lot before they even came home.  you will feel so tired tonight because you didn't eat a crumb today."   I will listen.  I will listen to that voice today and i will starve.  but i will put that voice in quotations.  it is no longer my own.  that is the step i am taking today.  Yesterday, i didn't throw up.  today, I'm adding quotations. tomorrow...