March 6, 2021 (poem)

TW:// mentions of anorexia, body dismorphia & thoughts of suicide 

March 6, 2021

Overweight and out of shape

Health at any size 

Hides behind positivity 

When all I want is body neutrality…

But every thought

inside my head 

is the fat shaming tactics that filled my childhood and adolescence.

I watched Barbie movies and read Seventeen magazines.

I wanted to be as confident as the Sugar Plum Princess.

Too fat to wear the leotard

and my tights were too tight for my body.

I wanted to be perfect and beautiful. 

What would I do to be skinny?

As I fantasized about cutting the stress marks and my fatty thighs to pieces

chunks of body that I thought — still think — aren't worth seeing.

Called disgusting by adults and children &

made to feel like I took up too much space,

now the same faces

are dealing with anorexia 

and their taunts were just projection,

that made me want to kill myself.

Never received an apology,

I am still ashamed of my body.