A Tragic Misstep

I am a frightened person, scared of the truth of my identity. Every morning, I wake up, take a shower, brush my teeth, and place a mask on my face. It is not gaudy or beautiful or even tangible but if I unmasked, the person inside would crumble like the rotten walls of an abandoned building. Thus enshrouded within my facade, its bold wit and thriving confidence ooze from my ruins and coil to hide the broken stairways and shattered glass. So successful is this cloaking, I did not even detect its formidable presence until the one day that I stumbled on my path and caught my balance on a wall. Astonished, my hand leapt back of its own accord as I scanned the vast expanse of its granite growth. Cold stabbed into my skin as though straining to reach my very bones and a fog emanated from the cracks in the stone. My hand trembled as it moved towards my new discovery. Inching closer, my eyes became trained on the gaping gash in front of me. I peeked into the hole and my world changed.

The massive wall dwindled abruptly to a barbed wire fence caging an emaciated girl bound and dissected upon a metal table. The world around me shrunk to her shuttered face. Time slowed as the girl lifted her lids and gazed solemnly back at a matching pair of eyes. Once made aware of the doppelganger, my mind was flooded with piercing memories, images, and pains that drained my vitality till I stooped on withered legs, reliving the imprisoned events of my past. Fading into unconsciousness, the first serrated memory pounced into my mind's eye...

                 Strutting into view, my sisters and mother walked towards my stiff figure as I assessed their appearances. I ached to see Rachel's slender arms and legs, while mine remained so bulky and bulging, and my mother's confident presence in comparison to my own second-hand variety. But, where I sighed in envy on those two, I grimaced with dread at my sister Christina. Her body flowed like the bends of a riverbed with a sizable bust, defined waist, and considerable lower portion. Rachel and my mother shared a similar body type while, to my dismay, Christina and I were shackled with that curse.     

         I had just entered seventh grade and was only just coming to terms with my earlier puberty and all the baggage it brought and continued to hurl in my direction.  Developing larger thighs, breasts, and a butt slammed my confidence down to the basement floor when I saw the thin and graceful limbs of my adolescent peers. I observed with a sinking heart all the flirting and attention my tiny friends received from boys, and I couldn't help but wonder, why not me, too?

                 Hustling home, I sprinted up my stairs and threw myself into my room. With barely a hello to my mother, I stood in front of my full length mirror and stared. I raked my heated gaze over my soccer player legs, untidy hair, and discernible stomach. I didn't necessarily despair over my differences, but I became concerned and more aware of my unsightly aspects as the weeks went on. Of course, being the over controlling perfectionist that I am, I sought a solution
.
         The next day at school, I withdrew my socializing attachments and observed. Friends once precious and close in elementary school flourished in the barrage of new circumstances and forgot about awkward me in their new-found brilliance.  I noticed something I thought rather profound in those moments. Of all the people I once knew, only the thin and beautiful ascended into such metamorphosis. It was at that break in time, where the world paused with bated breath in the face of a life-altering epiphany,  that I realized what held my happiness captive. Its once familiar glow had faded into the distance caged on an isolated island guarded by my new enemy: Fat. With jealous paranoia, it wrapped its fleshy arms in a suffocating embrace around my fluttering joy, smothering the pleas for help.

         My opponent had been identified, but I did not launch hot-headed into the battle after my quarry. I poured over different strategies tacticians before me had plotted. Knowing my weaknesses, I vetoed methods of direct starvation. I could never see myself becoming a living skeleton like the anorexics displayed on pro-ana websites. I just wanted to lose a few crucial pounds holding me back from my potential like a pack of bricks slowing the velocity of my ascension.

After hours of research, the ideal plan of action slithered onto my computer screen whispering promises and quelling reservations. I didn't need to face the danger of extreme deprivation when I could eat what I liked, provided digestion wasn't allowed to occur. Reading the emotional pleas of survivors as I scanned through countless websites for tips, I disregarded their warnings and plunged ahead confident in my own will power. Page after page after page I read dreadful epitaphs from the lips of loved ones and viewed pictures displaying the effects of stomach acid on the soft flesh of the esophagus. Bright red blood vessels lined an interior littered with sores oozing yellow pus and blood. I took it all in calmly and dismissed them out of hand in my arrogance.
After dinner, my plot was put into action. Matthew, the youngest brother in my family, made a batch of cupcakes for us all. I inhaled five of the iced delicacies  before I realized what I was doing. Horrified, I clutched my stomach in frustration until I remembered and rationalized.  I needn't despair when I had my own version of an undo button.

         Making all the right jokes and conversation, I apologized to my family and complained of an overload of homework to escape. I smirked at the ease my lying took hold of them all and bounced upstairs into the bathroom.
I had read that purging tended to be a noisy business for the uninitiated, so I turned on the shower and closed the doors to deafen my choking. I stared down at the toilet with trepidation. This was my defining moment. Once I stepped down this twisted path, I might never find my way back, and if I did, the scrapes and cuts I received would scar my body unrecognizably. Images of the devastating effects and stories I had heard flooded to the forefront of my mind, and I hesitated, hand on my mouth turning as though to leave. But, like my own personal devil, my mind cast a reflection of myself in all my corpulent glory  to counteract my doubts. Hardening my will, I bent over and stuck my hand down my throat until I gagged.

         It hurt. My throat was on fire and nothing came out but stomach acid. I remained hunched over sticking only the two fingers I could fit down my throat and heaved until my eyes dripped with their fiery tears. I felt so dejected. I had failed what was to be my salvation. A weight inside of me mutilated my hopes to a pulp like a sledgehammer edged with razors.
Morose, I decided to make actual use of the shower though I felt like falling into a catatonic state. Undressing was a reiteration of my body issues and further diminished my outlook. As my thoughts began to impale me with jagged spikes, I crawled from the depths of my emotional torture to try one more time, and if it did not work then, I would slink back and submit to my eviscerator, my butcher, my sadistic jailer--my own mind.

         Penetrating my mouth with my fingers, I bent over and tickled my gag reflex. Suddenly, a warm mush pushed out my esophagus into my waiting hand. My mouth seared and tasted vile but my triumph burned brighter. With tearing eyes, I stared down at my hand and saw red scrapes along the sides, puckered and stinging, as though grazed by a viper’s fangs, but my gaze was drawn inexorably to the results of my efforts.

      To this day I can’t remember the flavor of the cupcakes or the their appearance, yet the purple pile of undigested dessert looms in my mind whenever I let myself remember my first step on a path strewn with thorns.