I'm finally home, I thought I'd be happy
I get to sleep in my own bed and finally take a long shower
I get to see my best friend tomorrow
I get to see him

Yet I still feel like this..?
All those feelings from the course of five days unleashed.
I don't have the protection of sharing a room.
Now it's just me and the walls of my mind.
The walls that not only keep other away-

But they lock me out as well. What's in there?
I wonder.

I wonder...

Happiness: The ultimate goal, right?
We all want to be happy
We all want to feel fulfilled.

We see pictures of smiling, skinny bodies
and we know what happiness looks like.
It looks like thin faces
frail arms
tiny legs
concave stomachs

The first step to being happy is
looking
the part.

I am not comfortable in my own skin, I am not comfortable looking at my own body.
I hate that my body is often looked on by others, it makes me feel *****. But I love being touched. I love kissing.
I hate when they say my name, though. It sounds like a bad word. Something that doesn't fit. But I love my name. I love how it sounds.
I hate hearing from a mans mouth, it comes out tainted. I hate feeling squeamish when anyone compliments my body. I hate that I immediately want to cut into my skin when someone tells me I'm beautiful, or that they love my curves.

Some people wake from a nightmare relieved that its over.
But have you ever gotten woken into one?

Stuck in a house with glass embedded in the walls
No door
No windows
Blankness staring back at you until you wake up
But how do you wake up when you never fell asleep?
In a dream when you get hurt you wake up.
So it makes sense really.
Trying to wake ourselves up
From this nightmare we live.

Willow tree cracks
And fruit punch stains
That's what my nights are made of.

Dad,
       I know it's sort of a cliche, saying "words can not express how much I love you." but that is quite true. Although I rather think words COULD describe; the only problem is finding the words to do this justice. And you, of all people, know that I am not good with words. So I'll try this instead:
       You taught me how to ride a bike, you taught me how to use that pair of Heelys shoes so that I could ride for forever without stopping to get a running start. You [tried] to teach me how to ice-skate backwards, I do not have the best memory- but knowing me, that didn't end well. You taught me to love music, you showed me how music can communicate any emotion without a single word.
       There are something, however, that I do not remember you ever teaching me. I do not recall you ever sitting me down and talking to me about the person I should grow up to be. You never showed me a text book or took me to class to teach me how to be kind, or loving. But sometimes the best teachers, teach without ever meaning to. You taught me to be kind to everyone around me. You taught me how to talk to people in a way that shows confidence. You taught me how to stand up for myself, and what I believe in. You taught me that sometimes perseverance is key. You taught me how to love people past their faults. You taught me courage. It is true, these are all things that you did not sit me down to teach me, you simply taught me by being you. By example. You have always been the greatest example to me. That's the thing about kids, right? We're always watching and absorbing everything we see. I was so lucky to take in all that I did. I wouldn't be the person that I am today without your examples. For me, I know I will always use theses qualities. You helped set me up for a great life, and I intend on using every bit of knowledge and wisdom that you have given me throughout my 16, almost 17 years. I am so grateful for everything that you have done for me. You gave all three of your daughters the tools we need to live a successful and happy life. It just may take a little longer for some to realize this.. But I know you, you never lose faith in us. And that's more than I could ever ask for. I love you.
-Megs

I'm down here drowning and you're throwing water at me because you think I'm partched.

Listen to me, please.

willow tree standing proud and strong  branches flowing in the wind as if dancing to nature's song.

it's serene to watch, listen and truly see. we are but a small part, you and me.

oceans formed over days, weeks, years. their deepest points holding your darkest fears.

willow cracks and salty water lulling me to sleep. hush hush little baby, not even a peep.

Sometimes the hardest battles are fought alone
at night
when it's dark
and quiet.
I haven't even been typing for more than a few seconds
and already the tears are flowing.
Too strong for too long.
That's what they say, right?
Crying does not mean you're weak
it means you have been too strong for too long.
What *******.
I am weak.
I know I am.
Broken angel
hurt so many times
by those who were meant to protect.
Walls have been put up to protect myself since no one else
seemed to care enough to save
the five year old little girl.
Eleven years later and I'm cold and hard as stone.
I wish I were a stone..
Instead of this **** sponge who is destined
to be poked and prodded.
I will soak up your mess,
so you don't have to suffer.
Give me your worries, I will take them.
Give me your addictions, I will take them.
Give me your broken shards, I will take them.
I don't care if I get cut and scraped.
Let me bleed-
so you can live.

I want to know the course that the rivers beneath your skin take

I want to know the valleys in your heart and how deep they go

I want to know the canyons in your bones and who put them there

I want to know who's initials are carved into your mind

and the memories that they can no longer call "mine"

Things I didn't have control of:
-Mom&Dad; getting a divorce
-My brother being sick
-Mom having to leave for days at a time to stay at the hospital with my brother
-Having a new mom and two new siblings
-Dad living 45 minutes away
-Dad not being there
-Dad drinking
-Staying at Grandma's when I was sick
-That boy's actions and words in middle school
-My step mom cheating on my dad
-Losing three people that I had grown up with and loved
-My brother passing away
-Him cheating on me
-My co-worker lying to our boss saying that I bullied her because I was best friends with her now ex-boyfriend
-Another boy's actions when I told him I couldn't be in a relationship at the time
-Him telling me that he doesn't love me anymore
-Breaking my body in an accident and spending the entire summer recovering
-Other peoples' happiness and comfort

Things I have control of:
-How I react to the actions of others
-My own happiness
-The music I listen to
-What I eat
-When I work out and how hard
-If my room is clean or not (which it usually is)
-How I treat myself

*Yeah.. I can see why.

It's funny that something that could **** you
Something that probably will **** you
Can be so comforting

It's the one reliable thing you have
It's easy to fall into the patterns again
It's easy to hide it (to a point, but by that time you're too far gone)

Because it feels so good
To have your body disintegrate
To have your head swim and hands shake
It's better then the alternative, at least

I don't want to feel like I'm losing myself
But that may be the only way to go
Until my bones, my veins, they show
Because the alternative is **too dangerous

Love is giving someone permission to hurt you and trusting that they won't

Eating disorders are not always dainty, pretty models.

They’re not sticking one finger halfway into your mouth, to immediately get rid of everything.

Or not eating for one day and losing weight automatically. 

Eating Disorders are not going shopping with your friends and having a good time because you fit in the same size as them.
Eating disorders are laying on the floor of the shower willing yourself to just do it already.

It’s starring at the shower drain for so long that when you finally look up it’s highlighted on the tile wall.

Eating disorders are shoving all your fingers down your throat and scraping your knuckles on your teeth to only throw up an oz of what’s in your stomach— and so you repeat and repeat until your body shakes and your nose burns.

Eating disorders are crying as you look in the mirror because even if you reach your goal weight, you know that it won’t be enough.

Eating disorders are being so weak that you don’t want to go out, all you want to do is lay in bed until your stomach stops hurting.

It’s not wanting anyone to worry, but also wanting to know why your heart gets sharp pains through it sometimes.

Why your head always ******* hurts.

Or why you’re so exhausted all the time, why you fall asleep in class as soon as you set your head down- but when you lay down at night you can’t fall asleep because there are voices screaming at you to do better.

To eat less. 

To weigh less.

For as long as I can remember-
This is where I've lived.
I've never moved.
This house, this room has always been mine.
My mother has always slept on the other side of the wall.
Then why, at two in the morning, do I find myself wishing to go home?
Why do I repeat "I want to go home." over and over.
Tears stream down my cheeks, etching patterns and trails.
Creating a map for me to follow.
But where will it lead me?

Being physically close to someone does not bother me- I like being touched. I like hugging and the feeling of someone running their fingers over my back and arms.
But once that physical touch gets a little too close to emotion I push it away. Once someone starts to feel like they have feeling for me, or that I for them, I immediately think of ways to push them away in such a slight way that they do not realize what is happening.
Because the truth is.. The fingerprints left on my skin, the touch I can not scrub away in the shower, will be gone. I will have a new set of skin in a matter of weeks. Skin that hasn't been touch, hasn't been tainted with someone's prints.
But the words that they said to me will forever be printed on my heart. Each letter stamped into my mind where it'll wait to hurt me again, filed away under "Do not go back" until it gets dark and I wander through the shelves trying to find someone, something to occupy myself with. Something to remind myself that I was not always this alone..

It's 6:00am, I'm getting ready for school and wishing I could text you good morning.

It's 8:23am, I'm laughing with my friends and wishing I still had to take mental notes of the conversations so I could tell you and make you laugh too.

It's 11:34am, and I'm pushing my food around my plate wishing you still asked me how my day was going.

It's 2:30pm, I'm leaving school and wishing I was on my way to your house to lay on your bed and laugh with you.

It's 5:56pm, I'm sitting in these hard metal chairs at work wishing you would come visit me again.

It's 10:45pm, I'm getting ready for bed and wishing I could tell you good night, and to tell you to have sweet dreams.  

It's 11:11pm and I'm crying again wishing you were here with me.

It's 1:02am and I'm still crying and now there's blood mixed with the tears and I'm wishing you were here to tell me that it will all be okay.

It's 3:17am.. My eyes are puffy and sting, my cheeks are itchy and red.

It's 3:19am, My heart is torn to shreds.
And I miss you.

The numbness fades and it hits me all at once-
The crashing waves of ten thousand heart breaks

You need to do it.
                            I don't..
Yes you do- and you know it.
                            Stop. Go away.
Just do it already you big baby.
                            I'm scared.
Why? You've done it before. It's not a big deal. ******* go.
                            What if Mom hears me?
She won't. Do you want to lose it?
                            Yes
What are you waiting for then?
                            (sigh)
You need to do it.
                            (Shaking)
...
                    ­       (Gives in)
Feel better?
                           No.. Yes. I don't know
You do.
I win again.

Sometimes I look down at my hands and I realize that I do not know who is controlling them. I do not feel like I'm me, when I look in the mirror there's always a voice in the back of my head convincing me that what I am seeing is not really there, that I am not in fact the being staring back at me. My hands are not my hands, my legs are not my legs, and my face isn't my face. It's like I'm living, but through someone else. But I don't want to be someone else anymore, I want to be me. But who am I?

I'm still waiting for this hurt to go away. I'm waiting for the day when I can look in the mirror and not want to shatter it. For the day that I can go to a store with turning to every mirror and looking at my body, utterly disgusted. I'm waiting for the day where I don't want to take the silver pen that draws in red to my skin. I thought it was here.. I thought I was better. I was eating normally. But then is tried on the scale.. What an evil thing. A ruiner. When will I get off this track? I'm growing tired of this journey. But maybe I'll fly off it before I have the chance to hope off onto safe groun-

Good morning.
The sun is shining.
And you are in the clouds.
Welcome home.

When I'm upset about something, I walk
I'll walk a mile or two until I find a swing set
There's a swing set in my backyard- but being that close to everything is not what I want
I want to be where I normally wouldn't be
Some place where people will not know me, and in Utah if you go a mile you're in a whole new area with hundreds of new faces
It didn't occur to me why I always wound up on a swing set, my initial intent was to only walk
Today I realized it
When you feel so weighed down by your worries and troubles, nothing feels better than that split second of weightlessness at the peak of each swing
In that moment nothing else matters
You can look up at the sky and know that you're not alone, nor are your burdens always as heavy as they were in the moments before

Hold my hand when we walk or put your arm around my shoulder
2. Surprise me with random kisses
3. Stay up late with me and tell me your secrets
4. Tell me your fears and your heartbreaks
5. Watch the stars with me
6. Pay attention to when I'm quiet, ask questions
7. Please.. ask questions
8. If something is bothering you- tell me. We'll work it out
9. When you see something that worries you, bring it to me
10. When I'm acting childish just laugh with me
11. When we're fighting and I'm pacing the room with my hands shaking as they clasp each other trying to find something to say hidden in my skin- hold your hands around mine and pull me to your chest. Hold my head and tell me it's going to be okay
12. Just hold me when I cry and stroke my back let the ocean drain and then you can ask questions about what the salty water was covering
13. When I'm looking at my hands again, searching for those **** words that have to be hidden between my fingers lift my chin so I'm looking at you. Sometimes the only way to get me to talk is to force it out of me- refuse to leave until we're done, until you know I'm okay.
14. Coffee will always fix a bad day, but remember what time it is and how caffeine affects me.
15. When we're standing in the kitchen and your favorite song starts playing pull me to you and dance with me. Twirl me around and rest your hand around my waist.
16. Sing to me. Play for me. Show me your talents.  
17. Remember how easily I get chilled
18. Remember that I will make so many mistakes it'll make you crazy but you just have to stick it out with me and I swear I will fix things
19. When you say you love me.. Dear god please mean it. Mean every syllable. Mean it like the breath leaving your lungs is the last you'll have.
20. Know that when I say that I love you, I mean it with every fiber of my being.

I feel like I'm a weight on others around me,
yet my head feels so light.

I can't seem to talk to anyone about it,
but that doesn't stop the inner banter.

It's no wonder I get headaches,
there's so mush chaos.

Contradicting thoughts crashing into one another,
causing vibrations to ring though my skull.

Lights dance and my blood rushes to my muscles,
but I can't move.

I didn't use to cry over boys
Then you happened
You *******- you ruined everything
I had a perfectly constructed castle built
With little green soldiers protecting the gates
I catapulted marbles and gumballs, trying to keep you away.
But you came anyways
And with a Trojan horse
I let you in and you ******* broke me from the inside
You torn down my castle like it was made of cards
Three words held the power to blow it all down
And I cried.
I cried my eyes out when we parted ways.

A year later and I don't think the castle I constructed is as strong
Because another came along
And he trampled the green soldiers
He ripped right through the walls
And here I am again, considering digging a moat
That will surely be filled with saltwater for sharks

My thoughts are an angry ocean and I've been tossed out to sea.
I'm drowning.
Lord calm them, please.

"They're going to see how fat you really are if you eat in front of them. "
  no, they'll know I'm working on recovery.. this is recovery
"You didn't eat breakfast, so the day is already off to a good start. Why ruin it?"
i need to eat... food is good for me. it is fuel
"Food is fat. "
youre wrong
"Am I?"
...
"When you were in that awful place and they made you eat you gained, didn't you?"
yes but..
"You. Gained. Weight. "
my heart was in trouble
"They were lying. You weren't even underweight yet. We haven't reached our goal. "
maybe..
"We can still reach our goal. "
i don't know
"See? That wasn't so hard. Like old times, a lie here, a lie there. It's nothing. "
nothing..
"You're doing much better. "
i feel so tired
"That's from carrying all that extra fat on your body. "
they want me to go back to treatment
"NO. Everything we've worked for would be RUINED!!"
i don't feel good
"You're fine. You're beautiful. You're thin. "
my chest hurts
"You just need to do more cardio"


"Hello?"

"We reached our goal my love. Congratulations. You're all bone. "

This is what I am
I have been for quite sometime
Lost
But aren't we all, really?
We try to find ourselves
Like hide and seek
And some truly treat it like a game
Like a gamble
We are here to find ourselves
Aren't we?
Should we treat it like a child's game?
Perhaps not

Everyone wants to be found
But no one wants to be lost
You can not find a toy, unless you lose it first
That's what we need to understand
Maybe being lost isn't all that bad
We just need to be patient
Then we can be *found

It's all about perspective really. You can seemingly change the outcome of a situation by how you think of it. In this case.. It's as clear as past-
And present.

Past-
A young brother passing away
A childhood void of a father who was too drunk
Raised by a sister because mother was too busy
Losing three people who had become family through divorce
Now having a father that's too busy with his new family

Present-
A brother no longer in pain from his 17 years of fighting illness
A Dad desperately trying to make up from lost time
A Mom and sister that have so much love and care they take care of others
Have three toxic people removed form my life- bad influences taken away
Having a wonderful new Step Mom and Three new siblings and a very in love and happy Dad.

It's all
      how
you          
                  look
      at
it.

"I was really kind about it, I didn't lose my head or anything."
"See.. There's a difference between being nice and being a doormat. You have a tendency to treat others better than you treat yourself."
shrug*
"You say things to yourself that you would never allow someone to say about another person."

You pull me back just to push me out again.
You broke me for a fourth time.
I don't know how you put it back together every time, but you do.
I trust you again and again.

Why do I keep taking the same road when I know it's riddled with *** holes and dead ends?

It's not like you wake up one day

     and you suddenly hate every inch.

It happens gradually
    
     an inch at a time.

I remember where mine started

    and how it grew like wild fire.

Until it consumed me
  
     an inch at a time.

this isn't what my life was suppose to be like

i did not want to grow up to be who I am today

   it's hard to think of being different, though

    my whole life i've been counting objects, dates, everything

     when I was little and had a stomach ache i'd count the tile on the ground

      when I was a little older i would count the days my brother was gone

       i would count the trees and posts on the drive up to the hospital

        i would count the minutes while waiting for my dad to pick us up

         there came a day when counting the days became too much

         my brother was gone, and was not coming back

          so I started counting steps, i counted calories

           i counted how many times I chewed something

            and i counted scars and red lines on my body

             i learned to count objects and things I could control

              like how many spaces before a paragraph starts

               because I knew that I could not count ON anyone

Bruises left on my body
A footprint of your words.

Because you can't feel the tears sting your eyes if you're already drowning.

I put walls up made of cinder blocks
Each one a lie uttered by a former love

There was a gate, covered in keyless locks
But soon even that was a weakness to the doves

So I build another line, cement and glued together thoughts and painful sensations
It was an ugly wall, but all the better to keep things away

Each time someone chipped a peice away I would it was replaced without hesitation
"May I come in?" You call, "Maybe another day"

They say your first heart break will be the worst,

but they didn't warn me about how bad it gets after the third heartbreak from that same love.

Tv shows
Movies
Commercials
They all make fun of mental illnesses.

Anorexia is not a funny teenage boy that can be cured with Jesus shaped pancakes.

Get good grades
Take collage level classes
Get a job
Have a social life
Go on dates
Be pretty
Be skinny
Be normal
Be stable
Be safe

I need an escape.
To most teens that's drinking or smoking..
But no- I can't do that.
I  have to be perfect, don't you see?
In the church
In school
In life
But I'm only 16

There's a dark secret I keep
It use to be my escape
But it's affects are running out
I need something new to take me away
And that something I'm afraid, is you.