Skinny

Chapter 7

            Binging and purging became a normal activity for me as time went on. I was always so angry and repulsed with myself after I binged. It made me feel like a failure. After all of the hard work I put into not eating, how could I ruin that by eating a crap load of food? My only way away from those thoughts would be to purge. At first I felt disgusting when the bile rose, but after it was almost like a high. When I was done I felt rejuvenated, free, and ready to take on the world. It was strange how I could go from down, depressed, and disgusted, to that in just a matter of minutes.

            People were starting to get suspicious, too. It was getting difficult to keep coming up with lies when it came to eating, but I somehow managed. The one person who didn’t believe me with whatever I said was Robbie. He always gave me looks and tried getting the truth out of me but I held my ground. I couldn’t understand why he cared so much. If I was happy, shouldn’t that mean something?

But was I happy?

It was so hard distinguishing my emotions now. Overall I was happy with all of the weight I was losing, but when I actually sat down to think about what was going on, I felt completely miserable. I hated the fact that I couldn’t eat just so I could lose weight, I hated keeping all of my emotions bottled up inside, I hated lying to everyone I met, and I hated the fear of being fat. It was this constant struggle inside my brain every single day. I’d see someone eating something that I used to enjoy and just want to devour it, but somehow keep myself back. Or there’s a perfect window for me to just spill everything that’s going on in my mind, but I hold everything in.

I also had cross emotions about how I looked. I still saw myself as fat, atrocious, and hideous, yet when I went to school, I covered myself in baggy clothes so people wouldn’t see how much weight I had lost. It was a weird thing that I couldn’t exactly figure out. I stopped tying the back of my gym uniform, I didn’t feel comfortable in shorts, and tank tops were a no go. I felt like a completely different person.

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Fall was one of my favorite seasons, mostly because it wasn’t an uncomfortable hot, or an unbearable cold. And the leaves were always so pretty when they started changing colors, they were a nice sight to look at. Fall was coming to a close soon, though. It was November, which meant winter was just around the corner. It was sad to think about snow falling and ruining everything. I always had a strong hatred for snow. It made my hair messy and it was just way too cold.

I put on a pair of loose fitting gray sweatpants, a white tank top, and a black hoodie that read ‘Santa Cruz California.’ Brushing my hair out, I noticed that my roots were beginning to come in and sighed. I had already re-dyed my hair once before, so I knew how to do it myself now, but I still wasn’t crazy about the fact that I had to do it again. After I was all ready, I grabbed my bag and headed out the house. It was a usual routine now, I rarely said goodbye to my parents or brother before I left because of the fact that they would always be eating breakfast and I didn’t want to be around that.

I met up with Sasha and we began walking to school. Once there, we went to class and thus began the once again boring school day. When it was time to go to gym, I walked to the locker rooms but stopped when there was a sign on the door. ‘No dress day for everyone.’ I smiled and turned around to figure out where my class would be meeting, and then found them near the wrestling room. I walked over and joined a few girls who I had gotten slightly close to while being in class and joined into the conversation until we were allowed in the room.

The class piled in and we all sat along the walls. Mr. Wilson walked into the room a few moments later and smiled at us all. “Alright class, today is just a relaxing day and you are free to do whatever you want. However, I will be calling you up one by one to take your weight. Okay, now you’re free to chat and such.” He said before walking over to the scale on the floor and sitting down on his chair.