Letting go
A collection of poems by Katie
This series of poems are written about my experiences of struggling with an eating disorder and going through the camhs system as a teenager battling with my own brain. I hope people find comfort in the words as I do in the writing.
Just so you know: the first poem in this contribution contains a swear word. Please only continue to view it if you are comfortable with this.
+ Letting go
Letting go
Sometimes
I miss being sick
The grimiest parts of me
Wishes I had stayed
In that familiar city of grey and
Mental illness and whatever the opposite of healing is
But for once
I don’t want to write about this
For the first time
I am embarrassed instead of proud
Of all of the fucked up things I have done
To my body
Any casual comment on calories
And the voice in my head pipes up
Again
But I don’t want to be like this
There is too much truth in the cliche
You can’t live a full life on an empty stomach
Promises from that voice that
You can still be you and listen
Is ridiculous but acknowledging that
Is hard
Recovery is hard work
It’s okay to use another voice to say
Today is a hard day and
It’s okay to admit
The safety net is cut with huge holes
She wants you to fall
she won’t catch you
You have to learn how to land by yourself
But put in the effort and
You will discover that
You can fly
+ Leap of faith
Leap of faith
Take a breath
It’s okay to be brave
To take a risk
You don’t have to be confident
To unpick the stitches
Where illness is woven
Into you
It takes time
Energy
The connection doesn’t have to be permanent
But you have to make the choice
To unravel yourself
And become your own
Beautiful whole
Journey
Recovery is not simple
There’s no clear line
Where illness
Becomes wellness
Because the depth of the wounds
Is unmeasurable
But that doesn't mean
They won’t scar
It won’t be easy
But that doesn’t mean impossible
The road is littered with
Relapse routes
“Easier lanes ahead”
But there is a better
The way you’re going
Is better than
Going back to what you left behind
Let it burn to the ground
Make a new place
To call home
+ My heart aches
My heart aches
Each beat echoes a strange nostalgia for the old days
Where each pounding echoed an attempt
To claw my calories back
Bathroom scales make me feel homesick
Like a scrapbook of the darkness
I flip through
My mind wanders back to my familiar city of grey
Surrounded by mental illness
And whatever the opposite of healing is,
I always wander back to my sickness
Like a strange homing instinct
To go back to where I was comfy
Not because fixating on calories is comfy
But because the familiarity
Cushioned each blow of life
I always had a friend
To hold my hand through the foggy streets
But trying to remember
The same friend would
force my hand down my throat too
Is hard
Because romanticising my illness
Is easier than fighting for normality
Pretending i'm okay in my city of grey
Is easier than finding a new place to call home
So forgive me for falling in love with my sickness
That mirrors a silhouette I’m supposed to fall in love with
Trying to remind myself I can’t live on
Suppers of tobacco smoke and red lipstick
I am confused by the mad things I have done
In my search for happiness but
Wanting to die is not the same as wanting to find home
And I am still trying
To remember that
+ Puppet
Puppet
I told her I loved
the feeling of water on my empty stomach
Waiting for the coolness to slip all the way down
And land in the well
Was my favourite game
Convinced I wasn’t
obsessed with being empty just
Afraid of being full
But I slipped
tumbled into the rabbit hole but
I didn’t mean to shrink
I found the doorways to the breeding ground
Of my illness and
I learnt to call it home because
It was the only place that understood
Too distracted by pretending
To notice the string on my hands
Until she picked up the handles
+ Watery milk
Watery milk
I roll the idea around in my head
And it tastes of watery milk
The heaviness of the idea
Tugs at the tissues in my chest
I don’t bleed anymore
Consumed by the thought and aching
To cling to that small amount of relief
That numbs my brain
If I stop digging my nails into my skin
Then I’ll be absorbed by the static
Again
My mind wanders away from the possibility
Of finding my old life
My last threads of hope are caught by the wind
Of my constant storm
And all I can taste is watery milk
The comfort of being at peace
And I was her toy
+They say
They say
Don’t mould your body
For others
But make you jump through hoops
Like a circus animal
Making you feel
Invalid
If you don't match the shape
Carved out for you
By the DSM-5
So don’t sit there
And feel guilty
For having an eating disorder
Don’t sit there
And tell me
This is for vanity
When I’m part of a system
Screaming at me to be
Smaller
