These Hateful Bones

A Stream of Consciousness on ED

I want to scream.

Lodged in my lungs are spores of hate. I’d like to believe that if I can scream, loud enough, long enough, with enough force I can expel the spores.

I know this is not true. The hate is no spore, no visiting toxin.

No it is homegrown, native to my body.

It is in my bones, my muscles, my organs, and stitched across my skin.

I am a hateful thing.

The hate feels like fire incinerating me from the inside out. It feels like being eaten alive by shame and guilt, by disgust.

There is a shackle around my heart and a weight in my stomach, preventing me from escaping the disgusting weight of my body.

I am drowning.

Nose burning, eyes stinging. The thoughts are swimming.

They are so loud, a chorus of waves crashing into me. I cannot catch my breath.

I am going to die.

I am going to die in this prison, my body. My worst enemy, myself, will kill me because I did not do more, could not rise to the challenge of being perfect, so I must be punished.

What use am I if I am not perfect?

I don’t want to die, but I cannot bear the weight of my failure. It gnaws at me, eroding me. Soon there will be nothing left but these hateful bones.

I wonder will I find a way to love then.

When there is no excess flesh and fat to burn, can I love these thin hateful bones

Or is my wish to be smaller a wish to be nothing at all?

At night, I cannot tell the difference.