‘Don’t worry, I think it’s cause he likes weird chicks.’

We can never really see ourselves, can we? 

I can guess what people see when they look at me–when they talk to me and choose to know me. I can guess, but yeah. I’ll never really know.

There’s a lot of trust in this. 

For the better part of a decade I focused all this uncertainty towards becoming as small as possible. Unobtrusive edges. The least amount of present possible.

I didn’t trust anyone to see me.

With this came a lot of space. For everyone else sure, but also in me. There was a big empty space in my life where I’d have liked to put something. People–places–really anything.

I was spacy as hell too, what with running a blood sugar of 50 most always. I was half a human and half present and completely fucking nuts.

It’s crazy–it is. It’s a kind of crazy I understand, of course. It makes so much sense while you’re going through it, but it’s fucking nuts looking back.

This is a promise to people in recovery: your eating disorder will stop making sense. It won’t be appealing. It’ll be nuts, I promise. You’ll see it from some other side and laugh at the person who wiped peanut butter under the table to get out of eating it. You will.

So now, in the absence of nuttiness, I really don’t know how people see me. This is why I write, but it’s also a big reason why I’m scared. 

It’s really scary, actually, to go ahead and show up without a shield or disguise or a vice. 

I was talking to my roommate about this the other night–trying to figure out how people saw me and freaking out because I just couldn’t do it. I made all kinds of excuses as to why people choose not to know me. 

“Dude, I think I’m just weird.” 

To this, my roommate said,

“Allison, one day you will be standing at the fucking altar. You’ll whisper to the audience, ‘Don’t worry, I think it’s cause he likes weird chicks.’”

I laughed. And you know what? I felt a little better. Because goddamn I think she gets it. 

I’ll never know how she sees me, really. But I think she understands the person I’m trying to be. These days, I’m pretty sure that’s a good thing. 

I’ll never know how you see me, dear reader. By now, it’s probably not looking good.

But hey. You like weird chicks, don’t you?

My whole heart.

Allison