I step up and begin my journey. The scale boasting accuracy up to 700 lbs. The needle considers 409 but holds a bit higher. Only once before has my weight crept so dense. Three weeks of diet until celebration- 397 on a device registering only to 400.

I toss off the phrase “only to 400” as if it is not a colossal amount. I am a sofa, a dresser, a quarter of the weight limit of many elevators. I am massive, take up space, crowd the aisles. I am an elephant, whale, cow, fatty. monster. freak. I am all the names I am called. I draw attention. I draw crowds. I have always been too much. My weight echoes the manic child inside. Too much of everything but never enough.

I do not run the dishwasher unless every space is occupied unless nothing more will fit. When pumping gas, I top it off despite recommendations, the potential for spillage. Satisfaction equals full. Today I fear the wanting of it, laboring over a well-balanced meal mild interest at the taste, disappointment in the end--my belly prepared yet not full.

This first week I’m a slave to it. I’ve been here before like going back to an abusive spouse or childhood memory. I move from diet drink mixes to water to counting the minutes until my next snack. I am tricking my stomach to feel full. I cannot cope with the idea of nothing. I thrive on the something forthcoming. I beg the clock to move.

I obsess if the 20g of carbs in my fat free yogurt will put me over the edge and keep me obese-- unhealthy-- monstrous. I try to remember this is the alternative to candy bars, trail mix, coca-cola, or fasting until a two plate buffet lunch

As a child I was quick to conjure up illness out of a scratchy throat, raised temperature the slightest pulled muscle. “Eating disorder” didn’t quite fit. The symptoms in pamphlets seemed foreign--shoveling in mounds of food when depressed or angry. A puzzle to my young self. No emotional charge ignited me. Food is a constant like air. There was no seeking.

I never coupled myself with the alcoholic who drank at dawn, not considering I lived as a well-oiled fat wheel, without reason to speak of it. I was seduced by movies of bulimics their boney paleness the way sweaters hung loosely collar bones announced their presence. I spent hours hunched over the toilet swabbing deep with a toothbrush interrupted by gagging the pain of my insides clinging tight to this love. Red eyes and swollen throat. My body fighting as hard to keep food down as some bodies fight to expel.

When I am undersexed, bored with my job, disenchanted with self—there is the crisp cold soda, the warm noodles with butter spinach soufflé and cheese—mountains of cheese in this world to comfort me, fill me, rock me into comfort, the baby in me suckling. I take responsibility for loving myself the wrong way.