That's Some Headache

They say silence is golden, but for me it's forgotten.

I don't know when the argument first started, when the words began to circulate through my head, but it doesn't ever let up regardless of its age and repetition. Always the same words over and over again:

You're fat.
You're ugly.
You're such a cow, I can't believe you're eating that.
Go for a walk. NOW.
You're worthless. You can't even stop the hunger.
That faintness? It's GOOD. It means your body's burning calories.

But I lost twenty pounds in two months. I spent my whole summer starving myself and (horror of horrors) I'm PROUD of it. The feeling of control from that was about the best thing ever. Looking back it seems like a good time. It's almost as if I don't remember the obsession, the fatigue, the paranoia brought on by self-inflicted malnutrition. Yet those things happened. And IT was always there.

Just shut UP already, you stupid disorder! Leave me alone! I know what you think of me. I've heard your comments, your snide insults, the way you insist that right is wrong and wrong is right. I'm SICK of you.

Yet I love you. You offer me everything - control, happiness, the strength of will to deal with dissatisfaction. The ability to become beautiful.

No. Not beautiful. Ugly. Hideous. A living skeleton.

Supermodel thin.

Heroin-addict thin.

Absolutely in control.

Malnourished and dying.

At least I won't be a fat cow anymore. At least I won't hate myself.

SHUT UP! LEAVE ME ALONE! Don't you see, I've heard it all before! I heard it when I lost ten pounds, twenty, thirty, forty! I know what you promise, and by now I know it's not true. Can't you let me be?

Of course not. To stop would be suicide. I'd gain all the weight back. I'd be miserable again.

I can't take this anymore. I don't want to die. I want to live. I want to live. I want to live.

They say silence is golden.

They have no freaking idea.