Tamara and Benji Round 2 & 3

I open the bathroom cupboard and take the scale out of it's hiding place. I hide it to try and conceal it's power over me. Yet that power is so strong that I continue to use it on a daily basis, even though it has never said a positive word to me or has ever given me any good news, I still use it. I have never once liked what it has told me. In fact I don't even really like the scale itself. I hate the relationship we have. I am so codependent on it. Without it I feel out of control, with it I feel inferior and worthless. This is not a fun way to feel about oneself.

I place the scale on the floor. I stare at it. Actually it is more like a glare. I hate the sight of this thing, this plastic, metal, electrical contraption that was invented just to torture me. I pick up my right foot to step on the scale. My foot is clothed with a sock, the rest of me is clothed as well...jeans, t-shirt, hoodie, bra, underwear, earrings and ring. As I pause with my right foot an inch from the ground I start calculating in my head the weight of all that I am wearing. The anxiety starts. That all too familiar feeling of panic, worthlessness and confusion. I say to myself, "It's allright. I will weigh myself clothed and then I'll get undressed and weigh myself again because it won't be accurate if I weigh myself fully clothed." No one stops me to get me to realize that there is no point in weighing myself at all because I won't like what I see no matter what I do.

I start to move my right foot towards the scale and stop. I can't do it. I think, "I've already eaten breakfast today. It won't tell me my real weight because I still have the weight of what I've eaten today to weigh me down. Plus, I have to go to the bathroom. I need to rid myself of that before weighing myself."

I put my right foot back down on the ground.

I sit down on the side of the tub. Exhausted, drained from this mental battle. A battle that I face on a daily basis. A battle that happens daily due to this piece of plastic holding it's power over me. I lower my head. My hands reach up to catch the weight of it. I sit there, alone, in the bathroom, struggling to make sense of my inner struggle. I think to myself, "Why do I do this? Who in their right mind weighs themselves so excessively? Who, but me, puts all of their self worth into a scale?"

I realize right then and there that I cannot continue this way any longer. I know what I must do. I must kill it. I stand up, filled with conviction. I pick up that scale and walk outside. I place it on the concrete walkway. I see the mallet resting against the house, the mallet that Casey used the other day. I pick up that mallet. I feel it's weight in my arms. It gives me power that I didn't know I had.

In a voice, aloud for all the world to hear I proclaim to the scale, "I no longer allow you to have power over me. I release myself from your negativity. I do not want you in my life. I free myself from your power."

I pick up that mallet and slam it down on the scale with all my might. The scale barely gets a dent in it. "You're gonna take the hard way, huh?" I say to the scale with a sneer. I pick up that mallet again, swing down with more strength then I ever knew I had. The mallet makes contact with the scale and creates a gaping hole right in the middle of it. I smile. I am killing it. That thought makes me happy. I swing down again, and again, and again until all that is left of it is bits and pieces of plastic. I am heaving from the work. But I'm also smiling. I am feeling freer than I have ever felt in my entire life. I look up at the sky and watch the clouds as they pass. I sense that I have accomplished something great just now, other than just destroying a scale, but not sure what that "great" thing is just yet.

I look back down and see that the scale is still there, laying all over the back porch in smithereens. Time to rid myself completely of this evil beast. I gather all the pieces up in a dust pan. I walk triumphantly to the garbage can and toss what used to be the scale into the garbage can. I can hardly wait until Monday when the garbage men come to take it away from me forever. I walk back into the house, back to the bathroom and it is there that I realize what the "great" thing is that I accomplished.

I have rid Benji, my eating disorder, of it's most powerful weapon over me. It no longer has this scale in it's artillery. I feel vindicated. I think, "what other weapons can I get ride of?"

I rush to the closet. I see the "skinny" clothes hanging there. The "skinny" clothes from when I was anorexic. I no longer think of them as "skinny" clothes but as my "sick" clothes. I rip them from their hangers, tear them out of the drawers. I shove all of them in a garbage sack. I rid myself of their negative power of me. They no longer get to tell me every morning, "Look how fat you are. You're so fat that you can't fit into us anymore. Don't eat! That's how you'll get us back." I don't care about getting them back. Sure I was skinny when I fit in them, but at what cost? The cost of losing my hair? The cost of looking ashen and hollow? If that's what it is to be "skinny" then I was certainly fooling myself.

I know I must carry this mound of clothing to the garbage can. It's a heavy load to carry, but knowing that I'm throwing them away gives me the strength I need to continue. Once I pick them up I realize that they aren't as heavy as I thought them to be. Out of the house I walk and into the can they go. They rest atop the shards of the scale.

Benji is down another piece of ammo.

I walk back to the house, I am triumphant. I have won not only 1 battle today but 2. I know that I am better than what those material things told me I was. I have a womanly figure that is attractive and beautiful. I now realize that a size cannot make me feel beautiful, that a number on a scale does not signify my self worth. There is only one person that can make me feel beautiful. Who is that person you ask? Only yours truly...myself.

I have a long road to go yet until this war is won. Knowing that I have the power inside me to create my own happiness is all the ammo I need to defeat Benji. He's going down. He's getting weaker.

And every day I'm getting stronger.

Tamara 3/Benji 0