My inner child still hates looking at my reflection. It's a Pavlovian response, a knee jerk reaction, you know basic conditioning. No matter how often I tell myself it's ok now, I sometimes still have the stomach turning feeling of punishment and can feel my throat start to close up. A wave of worthlessness washes over me and spills down my cheeks.
I was 10 years old and hated ballet.
Being an awkward, slightly overweight,and uncoordinated kid, I really didn't have much of a chance. My body refused to move with grace and purpose. I spent most of the class staring at my reflection in the large mirror, trying to make it move like everyone else. Eventually the instructor gave up on trying to get me to plie properly and moved to more advanced moves with the rest of the class. I tried to make myself as small as possible, but I never gave up trying. The mirror only showed me my mistakes.
I was 10 years old and hated mirrors.
A timer next to the chair counted down my time left. I was sitting in a chair and hating every tear I had to watch drip down my face. I was being punished for wasting my mothers time and money by watching myself in the mirror in class. She noticed I watched my reflection in class and insisted it was because I was lazy and vain and doing it only to waste her time.
5 more minutes left and I had to look like I wasn't crying. She always joked to other adults that she would give me a real reason to cry if she ever saw me giving the"crocodile tears". Only it wasn't a joke, so I had 5 minutes to make my face less blotchy. This was the new routine. Every day after ballet it was the Mirror Punishment.
I am 31 years old and sometimes, I fucking despise my reflection.
