I FAILED

Just when everyone thought I would fly, I crawled back into the cocoon of anorexia: ‘I’m too fat’ plagued me, ‘I’m worthless’ plagued me, and ‘I’m a lost cause’ plagued me. I’ve resorted to what’s safe, and I hate myself for it.

---

Selfish is the feeling that's like a boulder on my chest. It's selfish that I've re-established an all too familiar ground in which I kill hope.

My beautiful mother has done nothing but love me to life, and I’ve done nothing but rob her of it - true living; spontaneity, joy, harmony, and peace.

The fights feel like death. The crying feels like death. The suffering feels like death. And I want to be more for her, I want to be the most for her, and I know I can be. But I don’t know if I ever will be. The truth rips my heart in two. I hate how strong anorexia is in my mind; the evil and subtle way it infiltrates it with its evil thoughts, broken promises, and endless, endless lies. Selfish is what it looks like, what it sounds like, and what everybody thinks me to be. Beautifully, my mum and dad are the ones who understand and vocalise the most their comprehension of the fact that my 'selfishness' is a disguise of what is true; that the illness acts in ways that do seem selfish. They are the ones who forgive me and love me unconditionally. I’m so tired of hurting everyone, of worrying them, and of devastating them. Through my selfish actions, whether one considers them selfish or not, I’ve given my family every reason to completely despise me, in the way I despise myself. I wonder every day if this will be the day they never look back and leave me in the rotten ground to suffocate and die alone in eternity.

---

I failed our road trip holiday. I came in so strong, and I came out so weak. But at least, at the very least, I gave everyone half a holiday. Though not a full one, also not an empty one. I was so brave, so good, and so strong. And the smiles and joy that brought for 3 sweet weeks was like a honey bee swimming in a pool of honey; a pool that was more full than it had been since I first became ill. But nonetheless, I did fail it. I hate myself for succumbing to the lies of anorexia, the familiarity of it, and the strength of its agonising pull. For just a little while, I got my spark back, and it felt so, so good, not just for everyone else but also for me to remember what it was like to live up to my name. But the spark failed, and all of the lights went out.

It's excruciating to be a prisoner to my own sparkless mind, once again... once a-fucking-gain.

For I’m not a writer, I’m not a girl, I’m not a lover, a daughter, or a student... I’m an anorexic. And I think that’s all I know how to be now. I’m so broken from having identified as a failure to this beautiful life that others know how effortlessly to be a part of that, I don't know if I will ever get the opportunity to fully recover. Have my wounds been so often? Have they been too deep? I failed the road trip, and whilst perhaps a short few weeks of failure seem insignificant in the scheme of things, in my mind, the road trip represented itself as a much more significant opportunity for achievement. In my mind, the road trip was my chance to recover in a setting of life. I want, so desperately, to manage the life that so many others can, willingly, enthusiastically, and indefinitely.

---

For now, I sit in this room behind my keyboard, typing out the words that I know how to say like the back of my hand. I’m used to the speech now. I’m used to the words that make the tears in my parents’ eyes fall. I’m used to being the breaker of hearts. Even though it kills my soul, it blackens my heart, it ruins my ability to believe I’m anything other than a selfish, broken girl.

Kisses,

COS x