I have never had an intervention before. I have had it politely suggested to me that at sixteen in I was drinking too much. Apparently bringing a mixture of vodka, gin, bourbon, whiskey, tequila, and crystal lite isn't a normal lunch.
They couldn't understand the way that brown mixture glided (forcefully) down my throat brought me a relief that I had never known. They didn't understand that version of me that I would become could look people in the eye until the world began to spin.
But I'd drink a million water bottles full from sun up until the end of freshman year, when my friends suggested that I stop drinking, at least when it wasn't socially acceptable, even to the group of misfits that I ran with. God knows I have always strived to be fucking different.
I have never been friends with my body. I would eat whole pizzas in the search for happiness, but only found disappointment, rejection, and shame before the glasses. Before the substances came the food. And God, did I know how to consume.
I started giving her drugs before and after the party, "but I am not drinking," I would say. I would call myself an alcoholic before I even understood the word. I wore it like a sash of honor, "I only drink on special occasions," and then snort whatever pills like opioids, fentanyl or smoked enough weed to make the whole world sing.
I have never been friends with my body. I have always been jumping from binges, to lean cuisine diets, or better yet at meal times just sitting in silence.
Then heroin came with her effortless touch, and I met heaven and hell all at once. I no longer had to look people in the eye. Heroin taught me how to live while barely being alive.
I have never been friends with my body. I have worn the yellow pinpoint marks with pride. Like she was my secret world, and I was on one hell of a ride. When you run with the heroin crowds, no one suggests that you're doing too much. No one expects you to keep down your lunch. No one expects you to be truly happy inside. When you run with a heroin crowd everyone has the devil in their eyes.
After seven years of being in a death lock grip, I fell out of hell, into yet another snake pit. Just when the breath was returning to my dry bones, I realized just how big they had grown, and if I know anything that brings me comfort it is how to control. I have never been friends with my body. I have tried to mould her into a version of myself that could fall like satin on a bruised mouth. I have tried to use my body as another means to escape myself.
I have never had an intervention until my friends heard my body's silent screams. They say my bones would look better if I could just keep a meal if I could just make peace with myself, but if you could only see the version of myself that lives in my head, then you'd have a bone to pick with the mirror. You would wear heavy sweatshirts in the Florida heat. You might understand why all this time, I have been running away from myself.
If you could only see the little girl that looks back at me, begging to be loved after everything.