Tired of this body
Her whole life, Siobhan was treated based on how she appeared. She noticed this in Sunday school, when the little boys around her would flock to the girls with new dresses or different hair. They would flock to her. Siobhan's mother was a proud person, who took great pride in making sure her children were well-kept. She always found that people took better care of her if she was well put together. As a teenager, Siobhan noticed that she was more inclined to get what she wanted when she showed herself off a bit. As an adult, she found that people were more respectful if you looked like you had money. She also found that men were less angry if you were nice to look at.
Siobhan used to take pride in her body and appearance. She would take her time with her appearance and make sure she looked perfect. Was it healthy? Probably not, but she always looked at herself with a sense of pride. Everything she would do was articulated by herself. She was in complete control in regards to her body. After she moved away from her parents, before Roger, she had full autonomy. It was so freeing. She took care of herself, she didn't engage with the vices that cursed many people around her. She didn't smoke, do drugs and only had the occasional drink. She treated her body like a temple.
But it all changed when she got involved with Roger. In the beginning, he cherished her. Showering her with lavish gifts and seemingly endless love because she "deserved it." he made her feel pretty, in a way she couldn't understand. Something changed along the way though, something got lost along the way as his words changed from "you look amazing tonight" to "i can't be seen with you" and "Who are you dressing up for." She had intertwined her sense of worth with the sense she had of her body. The kindness she used to treat herself with was no more and instead was replaced with a feeling of deep shame. She blamed her body for the way she was treated, refusing to accept that it had nothing to do with that.
Along the way, her autonomy was stripped. Maybe it was the first time that Roger made her feel powerless. Maybe it was the first time he violated her? But Siobhan had become a doll on strings. She moved with his demands, she moved for other people's entertainment. Her mind had become a place of hollowness, in which her pain echoed in the abyss. Her life was supposed to hold a purpose, but she was simply a puppet for his entertainment.
She didn't know what it was with her body. The lungs used to keep her alive were slowly choking her with the idea that she was not good enough. The heart that powerfully pumped blood to keep her alive, she wanted to rip out in hopes that it could numb her. She had accepted the way that Roger abused her, but she couldn't accept the feeling that her brain was divorcing her heart. There was so much she couldn't understand. Why was it okay to sell what's between a woman's legs without mentioning her inner workings? Why was she silenced by the man who was supposed to love her? Did her opinions make her less beautiful?
She hated what her body had become, how her pride had changed. She no longer had control over the scars that surfaced on her skin. They told stories she didn't want to hear. Her body was a reflection of her story. How she came to be, how she got to where she is now. Her body carried her through this. But that didn't stop her from hating it. She yearned for her old body, the untainted, unscarred body.
