The Eternal Winter Solstice

The Winter Solstice is the day of the year with the least sunlight and the most darkness. Spoiler alert, Dolls, the eternal Winter solstice is an eating disorder. It's the kind that'll shelter those precious moments of sun.

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Constants are the components of an eating disorder that are neverending, just like the darkness will feel when you're buried beneath your blankets with a heat pack between your knees and a hot chocolate in your hand. Constants are the cold that doesn't leave, the wind that doesn't catch a break, the heart that's never beating, not quite, not quite at all. Calories. They will forcibly transform you into a human calculator. Your waking hours will be spent adding, substituting, multiplying, dividing, and mostly, subtracting, subtracting, subtracting. Becoming thinner will feel as though it's all that matters in this world. You'll lose the substance of life, the things that ignite your soul and burn your flames. It'll feel so cold as you shiver away to the bone, physically as your insulation melts away and mentally as your worth, hobbies and passions are torn... no, stripped... no, executed. It isn't gentle. It is incessant. And brutal. And unfortunately, the most real thing you'll have ever felt.

Your eternal Winter solstice will live up to it's name - the cold-ening of your soul.

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In my suffering from anorexia and depression, I've become accustomed to the belief that a beautiful existence is made entirely of the pitter-patter of rain that are our forecasted joys. They are the plentiful delights made up in small or big ways. I also believe that the parts of our lives that disable those joys are the same things that drive us to despair and heartbreak. The joys of a Winter solstice are memories, activity, and freedom. A beautiful life is made up of the memories you recount in your mind. And in living with an eating disorder, there are endless memories you'll either never get to make or will be tainted with an underlying numbness. Activities one engages with in a fulfilling life include skiing, walks in the sunshine, post-run coffees or pilates classes. But for those who are too sick, the reality of their life is a blackened world and one million silver stars from battling a simple flight of stairs. Freedom is a component of life that manifests in many unique ways. For some, freedom is the choice to vote. For some, it's dancing until the midnight hour. And for others, it's wealth great enough to be able to cease working. Freedom is everywhere and nowhere all at once, it seems. I have so many freedoms in my life that I'm immensely grateful for, including my freedom to love whoever I choose and the family and financial security to work on my mental and physical health. I'm immensely lucky which is of significance to note considering my freedom cannot be harnessed in so many ways. I often feel as though my freedom is wasted. I live so abundantly in some ways and yet, I cannot relish in elaborate home-cooked meals or extravagantly catered meals that I have available to me at my fingertips.

My freedom, my sweet, brightly lit freedom is limited by the dark curse of my own mind.

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The brightness in your life isn't all about your luck. The brightness in your life involves the energy you unearth, the opportunities you allow yourself to grab onto and the wisdom you inherit. But if you take away one thing, Dolls, let it be that your world can always be brighter, but you must be brave enough to take all that you see.

All my love,

COS x