I Mean, We All Know The Dangers

My Bones Are Brittle, My Heart Weak And Erratic, My Esophagus And Stomach Riddled With Ulcers, My Reproductive System Shot, My Immune System Useless... I'm Not Going To Have A Happy Ending.

Some People Who Are Obsessed With Food Become Gourmet Chefs. Others Become Eating Disorders.

Madness Is Not What It Seems. Time Stops. All My Life I've Been Obsessed With Time, Its Motion And Velocity, The Way It Works You Over, The Way It Rushes You Onward, A Pebble Turning In A Brook. I've Always Been Obsessed With Where I'd Go, And What I'd Do, And How I Would Live. I've Always Harbored A Desperate Hope That I Would Make Something Of Myself. Not Then. Time Stopped Seeming So Much Like The Thing That Would Transform Me Into Something Worthwhile And Began To Be Inseparable From Death. I Spent My Time Merely Waiting.

If I Had Been A Different Sort Of Person, Maybe Less Impressionable, Less Intense, Less Fearful, Less Utterly Dependent Upon The Perceptions Of Others - Maybe Then I Would Not Have Bought The Cultural Party Line That Thinness Is The Be-all And End-all Of Goals. Maybe If My Family Had Not Been In Utter Chaos Most Of The Time, Maybe If My Parents Were A Little Better At Dealing With Their Own Lives Maybe If I'd Gotten Help Sooner, Or If I'd Gotten Different Help, Maybe If I Didn't So Fiercely Cherish My Secret, Or If I Were Not Such A Good Liar, Or Were Not Quite So Empty Inside... Maybe.

I Threw Up Again That Night, Half-afraid That My Eyeballs Would Explode. But It Was, By Far, More Important That I Get Rid Of Dinner. Of Course, By Then, Throwing Up Was The Only Way I Knew How To Deal With Fear. That Paradox Would Begin To Run My Life: To Know That What You Are Doing Is Hurting You, Maybe Killing You, And To Be Afraid Of That Fact--but To Cling To The Idea That This Will Save You, It Will, In The End, Make Things Okay.