the reflection in the mirror

for as long as i can remember, i have judged myself every time i have looked in the mirror. i have picked apart my features over and over and over again.

your pores are too big. you have acne. you have cellulite. you have spider veins. your belly is too round, too soft, too large. your legs are too short. your boobs are lazy. your thighs touch. your butt is flat. you are too big. you are too big. that last one is loud. so fucking loud. i don't know when it started. i remember in high school thinking i was bigger than all of my friends. when girls were borrowing each others jeans + dresses, i felt there was NO WAY i was going to fit into their stuff. i didn't participate because i didn't want to be humiliated. in high school, i borrowed a stretchy dress for sno-frolic from my best friend. it was literally the first time ever i had borrowed another girls clothing. it felt awesome to wear something that my thinner friend wore, even if i filled it out differently. yet, i still kept on thinking that i was always 'the bigger friend'. during my sophomore year, i bought a dress that was a size 3 for prom. i still thought i was huge. some of the influences and women in my life at the time almost made me feel like a pity project. i remember thinking ... well, if they think i'm 'rounder' or 'have more curves' then that's the way it was. shit, i was bigger than they were. what i didn't think about was that i was strong. i was an athlete. i had muscle + curves. i should have known better then. i wish i would have had more positive influences on my brain at that age. i didn't. i just kept trying to fit into a smaller box. not much changed in my twenties. more of the same. i never wanted to wear dresses. i hated shopping for shorts. i didn't wear shirts cut for women. i cringe looking at pictures from this decade in my life. i feel like i just stop caring. months before i turned 30, i made some kind of weird ass challenge to myself to lose 30 pounds by the time i turned 30. you know what? i actually fucking did it. it started out with being on weight watchers and only changing how i ate. shortly after losing the 30+ pounds, weight watchers ended their stint in town. so, i started running. it was honestly my version of therapy. i looked forward to it. then somewhere along the line, i blew up my life + slowly the weight crept back on. it didn't start bothering me until a couple years after i met nick. when i met him, i still felt great + was feeling confident in my body. i was wearing cute stuff and LIKED how i looked in the mirror. i had curves, but they didn't get in my way. it just was who i was. at some point, the wheels came off. i feel like a lot of things started changing for me when i went through a weird work transition. there was an abrupt end to a close relationship with some work friends. people that i had spent time pouring into, trusting and learning from became people i didn't recognize. i was kind of left floundering around for a bit. i took a huge hit to my self confidence. it lit up a very raw fear that i had buried deep inside me, covered with a smile and sense of humor. my intense fear of rejection clawed it's way to the surface of my life. i didn't realize at the time, but this would really start to affect my mental health. from that point forward, everything seemed to flare up my fears. i would spin tales in my head about scenarios that would never happen. i would stress. i would overthink. that's when i would comfort myself with food. i could control that. i could be alone with that. i didn't need to get drunk to numb my pain, but i sure as hell would eat until i felt sick. that was the poison i picked. my willpower flatlined. my anxiety was high. my confidence was taking blows daily. i eventually started seeing a therapist. i eventually went to the emily program for intensive outpatient therapy for my binge eating disorder. i still see a therapist. and you know what ... i'm still fucking battling my fears. it's not to say i'm not doing the work. i am. i just have fucking decades of sludge to walk through first. all of those things i tell myself in the mirror? i tell them to myself because of lies i have believed about myself most of my life. only when i get regular about loving myself on the inside will my reflection change.