It’s five in the morning and the light from streetlights outside is just bright enough for me to see my body in the mirror. I’m throroughly conviced that hell is a room of endless mirrors repeating images of visible collarbones and measurable thigh gaps.  This morning, my collarbones protrude from my chest, and my hip bones looked jagged and perverse when I turn sideways, and my elbows could cut glass, but my thighs, are massive, engorged, inflated. Fat. Today will be a Hungry Day. 

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You are beautiful. 

 

It’s a trick I found last night deep in the underbelly of webpages on how to help yourself overcome an eating disorder.  Tell yourself you’re beautiful, it said, and begin to correct your harmful thinking.

 

You are beautiful. 

 

         And this time, when the words slip from my mouth they are followed by a cackle because I know they are complete bullshit.  I feel no different, no better, only slightly amused that some crackpot on the internet thought this would work. Still, maybe tomorrow it might be effective... I can’t completely pass up a potential "cure." But today is a Hungry Day, and I know I need a distraction. 

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