The harsh fluorescent lights of the grocery store burned my tired and puffy eyes as I wandered down the canned food aisle next to my mom, scouting out possible options to expand my dietary repertoire, as suggested by my unsympathetic dietician. Each appointment ends with me crying, my mom and I having a very frank, emotional discussion in the car, and then going to the supermarket to pick out new foods to add to my limited diet. This proves extremely difficult and stressful as I’ve come to fear most foods, as well as beverages that would provide my body with any sort of valuable nutrition. My mom wearily named off foods, hoping I would agree to eat at least one. That would be a victory in her book. I half-heartedly accepted the suggestion of artichoke hearts, which I never fully intended to eat.The can sat in the cabinet for two months before it was eventually used in a dip. As we reached the end of the aisle, I pulled my eyes from their usual resting spot on the floor. And there she was. My height, maybe two years older than I was; it was hard to tell, as her gaunt and tired face gave her the illusion of age, but her scrawny body gave her the appearance of a child. Her skinny jeans were not skinny enough. They wrinkled at her knees and bunched awkwardly at her ankles. There was a gap the size of the pacific ocean between her thighs. She wore a jacket, zipped up to her neck, though it was the middle of May. My first thought, however dark this may sound, was what is she doing in a grocery store? I was almost amused at the irony of the situation. She had no basket, nothing in her arms, she just walked empty handed, looking lost. There was a brief moment of eye contact as she passed and then she was gone. I looked at my mom. She had her eyes focused ahead. I wondered for a brief moment if she had even seen what I had or if it had been some kind of hallucinatory vision. But as we rounded the corner and there was appropriate distance between us and the girl, she spoke.

“That’s what we’re trying to avoid. If you had kept going at your rate, you would look like that too.” I feel a stinging, pulling sensation inside. There was part of me that still did want to look like that. This was the same part of me that wondered what that girl had thought of me. Did she think I was fat? Could she tell that I was struggling too? Did we have some sort of unspoken understanding? I had faced the demons that she faced, I knew the feelings she felt all too well.

“Are you ready to check out, or did you want anything else?” my mom asked, seeming to have already forgotten what we had just experienced.

“Yeah, I’m good” I said. I looked into the basket. Cottage cheese, dried fruit, bread. Safe foods. Artichoke hearts, avocados, lentils. Uncharted territory. I was suddenly grateful. Grateful for the support system I had, the painful family dinners, the appointments that left me in tears, the stressful trips to the grocery store. I for once felt that I was the lucky one.