Top 10 things I could live without

Trigger warning: eating disorder

1.My mothers hair,  Everyone said I had my mothers hair. I never wanted to be anything like her. Living with her past in the small town I grew up in only led to me being mistaken for her. Over and over again. I’d had enough of my mothers hair. I’d had enough of braiding it and combing it trying to get it into a hairstyle where someone wouldn’t immediately ask if I was her daughter. I’d had enough styling at all. I cut it all off, up to my ears. It was short and no longer looked like hers. But it still didn’t feel like mine.

2. My fathers eyes, of course I had to inherit something from him too, but no one around here knows him. But I know him. I recognize him staring back at me in the mirror. Grandma asked me why I had broken the mirror in my room, and then the one in the bathroom. I couldn’t look at myself in the eyes so I took it out on the mirrors. It didn’t help by the way, only distorted my image a bit. If only I didn’t need my eyes to see, I feel like I need to take them out.

3. Smokey smells that follow me everywhere. I cannot escape the smell that captured me when I was young, the smell that burnt the skin on my legs, that forces me to only wear pants and never go swimming. The smell lingers, wherever I go, I’ve grown accustomed to it, but it also gives me nightmares. I dream of the flames and of fire and explosions. Of smoke and of burning and  of ashes. Whatever is wrong with my nose simply makes my life harder than it needs to be.

4. The name upon my birth certificate. She said I couldn’t change it but it has never fit me right. I’ve tried to go by others but she refuses to try. I tried to accept it but I can’t seem to make it stick. I feel myself cringe every time it is said. Why does it feel so wrong when it is one thing that is supposed to be innately me? Do I really have to go on with a name that hurts to hear? Maybe someday I’ll meet someone to call me what I want to be called.

5. Food- at least for up to a week at a time. I’ve done it many times before. At first it was hard the first time the fridge was empty. It was hard to distract myself. But now I know I can make it without food for longer than I expected. I can make it until I feel myself weakening in my legs and arms. Maybe next time I will try to make it longer… To make it as long as possible, until I feel too weak to move, and even after that until I cannot open my eyes. I think I can live without food. I don’t know how long.

6. School.  It was only designed to point out how bad I am at these normal human things like sitting still in a seat or being quiet, or reading from the board. All things I do not like to do.These things make me stand out. I used to be the fun one. Eccentric and exciting. Now that we are older they seem to think I’m more annoying. I can’t look at the ones who used to be my friends. The ones who now jeer into me and follow me, only to point out when I’ve made a mistake. I’d rather avoid it, avoid the teasing and the grading and the reading and the math and everything else that makes me feel like I probably shouldn’t be considered a human. I would avoid it if I didn’t feel so much worse here.

7. Getting older, the way it changes me is frightening. How irreversible it is, how people will absolutely know I am a woman. That scares me. I can never go back to the way I was before, and I know that everything about me will be different! Or so they tell me. I will become someone new and what if I do not like who I am at the end of it? I can’t turn back time but I at least want to turn into someone I’d like if I have to change at all. Besides, I prefer when people don’t know if I’m a boy or a girl. After I get older they will be able to tell.

8. Drunks. Drunks don’t know when to stop. They will start drinking as soon as they get up from the stupor of the night before. They won’t even try to hide it when they get bad enough. They don’t remember anything, including who they are supposed to be. They don’t remember that they are supposed to be a protector, a guardian, someone who buys groceries, or plays Bingo. They don’t remember any of that and they don’t want to. Sometimes they even turn on shows they used to hate and seem to get lost in them! They get lost in themselves, and forget about everyone else. They forget about me except when they need the remote, or even another drink.

9. This house, I grew up here but it is not a home. It is not my own home. If it were my home I would want to feel safe. If it were my home, I would want it to smell nicer, and I would paint the walls a different color. But it isn’t. It smells like smoke and the walls are yellow and stained. The carpet looks darker every year. A lot of the stuff in this house doesn’t work. I wouldn’t mind any of that though if being in this house didn’t make me feel so alone.

10. Myself, the biggest thing I could live without is myself. My brokenness, my stupidness, myself. My not-fitting-in self. My messy brain that’s confused a lot, and the fear that has always been inside of me. The sadness that goes along with it. I think I could live without myself, but I still don’t know how I’d do it.