I took a step closer and I flinched.
I’d seen it a hundred times before every time I pinched her sides, turned to the side and sucked in her stomach whilst thinking about how her thighs touched.
I tried to cover her flabby arms with her long hair.
To hide everything she had once deemed a ‘flaw’.
I remembered the hunger she ignored.
The way she celebrated her hunger like it was an achievement or a stamp of approval making up her identity.
She didn’t know how to love her, she hadn’t learned.
She only knew the girl who fed her shame for breakfast and called it discipline.
She didn’t trust me, how could she?
I had worn her anxiety like perfume sometimes subtle, sometimes suffocating.
I stared at the girl who lived in my skin, the one who was trying to escape it for years.
I tried to speak,
but the lump in my throat grew heavy.
So instead, I whispered: “I’m so sorry.”
I’m sorry for the years I starved you.
For punishing you when you were crying out for rest.
For pushing through pain,
and calling cruelty self-control and discipline.
I’m sorry for the endless critiques
and I’m sorry for every time I looked in the mirror,
believing every lie about you.
You’ve held me through heartbreak, through sickness, through long nights of self-hatred.
And still, here you are. Still breathing and still showing up.
As I once again look into her eyes, I expect to see resentment but all I see is weariness wrapped up in mercy.
And then, just for a moment this fifteen year old’s eyes stare directly into mine.
Yes, there was pain but there was also something else, a flicker of recognition and maybe a slight softness. As if she realised that the twenty-five year old woman staring back at her had finally come to accept what she had once hated.
We stood there, me and the girl I once was. Not wishing to forget the damage but to begin again, living in forgiveness.
I watched her glance down at herself, counting all the places she still didn’t measure up as she ran her fingers over her scars.
I wanted to tell her “Stop!” But I remembered, the lies were so deep she wouldn’t hear this. So instead, I whispered; “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for making you, my enemy. I’m sorry, I made you believe that love is to be earned by shrinking, hiding and hurting.”
And before I faded, I told her; “Take care of the body that He fearfully and wonderfully made for you. You only get one.”
Many Blessings, Grace. Xx
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