Are You There Stomach? It’s Me, Thomas

Sometimes I lift my shirt up in front of the mirror and sigh because I have a stomach. I could make this go away pretty easily, I think to myself, after I suck my fat in and my torso turns flat. A plan comes to mind: cut out dinner, eat only yogurt for breakfast and salad for lunch, and treat myself to potato chips and a soda on the occasional weekend. The regime feels familiar, because I implemented it often back in my early teen years.

At that time in my life, my mom yelled at me for hours almost every day, a doctor once told me I could stand to lose a few pounds, and a Korean girl I had talked to for weeks over AIM called me ugly when I finally sent her a photo of myself.

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Maybe It’ll Just Happen

Over the past week or so I have felt sad about my attraction to men. While I love my life without a male romantic partner, I still feel some angst about feeling attracted to men at all. When I let myself luxuriate in my emotions, I recognize that a lot of my pain comes from my lack of control surrounding men, dating, and desire.

As a former anorexic, I tend to prefer situations where I can exert a lot of control.

Thomas Practices Self-Care in the Face of Anorexic Thoughts and Watches a Glorious Movie, Girlhood

Sometimes I act a little dramatic. Earlier this week, after an eyeroll-worthy email exchange, I stopped harboring feelings for the crush I held onto for the past eight months. Afterward, I thought well, if this seemingly beautiful well-read social justice-oriented hunk of a man turned out to be awful and an emotionally stunted communicator, I will literally never ever trust or date a man on this planet. On top of that update, one of my good friends, who I still care about and respect, has started prioritizing her boyfriend in her life, and I thought well, if this is happening to a person who identifies as a feminist and used to rant with me about people who over-prioritize their boyfriends, I might as well never make new friends because they’ll all eventually prioritize their boyfriends. For a day or two I felt the urge to stop eating. I thought to myself, hm, if I cannot control the quality of men that exist in a patriarchal society and I cannot control the prioritization of men and romance in a patriarchal society, then I might as well control the prominence of my ribcage. I literally felt my heart freeze up, like someone sprayed an icy mist into my chest and made my insides all cold and untrusting.

But after feeling my feelings while playing tennis at 7:30 this morning and then waiting for my tuberculosis screening in a nearby CVS, I thought to myself, wait a f-ing second, this is not who I am, I am not a fundamentally cold and untrusting person. As I guzzled a Blue Machine Naked Juice while in line at the CVS and then an Orange Fanta in my apartment, I thought I’m Thomas, who values warmth, vulnerability, and over-disclosing about my personal life on the internet, I’m not going to let some random man on the internet and the patriarchy turn me into someone I’m not.

Life Sucks and I Feel No Hope

I starved myself for 36 hours straight last week. Several personal issues blew up in my face and I wanted not to feel. I talked to my close friends and went to therapy and started to eat again. This series of tweets illustrates how I feel after eating:

Ariana’s September 2018 = Thomas’s April 2019. That’s that on that.

Life sucks.

Everything I’ve Ever Wanted

I always wanted to run away from home, from my abusive mother and her screaming fits and mood swings. In high school, I put my head down and worked hard so I could get into a good college and escape. I did run away from home once. I wrote a blog post about it, too. Then, I got into a great college and left at long last, only to run head first into a disturbing relationship and PTSD.

Fast forward five years and countless therapy sessions later.

Eating Disorders, Control, and Unbearable Lightness by Portia De Rossi

Cover via Goodreads.

Rating: 5/5 stars.

Before I begin my review of this book, I want to share the story of the first and last time I forced myself to throw up. While this doesn’t relate exactly to Unbearable Lightness, it sheds light on why I empathize so much with Portia De Rossi and what she went through. Skip down a few paragraphs if you wish.

In my first few years of adolescence, I always felt lost. I was born gay in a society where the word faggot is tossed around like footballs are thrown on Sunday, born homosexual in a world where my own mother prefers me dead than happy with a man. I couldn’t change any of this – all I thought I could do was struggle through school and maybe make a friend or two.

Couple that with the need to be above average.

Perfect by Ellen Hopkins

Cover via Goodreads.

Rating: 5/5 stars.

In Perfect Ellen Hopkins tells the story of four teens trying to find their flawless selves. Cara’s brother has been committed to a psychiatric hospital after a failed suicide attempt, and she is struggling to deal with their parents’ overbearing expectations as well as her sexual identity. Sean utilizes steroids in order to succeed, but does not realize that the risks and the consequences may make his efforts futile. Kendra covets the perfect body, yet cannot see beyond the idea that skinny is beautiful. Andre aspires to be a dancer, although his family disapproves. These four have to fight not only with the external forces raging against them, but also with their internal demons that may be the end of them.

Staying true to her trademark, Hopkins weaves a tale of teens with issues – in this case, anorexia, homosexuality, steroids, and dance – through her pulchritudinous poetry. Her writing was wonderful and seamless, as always, and Hopkins is one of the few young-adult authors who manages to obtain that perfect balance between not enough detail and too much detail – which, considering the subject matter, is quite an accomplishment.

Anorexia – A Luxury Disease? Heck No.

Image via 101healthsolution.com

Have you ever been so angry that you couldn’t find the words to express your emotions? I haven’t. Honestly, I rarely get upset. Irritated and annoyed, maybe. Angry, no. I’m not a fan of anger. I find it immature. Impractical.

I’m upset.

I was reading an article I found online. I won’t divulge what article, but I will admit I was enjoying it until the author alluded to anorexia. He called it a luxury disease.

He had his reasons. Slavery, starvation, safety against terrorists – I get it. Those are big issues. There are a lot of problems plaguing this world, and it’s impossible to name all of them or attribute them levels of importance. Which is why I was offended when I read something along the lines of “at least they have food! It’s their choice to starve themselves…”

Eating disorders such as anorexia are body-damaging and life-threatening (for more information on anorexia and how to help, click here). Not only do victims of this illness refuse to eat, but they rebuke their body’s natural instinct to survive. That’s one reason why I find this disease disturbing, and it troubles me that people don’t take it seriously.

When you’re hungry, you eat. You usually don’t even think about it, unless you’re dieting (you’re still eating, though). If you’re anorexic, you learn to live with hunger and to let it consume you to the point where being hungry is a sign of strength – of perseverance. Self-starvation in order to secure a skinny body. It’s just not right.

If you’re currently suffering from anorexia or you know someone that is, here’s a helpful website. You can also leave a comment or message me – I have experience with anorexia and I know how good it feels to shed those pounds, but trust me, it’s not worth it in the end.

I apologize if this post is rather unconventional, it was a spur of the moment thing. But I meant every word I wrote.

Image via disorder.org