I’m in a weird mental space tonight. I will probably delete this.
For as long as I can remember, I existed on the periphery.
I don’t want to make any definitive statements about how other people perceive me, because I know mental illness can deceive you.
Now I’m just musing about my core wounds and how they’ve shaped my adult life.
There’s shame. It’s given me body image issues on a grand scale. I used to close the bathroom door, get undressed, and pull at my skin until it turned red. Silently scream at myself in the mirror and remind myself that I was ugly. That I was a waste of space. I should die. No one will love me when I look like this, so there’s no point.
I assume the root of this thinking stems from a crush who publicly humiliated me in front of our classmates when we were in middle school. I was in 7th grade. It was gym class. I was the depressed, fat girl with only the weird emo kids as friends. I called his girlfriend a slut. I had probably just learned what that word even meant.
He told me, “That’s why you’re fat and can’t get a boyfriend.”
Oddly, it’s almost like he was right all those years ago. He successfully condemned me to a life of isolation.
I saw him in Walmart a few months ago — pot-bellied and bald. It didn’t really make me feel any better. It made me laugh a bit to myself. I still felt like that ugly little girl who cried in front of everyone. I quickly turned down a separate aisle.
Funnily enough, there was about a year or two in high school where I still really craved his validation. I wanted someone, anyone, to tell me that I was pretty. That what I always suspected to be true was, in fact, a lie. That he was joking. That he didn’t mean it. But it never came.
I would hug him whenever I saw him in the hallway. I think my brain used it as just enough evidence. I wasn’t horrific.
He had a crush on my friend that I was always jealous of. I gradually lost interest.
I’m sure it didn’t help that in high school, girls I considered my friends would do their absolute best to fuck the guy I had a crush on. Because what is girlhood if not passively torturing one another?
And I’ve written about these things. You can read the poetic version where I speak as though I’m inhabiting a dream sequence. Part of these experiences almost didn’t feel real.
And I know I’m not the only person life has punched down on, but it always ends that way. And I always find myself back here. When I end up in this space of despair, rawness, ugliness — I always want to smack myself. Why the fuck am I not listening?
My therapist implies I’m ridiculous.
“You’ve only been rejected like, what, five times in twelve years? That’s not a lot.”
But it’s more than enough for me. I try to let it roll off my back, but I’ve been silently building a case against myself in my head for years. Every rejection, every no, is used as proof.
You’re too ugly. Too fat. You’re embarrassing yourself. Did you really think he liked you that way? Idiot.
He’s Just Not That Into You became a bible of sorts. My algorithm my preacher. Every video of a young woman weeping about being ugly or ugly privilege ignited rage within me. My worst nightmare was haunting me through my phone — lonely, ugly, and forgotten.
I lost weight because it felt as though I was putting lipstick on a pig. The few compliments I did receive, I never believed. Even now, one hundred and fifteen pounds lighter, I freeze and sheepishly say thank you.
Thank you for noticing me and, by the way, did you know I used to be morbidly obese? Save your attention for an individual worthy of it.
I rarely allow myself the pleasure of indulging in this level of self-hatred. If I’m being honest, it feels so good to dig the knife in deeper.
There’s so much energy required for hope. Sometimes, I don’t even want to bother anymore. But I can’t bring myself to cry anymore. I don’t think I’m out of tears — maybe I’m finally at acceptance.
If I have to be alone, can I live with that?
And I want to ask God or someone — why? Why me? Am I not pretty enough? Skinny enough? Am I too much? I feel as though I was born inside out. Or I was formed incorrectly. There’s just something wrong about me.
I wish I could go to a cabin in the woods and have someone lock me inside. I would bring a book or two. Smash my phone. Leave my laptop behind. There would be a fireplace. And I’d just exist in this liminal space. No expectations, no alarms, no surprises.
I would finally be left alone for good. I wouldn’t have to be pretty. I wouldn’t have to be thin. I wouldn’t obsess over every bite of food I take.
Maybe I could stare out the window and watch how life continues on without me. Or curl up in a blanket and stare at the wall. Absorb the complete silence of my new life.
I hope it would snow. I hope it would blanket the wilderness and rustle the trees.
If you take anything from this, I leave you with this:
A) I need to increase my Prozac dosage.
B) Losing weight solves nothing. You’ll still be the confused, lonely fat girl on the inside.
C) In an intense desire to overexplain myself and not be misunderstood, if you read this and think this story sounds familiar. Sorry in advance. I harbor no ill will toward anyone, but a desire to understand my mistreatment. I know I won’t ever get an answer as to why. And I’m learning to be okay with that.