Alleigh Peterson

Alleigh Peterson Mar 2018

if you think we'd be better as strangers
i hope you spit your anger into
every word and make sure i choke
grab your words and crumple them in your fists
make sure i know you don't care
you made me feel things i hadn't felt since
sophomore year of high school
i was so madly in love then, too
and when people tell me
all good things must come to an end
i
just
laugh
i laugh so hard my ribs explode like shrapnel
and i'm reminded that
i didn't eat today
i try not to think too much about the past
until i see that the past was
eighty pounds lighter
and i wonder if the weight i gained
wasn't just from recovery
but also from the baggage you left--
cleaning your room was the worst part.

im quite drunk and thinking of you again

Alleigh Peterson Mar 2018

do anorexics eat sriracha

it's 10:58 pm here
i have stumbled down the stairs one too many times
and i can see the look on their faces
when i say i'm okay
i'm okay
one too many times seems repetitive
repetition is good
repetition reminds me of the clock ticking inside my head
but the clock counts calories instead of time
as i count the seconds passing through these hunger pains
like contractions

should have bought a pregnancy test today
i didn't
i'm good at not doing things
like going to class
and eating

this bowl of rice and beans
seems all too familiar and i watch myself in the mirror as
i
eat
it's a trick i've learned
it helps me stop

the day i found out spicy food can curb appetite was
revolutionary.
i had always hated it
but sriracha became a new best friend
i've lost 30 pounds in 6 months.

Alleigh Peterson Mar 2018

conveyer belt

i drove over the bridge today and i felt above it all
high
and i think of you
you know i am afraid of heights
and driving over the bridge helps me
feel temporary
like loving you--
one wrong reflex after another.
i'm driving high and i feel you there
somewhere
sometimes my body tingles
and i wonder if you're thinking of me then
the places you touched
my body is a wasteland
nuclear test sites scattered across my skin
reminds me i am made for just that
destruction
you're moving to west virginia
i wanted to beg you to be careful
take care of yourself
love yourself like your mother should have
but didn't
i loved you enough for the both of us
i think of you too often
and too much is never enough
but that was always the case
wasn't it?

Alleigh Peterson Feb 2018

robbers

i.
i sat in the rain with you today.

ii.
in thirty seconds the rain had gone from light drops
to earth shattering jolts and you grabbed my hand

iii.
i don't know what this feeling is and i'm scared i'm so scared
but i am going to take this and run with it
run with you

iv.
i hope i make you think about things you wouldn't
normally think of
like maybe
me

v.
you said you wanted to kiss me twice today
so why didn't you?

Alleigh Peterson Jan 2018

flatsound

a house is not always a home
i learned that too early
too young to know what family was
because i never
had one
passed from family to family like some kind of disease
and that's when the disease
became
me
i'm sick again
it had been years since my last treatment
in and out of hospitals like a child going to school
i tell people i'm afraid of needles
and they think it's because i've seen what they do to my brother
but it's what they do to me
that makes my heart jump into my throat
and i can't
breathe
is what my nurse tells me
"maybe you won't faint this time"
i want to tell her that i'm scared
but then my terrible mind stops me
"there are people out there with worse problems"
my mind yells at me
just like my father does when he's had enough to drink
but the difference is
at least i
want
to put my hands on my mind
and choke it senseless
tell it to shut up
tell it to go away
go away
it's a problem
"she's a problem" is what my mother says
i've been in therapy since i was four
and my mother says it's because i had
adoption issues
as a child
little does she know
that the adoption issues didn't go away
i'm still four
million years away
from being okay with myself
as i sit here writing this
my parents are at a dinner party
and i am at my own party
with abandonment issues, depression and anxiety as my guests
they throw open the door to my house
not home
and make a mess of me
shamelessly
they tell me things i don't care to hear
my doctors say it's paranoia
schizophrenia, perhaps
i don't listen
i'm good at that
my therapist says i don't listen to things i don't believe
so maybe that's why i haven't heard my parents say
i love you
in years
or maybe it's because they haven't cared enough
to say it.

Alleigh Peterson Dec 2017

getting bad again

someone is standing over me
as i am hunched over the toilet in the bathroom
after a long night of drinking
and i wonder if they look at me the way i look at myself
the tear stained cheeks and the gagging
trying to get rid of the alcohol
that i used to drown my sadness for a night

and one night turns into ten
and drinking turns into smoking
because being high means more laughter
and laughter means i don't think about how
i want to die
because multitasking isn't my forte
especially when my mind is gone
i wish i could be gone too

i talk about how i've tried to **** myself 9 times
and my friends think i wouldn't try it again
"thank god you're still here" they say
but they don't know that i'm an atheist and
thanking god has not been on my to-do list in years

when i say i'm getting bad again
i don't mean i know you noticed that
i'm not smiling as much anymore
when i say i'm getting bad again
i mean i dream of self-destruction
and tearing myself down after i've built myself up
is all i'm good at.

when my family tells me they'll pray for me to get better, i take it with a grain of salt, because it spills from the mouths of people who don't say what they mean. it comes from the mouths of people who want to see me get better so they don't have to explain to their friends at church why i'm so depressed
and why i've gained so much weight (because bulimia is a *****) and why my arms are covered in scars and tattoos because they've never had a mental illness
and to them, it's all in the head.

Dec 2017

lo

Ten Things To Remember When Loving Someone With An Eating Disorder

1.  There is nothing romantic about the way our hair falls out or the way we hover over the open toilet like there's no other empty space in the house.
2. Do not think that it will be easier to love us because the love we aren’t giving ourselves will go to you.
3. You can trail your fingers along my rib cage, count every vertebrae in my back like marbles stacked high on top of each other. This is not beautiful, this is what dying looks like.
4. I’m sorry for the smell of my breath, but there’s no amount of toothpaste that could cover up the smell of myself rotting from the inside out.
5. “I thought you had to be skinny to have an eating disorder.”
5.   “You don’t look like you starve yourself.”
5.   I know that you wish you could hold me without worrying i’ll turn to dust if you squeeze too hard.
6.   I grew up being told that my body is a temple and I should treat it as such, but I don’t think this is right, see; temples can be destroyed but it always takes another person. I am doing this to myself.
7.   I can’t remember the last time I ate without feeling guilty.
7.   I can’t remember the last time I ate.
8.   One day, I will be nothing and you will be nothing, and i’m sorry that i’m already so close to being gone.
9.   I want to get better. I am trying to get better.
10. Do not think that loving us will be easier, because the love we do not give ourselves is gone, and we cannot love you more than we don’t love ourselves.

#eatingdisorder #anorexia #bulimia #ed #ednos #trigger #triggerwarning #triggering