Game Over

First grade (or was it second, or even preschool?): I am standing on the bathroom scale. Sixty-eight pounds. I have gained a pound. I feel anxiety squeeze my chest. I had been a good girl this week. I had cottage cheese in my ice cream cone instead of the real thing.

But the scale does not seem to register this. I feel a sense of desperation. I am not good enough. Because I am the fat kid. I am in shame country and I don’t know how to get out. I’m trapped.

Elementary school: I stare at my face in the mirror. I put my nose up inches from the glass and examine it from every angle. I am searching, searching for ugliness, the mark of Cain that stamps me as not good enough. I cannot find it, but I know it must be there. I know it because of what people tell me — and what they leave out.

You would be so pretty if you lost some weight.