I love this place.  This place I call my second home.  But you fill me with dread the instant I enter.  As I stare at the size zeros with their prima ballerina shape, I immediately feel the presence of a gaping hole where my stomach had just plunged through.  As I stand next to them, you arise within my thoughts: making me question my every move and contemplate my existence in this world.

One inhale and exhale. One deep breath.  The effort it takes to stabilize myself onto the shaky ground you put before me takes an exhausting consumption; I must show that I will not be intimidated by you.  I can feel the palpitations erupting through my sweat glands: tu-tum. tu-tump. tu-tum. tu-tump.  My eyes scour the room, looking for the perfect lines; I found it.  Standing perfectly still yet moving at the same time. 180 degree feet, ready to pounce on the combination.  Perfectly rotated thighs, shown delicately while hiding their power.  Fingers, carved straight from King Louis XIV’s mind.  Plump arms, rounded and full of life.  So effortlessly.  

You inject into me.

“Why can’t I look like her?”      

Get out of my head.  

“I will never look like her.  I shouldn’t like the way I look because they don’t like that: they like her.  Be more like her.”

I look at her and I want to be everything she is.  I look at her and can’t stand to view myself in the mirror.  

Why do you exist in my mind?  You come in silently, creeping in.  You only arise when I see her.  You make me question my existence and everything that I am.  I can’t receive a single compliment without you popping up into my head;

“She already does that.  They are pitying me.  Her lines always look better.  She will always turn better.  Her movements are sharper and smoother: the perfect combination.  They will only like me if I look like that.  I need to stop looking like myself.  I need to fix myself.  Why can’t my body look like hers.  I need to be as perfect as her or they will never like me.”  

The thoughts you infiltrate through damages me to no resolution.  You compare me to every other girl standing in the room. Thoughts uncontrollably flooding, making my entire self esteem decline to which I am left with no motivation.  

“There’s no point.  I will never look like them.”  

I will never get used to these phrases you say over and over again, pounding into my unconscious mind.  Just leave me alone.  Why won’t you leave me alone?  Why won’t you let me accept my body for what it is?  I'm trying.