You know back in the day they said “you are what you eat” and that was enough to scare me. It meant there are no secrets and everyone sees what you do and eating more or for pleasure was shameful. I found -who I thought-was the one at my thinnest and to his delight, I got thinner and thinner. I gauged this through his attention or willingness to show me off to other people. I can remember once that he said I was sexy and outside that very core memory; once when he said I looked pretty. I could tell you every detail of those moments, where I was what I was wearing what he was wearing head to toe what we were doing everything. If I could be desirable I could maybe find protection. There were moments in our relationship I desperately needed someone to stand up for me, he really lacked in those moments.

I was always made to feel a problem. And at times when I had no responsibility to anyone but myself, I was a problem. Through drugs and exercise and starvation and any means I aimed to be as “worthy” as possible. Hyperfixation on food and thinness allowed me to deprioritize any other trauma I should have been working through. Being pretty was a coping mechanism I just wanted someone to want me.

When that relationship broke all the way down and addiction once again became the thing that would dictate my plans I became focused on one thing- No one was going to sympathize with me or believe there was future happy ending for me if I was not pretty. So I starved and I worked out and binged alcohol to binge something to numb the pain so I could get on with what I had to do.

And no matter how pretty I was things didn’t improve for me. In fact the men I thought I was making connections with viewed me as a toy. And dating up in age only amplified that pov. They threw me away; every single one. And in my mind I began to think maybe I’m just not pretty enough.

It’s important to note while this remains the over arching story in my mind I am dealing with near daily trauma of being a single mom, absolute exhaustion while trying to portray a perfect life because if I do anything less the courts will take my children away because my ex and his mother have fabricated a reality to Child protective services that I’m a severe Danger to them. I completed the humiliation ritual- a year of random, fully supervised drug testing. My ex opted out. I had to be perfect. I was promoted 4 times over the next years. While maintaining my children’s extra curricular activities which I paid for and furnished alone 99.9% of the time- I fear he’ll say he gave money for a registration fee once.

The point is the weight of everything and the amount of crying you do begins to show on your face. Like craters on the moon and empty riverbeds in the desert. And it’s not any longer “you are what you eat” but it’s suddenly another familiar call from my grandmother “your face might stay like that”.

My face bares the marks of tears and my stomach and neck bears swelling from toxic floods of cortisol; from years of living in survival. My face is scarred from picking at any and all imperfections, boiling and searing my skin to find any trace of youth left.

And this summer I couldn’t hold on to it. It all fell away and suddenly there was no pretty left and in my long lived paradigm that means no hope no future. What is the future if I don’t ever appeal to someone’s eyes again?

I’ve become utility. I serve the purpose of raising my children and purpose I know is so important and substantial and valid to the human spirit and so, I go on in duty.

Is it such a sickness to long to be adored? I just fear that I will never be taken care of because I will never be adored, having fallen short of the expectations of everyone while equally being failed by them

It’s so stupid that I even wanted my son to think of me as beautiful too and his harsh words towards my appearance maybe sting the most. I almost killed myself this year and I’m not pretty anymore and I wish I had the strength to come back from those things