"Your hair will fall out"
"You'll faint and pass out"
"Why must you hurt yourself?"

I don't mean to, I swear
I try to recover
Each time I fail

Skin and bones are what I desire
At least that's what my mind tells me
As my body is starving, fading away

Recovery is hard
Relapse is familiar
My eating disorder is killing me

I was terrified,
But I’m my empty hands I hold freedom
In that I have nothing to lose
I have burnt all my bridges,
Lost everyone who cared about me
The fresh air doesn’t taste like freedom
It tastes like ash.


I was so scared,
But now I don’t feel anything at all.
There is nothing anyone can take from me
I promise, it’s already gone
This is not the perfect freedom I imagined,
My child, forever isn’t build upon dreams
The real ones don’t dream at all

head filled with thoughts of knives and blood and tears and the finality of the silence that comes After.

short car rides feel that much longer one-handed and with your mind taking detours.

an empty passenger's seat, save for the bag of fresh pharmacy goods; bandages and pills and the sting of the chill winter air.

the suffocating feeling of being stuck inside all day, except this home is a body and relief is only found in quick, deep successions.

basement flooding with memories of Then and When and Red and we find ourselves to be lost in it all. drowning even.

wade through the murk and discover us in the darkest alcoves of yourself. we hide in the shadows where it's safest, drenched.

it's hard to stay present around these parts for very long without something (or someone) stirring inside begging us to forget the rest.

i'm down on myself a lot.
i don't take pity, i take punches.
grab the wall and lean into my emotions, smash through the anger, the self hatred.
that barrier i build around me to fend off (protect?) others only breeds a battle ground inside myself. i need to learn how to break free without breaking me.

i'm still learning how to let go, to forgive

myself

-somedays the voices in my head are shouting so loud I can't hear anything else.

Im tryna survive in these streets,
It's funny when you look around,
And realize all you got is yourself,
Nobody around to help,
Makes you think about your life,
My life doesn't feel worth living anymore,
It keeps getting worse not better.

I feel like leaving and not returning,
There's nothing anyone can say or do,
I can't deal wit all this,
Too much coming at me at once,
It's not slowing down,
It keeps coming that sh*t speeding up.

Y'all keep trying to have faith,
But how can you have faith at this point?
I have nothing to have faith in,
Can't tell someone something,
If you're not in their shoes,
Everyone's struggle isn't the same,
Y'all don't know what i go through,
Don't even what i suffer with mentally.

My life ain't your life,
Your pain isn't my pain,
What you go through and what i go through,
Ain't the same thing,
Something has to change,
If not i don't know what I'm going to do,
I'm at my breaking point.

Across the table
my grandpa asks me why
i don't eat cinnamon toast crunch anymore.
The last time i saw them
i loved it so much
that he tried it, and got hooked
but now i don't touch it.
And i don't know how to tell him
why,
how to tell him
that the thought of all that sugar
paralyzes me.
So i just sit with my corn flakes,
avoid his eyes
and hope he doesn't notice
how desperately i wish i could eat it.