not good enough.

my before picture is hideous

i’m disgusting

rolls of fat collecting around my middle almost down to my awkwardly skinny ankles.

my after picture is great, but somehow i think it’s just the angle

that i don’t really look that good

i can’t even appreciate my after picture because now i constantly compare myself to it.

i look at myself in the same mirror,

under the same lighting,

in the same position,

in the exact very same spot,

and i think i look fatter now than i did when i took the pic a month ago

and i’m so very disappointed because this is what i do.

i get thin,

i get fat,

i get thin,

i get fat. because i’m

destined to repeat this

disgustingly unhealthy cycle,

to never be satisfied,

to never settle.

but at what cost?

I can’t even appreciate my after picture, because i’m constantly comparing myself to it,

wondering if i’ve let myself go.

i panic.

first slowly, bit by bit,

little drops of fear collecting until i’m lying in a huge puddle of bright red failure, like a scene from CSI Miami, and Callie Duquesne’s about to show up with her perfect body and shiny blonde hair and take pictures of my horribly gory demise from moderately overweight person to thin person who was never totally satisfied with herself to slightly heavier person who’s on her way to becoming fat again.

and i’m trying to figure out when it started, when i first became a person who wasn’t comfortable in her own skin, but the memories are hazy, faded and blurry, strung together at random and mentally photoshopped by years of overanalyzing and my writerly imagination filling in the details that i don’t remember, probably never remembered.

I wasn’t born hating my body

sometimes I get glimpses of it, quick flashes of what it might be like to just enjoy the feeling of the sun on my skin, eyes closed, not a thought in the world, but then

walls of reality slam down around me, ruining everything because for just a second, I wasn’t worried that I look fat from this angle, the stretch marks on my legs are showing, I’ve eaten too many carbs today, and I should sit up straight and suck my stomach in and drink 3 liters of water so no food can fit in me and then lace up my sneakers and run until and I can’t feel feelings anymore and the trees in front of me swim and sway and threaten to swallow me whole

because i’m

not good enough.

no matter how much weight i lose it’s not good enough

i should lift more weights

eat less carbs

cut out processed foods, because gluten is bad! so are things that have more than 5 ingredients! ew!

because we sit here and

judge people’s bodies

judge what food they put in their mouths

and when

and judge

judge

judge

judge

judge

judge

judge

judge

judge

judge

judge

and where the hell has that ever gotten us?

when you strip away

all the things that are supposed to keep you warm and happy and comfortable in your own skin

bulimia is the blanket you choose

you wrap yourself in lies

black is slimming

that’ll look great if you wear some spanx underneath

minimize this, maximize that

[[[and not now, but at some point CAN WE JUST TALK ABOUT HOW WE’RE SUPPOSED TO BE SO THIN AND STILL HAVE BREASTS? thanks society, for creating an ideal for female beauty that’s LITERALLY IMPOSSIBLE for 95% of the population to obtain without plastic surgery, because when you get that thin your boobs go POOF,

but that’s a rant for another day.]]]

swathed in deceit

wrapped in illusion

push it up

suck it in

lift

tone

burn

tan

dye

paint

NO

just

NO

because it’s still

not good enough

there will always be jeans that don’t fit

there will always be someone with nicer abs than me

even if i make my body the most perfect thing it can be, abs of steel, muscles coiled around my bones like ropes

there will always be someone else who does it so naturally

so even if i finally build myself the perfect body, there will always be someone else who didn’t have to work as hard because they’re not BROKEN AND SAD like me.

so i’ll never be good enough.

i’ll never be thin enough,

pretty enough,

young enough,

have hair that’s

long enough,

i’ll never squat enough,

bench enough,

run far or fast enough.

i’ll never BE enough

so you know what?

i’m done.

and i’ve been trying to write the ending of this poem for a few days now, because i want to to end with hope, even the tiniest sliver of low-carb sugar-free portion-controlled panic-induced hope. but this isn’t a lifetime made-for-tv movie about anorexia. those always end well, with the beautiful girl in the hospital surrounded by loving family, and then they cut to a scene of her playing some sport because she got strong again, and yay, no more eating disorder. but what they don’t tell you is that you never get over an eating disorder. you’re never fixed. you’re just stronger than you were before, and that’s the best you can hope for. so this isn’t the end of my story. i’m going to struggle with this for my entire life.

but there is hope.

because today, i’m going to eat something with more than 30 grams of carbs in it and

you know what?

i’m not going to have a panic attack.

maybe i’ll stop when i’m full.

maybe i’ll stop when i’ve stuffed myself.

maybe i’ll obsessively cut it in half and then log it into myfitnesspal.

but maybe not.

and tomorrow, i’m going to lie out and read a book in a bikini and every time i wince and cringe and want to curl up into a ball or go inside or readjust myself so i look better i’m going to remember that

my stretch marks are battle scars

my hair might actually grow long again

my lovehandles are a trophy, not a source of shame

and if what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger

if we really believe that

then we shouldn’t hide our scars

and if anyone says a word to me about them

any of the marks 20 years of disordered eating left on my body

if someone says one single disrespectful word

i’m going to tell them the story of the battle taking place inside my skin

i’m going to read them this poem.

No such thing as sin: A Yom Kippur Ramble

Yom Kippur is one of my favorite holidays because I believe in reflection. Any holiday that demands we stop our busy lives and think about the past year - where we went right, wrong, and everywhere in between - gets an A in this teacher's book. As a teacher, I've always worked it into my curriculum. Thinking about choices, whether they are our own or those of the characters we are studying, has always been one of my top priorities. Personally, it's sometimes tough to hold myself to the same expectation because I'm always willing to put myself on the back burner, as I think most teachers are. But regardless of how insane life gets, Yom Kippur forces me to press pause and really, honestly, reflect. 

This past Yom Kippur, as I sat in Friday night services with my father, I had a lot to reflect about. I hate my body, I feel simultaneously overjoyed and horrified that I'm in between full-time teaching jobs, I'm worried about money, I'm not sure I can sit still for the entire service and I wish I were still in 7th grade so it was appropriate for me to take a 20-minute bathroom break to apply flavored lip gloss, did I turn the oven off, etc. I wondered where we go when we die, what my kitten thinks about all day, when I'd have kids. I tried sitting with perfect pilates posture, and lasted about 10 minutes. I should catch up on Grey's Anatomy, write more, eat less, run more, drink less, and in the middle of this I tune back in to hear the Rabbi say:

There is no hebrew word for sin. The closest translation in English is "missing the target." 

The Hebrew word "hatat," however, has a clear concrete meaning to go with its abstract one. In the Book of Judges we read about a band of sharpshooters, so trained and talented that every one of them can sling a stone at a hair and not miss (Judges 20:16). The word in this verse that means "miss," yehetu in Hebrew, clearly has the same root as "hatat." "Sin," in Hebrew, means something like "missing the target."--From this site

MIND BLOWN.

I didn't MESS UP HORRIBLY.

I just missed the target. 

I didn’t RUIN EVERYTHING.

I just missed the target.

I’m not a TERRIBLE PERSON who deserves punishment/needs absolution.

I JUST NEED TO WORK ON MY AIM.

And that’s a lot easier to process than my usual I’M A TERRIBLE PERSON I CAN’T BELIEVE I F-ED UP YET AGAIN I’LL NEVER GET IT RIGHT I SUCK AT EVERYTHING thought spiral.

Thinking about it as missing the target means even as I was doing things I would later regret, I still had that target in mind. It also means that I was standing on the same field as the archery target that had my goals on it, even if I had terrible aim. Maybe I was running in the opposite direction with my bow and arrow. Maybe I was shooting blind. But at least I was in the same general area as the goal. At least I had it in mind. At least I was on the same field.

If sin is 100% wrong, and there is no Hebrew word for it, then nothing I did this past year was 100% wrong. That means every mistake had a purpose and every regret had a reason. Those mistakes and regrets are mine alone, and I’m not trying to avoid taking responsibility for them. But this makes them seem a lot less futile. It gives my mess-ups a purpose, even if that purpose is me realizing how crappy my aim is as I survey a field full of arrows and an empty target (have I killed the metaphor yet? Probably).

So Shana Tova. Regardless of what religion you are a part of, if you are a part of one at all, I hope you take some time to think about how things have been going for you and reflect. Remember, we all miss the target sometimes. Have a good year, and work on your aim.

I'D LOVE YOUR THOUGHTS ON: 
In the last year (or so), which targets did you make? Which ones did you miss? 

BODY DYSMORPHIA: I'M MESSED UP. Are you? Let's discuss.

I just read this beautiful, haunting, honest, and hilarious piece by a writer who recovered from anorexia. It came in the middle of an internet rabbit hole I fell into, one of the negative-body-image-fierce-lady-writer variety.  As usual, I emerge from the reading binge, bleary-eyed in my underwear, wondering what it all means for me: as a writer, a woman, a daughter, a friend, a teacher of adolescents, and a lifelong disordered eater.

Confession time: My weight never dipped below 100 pounds. 

Here's the thing: not all anorexics and bulimics are thin. Many of us look quite normal. At my smallest, I looked a bit bony, arms and legs dangling off a normal-looking, even slightly soft midsection. Both times... At 16, eating 300 calories a day, downing half a dozen horse-sized diet pills, and running track... At 26, eating 890 calories a day, working out endlessly and never leaving the house... I looked good. 

I was never hospitalized. I came close once, after going four days without eating and passing out during a final exam, but never quite made it there (thankfully). 

No one ever staged an intervention. There were no doctors, nurses, treatment centers, support groups, or anything of the sort. Only crash diets, gym memberships, vomiting halfway through a 10 mile run on an empty stretch of highway, and years of feeling unhappy and uncomfortable in my own skin. 

At my thinnest in recent years, I was 127 pounds, and looking back I'd sacrifice a few relatives to get back to that weight, but at the time I felt pudgy. I remember vividly how, even with so little fat on me, when I laid down to tan in my bikini the skin on my hips fell out of my bikini at an unattractive angle. It's gotten to the point where I don't know what I look like at all. I can't tell. Nothing fits. My body appears stretched out, loose, misshapen, and weird. My face looks good, not fat like before when I was crash dieting, but my body... I guess you can only bounce back from so much. 

I go through positive phases. I'll see myself naked in a mirror, lift my arms above my head, and think, "You know what? I'm actually pretty hot." Looking at my stretch marks, I'll think, "Damn... those are awesome stretch marks. They're badges of honor, battle scars to be worn with pride... They are marks of survival, not failure..." 

Then I remember that nothing fits, and I want to cry again, I want to give up, I want to crack down and get back in shape I can be proud of, I want to lie down and do nothing at all... 

AND IT'S JUST A BODY. Before you even think about saying it, realize that I've said it to myself a million times, and I'm saying it right now as I write this: What the hell is wrong with me? Why do I let this take over? Am I that vain and self-absorbed? Is there nothing else that matters to me? What does it say about me that I'm so obsessed with how messed up my relationship with my body is? I hate it. I hate it. I wish I could stop it. Part of me hates you for judging me, but part of me is right there with you, making a face at myself. 

I don't know what to do next. The whole thing makes me extremely uncomfortable. But I have to find some meaning in all of this madness, or else what will it have all been for? There's no way I can just wake up one day and not agonize over my body, right? That ship sailed in elementary school. I was never going to be normal. Maybe I should set my standards lower and learn to cope. 

CONFESSION TIME: I hate myself. Not who I am, but my physical self. I think it has always been this way, and the periods in my life when I thought I was coping were actually denial. I don't know if I know how to NOT hate myself. 

RELEVANT EXAMPLE: My legs look great still, but all I see when I look at them is how much nicer they would be if I hadn't tortured them with years of yo-yo dieting. All I see when I look at them is the fact that they don't fit into my pants and I refuse to buy new ones because new ones are failure. All I see when I look at them is that they are 3.5 inches greater in circumference than they were 1 year ago and I HATE that I know that, I HATE that I have the measurements of my thighs logged from this week last year. I HATE THAT I'M THE KIND OF PERSON WHO MEASURES MY THIGHS, LET ALONE WRITES THOSE MEASUREMENTS DOWN WITH DATES. 

Part of the problem is the fact that I'm afraid to talk about it. I feel self-absorbed, selfish, superficial, obnoxious, and like a total jerk because there are people everywhere that have real problems bigger than being 20 pounds heavier than they should be and not feeling confident naked. People everywhere yo-yo diet, cry in fitting rooms, and count calories, and we shouldn't talk about it because people are in real pain out there and every time we talk about our self-indulgent self-proclaimed self-hate, we're marginalizing the real problems and wasting time that might otherwise be spent solving them, or making our lives better and more fulfilling so we aren't self-indulgent assholes who worry about ourselves all the time. 

Today I'm going to take a stand in the opposite direction: I am genuinely unhappy in my own skin. Regardless of what that says about me as a person, it's the truth, and it's awful. I know the vast majority of the problems in this world are far worse, and that millions of people would love to have this be the worst problem they deal with. But to me this is a big problem, and for myself, I won't let it be marginalized. 

I'm hoping that if more of us talk about disordered eating and unhealthy body image, we'll start to feel better. It doesn't need to be sensational to hurt. Every time I walk down the street behind a thinner woman and find myself searching for a physical flaw on her, just one thing I can claim to "beat" her at, it hurts. She's probably a lovely girl who has important things that matter and she's not preoccupied with the fact that maybe her legs could be slightly more muscular because she's a good person who has better more meaningful things to fill her time with. She doesn't deserve my critique, silent or not. Every time I think back to this mythical time when I was thin with despair -- which is even stupider because I know that at that time I was just as unhappy as I was now, despite being much lighter and fitter -- it hurts. Every time I see someone eat just one portion of something indulgent and I remember gorging myself on Doritos in second grade because even then I couldn't moderate ANYTHING -- it hurts. It hurts to realize you've spent your whole life failing at something. It hurts to admit all of this. It may not be poverty, hunger or abuse, but it hurts, and it's real, and you can judge me all you want for writing about it in such excessive detail, but I need to do something. 

I have battled eating disorders, body dysmorphia, negative body image for most of my life and it feels as if it's eating me alive. I need help. And I'm going to talk about it. 

What about you?