"Loosing weight is weird" I think as I stare at my naked body in the bathroom mirror.
I don't feel how I thought I would. My anticipated joy had turned to relief, a burden I no longer had to bear.
My soul has always been chaotic-always waging wars against itself, so of course this too would bring conflict.
The clothes that clung snug to my skin are now too baggy. Clothes I finally felt confident after years of searching for what worked, what didn't, what was flattering, what wasn't.
And now I'm looking up how to shrink everything
And my ******* aren't as full..
sloping and drooping down without being rounded by fat;
like tissues stuffed in a bra that's just slightly too big.
Not to sound ungrateful, because I love this new body (it's an answer to prayer really; taking away the edge of my insecurities) but I suppose it feels a little foreign.
Like a best friends house you practically grew up in: completely memorized in its familiarity; marked by memories, a home away from home, but still not the place you called "home".
And I spent so long learning how to love this body; accepting her flaws, her imperfections, but never quite convincing myself, only to have to relearn again.
And in some ways that makes me...sad?
I don't have another word for it.
Maybe it's a grieving, for the part of me that was a part of me for so long; a part I scolded and criticized.
And I hate myself at times.
Because I was my own bully-projecting my insecurities with verbal lashings.
All because I had this idea that if I was prettier, skinnier, I would feel more wanted and less alone...that it was the missing piece to my happiness.
And the assumed projections of strangers thoughts bombarded me into thinking there was truth in those hauntings,
because somewhere down the line, at an unknown moment in my subconscious, beauty became abundant.
I should get used to this changing skin, because life and age will always be forcing it to keep up, to adapt; It will continue to expand and sag and wrinkle and crease.
And I hope I can learn to love those foreign bodies too, though not so unfamiliar....
                           just unplaced.

You look in the mirror and know bloating is your enemy
You have people tell you, you are too flat
You are not skinny, you are not fat
When food can be your frenemy

You put in all this work
You have people tell you it will never be enough
You are not strong, you are not weak
When your body can call your bluff

You always try and stick to the rules
You have people tell you that you could do better and include this and that
You are not memorable, you are not forgetful
When your diet looks like something you do not get at