Don't call me skinny, that's an insult

Any woman, entering in to any public space can expect to have her body judged by both men and women alike. We have so many ways to describe women's bodies, so many different criteria that we are constantly judged against:

How small are her breasts?
How big is her ass?
How broad are her shoulders?
How slender is her waist?

We describe women as curvy, thick, fat, skinny, slender, voluptuous, petite, athletic. While we often describe men in three ways: fat, skinny, muscular. It's no secret that women are held to a stricter standard when it comes to their appearance, and that's often because we're taught that a women's appearance equals her worth.

A fat woman, is an invisible woman, an ugly woman is someone to be ignored because when you're a woman, you must be attractive to prove your value to men and often to other women.

For a long time I bought in to this ideal. I didn't wanted to be stared at, judged, or worse, completely ignored because I couldn't manage to keep my appearance together. I developed an eating disorder, starving myself, working out excessively all to prove my value to society. And that's why I think as women, we need to stop congratulating one another for being thin or skinny.

It's not an accomplishment by any means, and calling someone skinny isn't a compliment, it's a body type. Some women look like that because of genetics without being healthy or exercising at all, meanwhile other women, not unlike myself, go to extreme measures to meet a certain ideal.

We continue to value one another based on weight, and it needs to stop. The body shaming needs to stop. The small, critical comments about each other's arms and legs has to stop.

And now there seems to be this influx of women's bodies that are sculpted, ripped, and muscular.

I will be the first to admit that I regularly lift weights at the gym, heavy weights, and I do it because I like the way it feels. Not because I'm trying to meet some new, trendy ideal of what's sexy. This new ideal is passed off as being about health, fitness, and loving yourself, and I just have to say that is complete and total bullshit.

If I have to hear, "your health is your wealth," one more fucking time I'm going to gauge my eyes out.

It's not about health, it's about vanity and you fucking know it. It's about shaming other women, who you deem as unhealthy, and you fucking know it.

There are overweight people who are healthy, so if it was really about health we would not praise some bodies while shaming others. It's a specific body, a look, that we deem as healthy and for most of us that look is completely unrealistic.

So I'm done trying to meet some fantasy ideal of what a woman should look like. This is who I am. This is what my body looks like, cellulite and all, and I don't give a fuck if it doesn't turn you on.

Keep your arousal to yourself.

My body isn't perfect, but it's mine so shut the fuck up. No one asked you anyway.

Love,
Kris

Because I AM the maniac: Living with mental illness

Times get tough. Folks get sad. Most days, it's easy to push through, to hold on until the next day and the next. And then there are those times when something just snaps deep inside. Can't think straight. Can't calm down. Can't get my mind to stop racing. I'm moving so slow, better move faster to keep up with the urges, the goals, but it's impossible. I can't keep up. Too much anger, so pissed, so frustrated.

Scream, yell, punch the walls but the pain won't go away. I can't get the feeling to stop, the itch to subside. So I hit the gym, work out for three hours straight, praying for a sense of relief, but there isn't one. Just want to calm down, want to slow down but can't.

The feeling persists. I don't want anyone to know. I don't understand the harmful thoughts and feelings. And if I can't understand them how can I ever tell anyone else about them.

Things get worse. It's time for sleep, but you don't sleep, nope, not anymore. Most nights just lay awake, thinking, replaying, can't sit still, can't calm down. I'm euphoric, on top of the fucking world, but I hate everyone. They're all too slow, moving like sloths. I can't deal. Need to separate. Need to get out. Need to do things that no one knows about. Hurting myself, hurting others. I  can't stop. I'm not in control, the other bitch is, she's confident, she calls the shots and I let her because I'm too weak. I'm lost inside myself.

Two years ago, right before Christmas I lost my shit. And I didn't even know I had lost it. I went something like two weeks without eating or sleeping, and I just remember feeling like my heart was going to beat out of my chest. I wasn't hungry, my stomach didn't growl. I wasn't sleepy, I  wouldn't yawn.

For a long time I just thought I was a superhero ( I actually believed this). I thought that I had some amazing super power that allowed me to work harder without sleeping or eating. And I ignored the itches and the urges, worked through the deep depressions that followed my manic states. So that only those close to me could tell that something was wrong, something just wasn't right with Crystal.

I once wrote an entire novel in two weeks, then turned around and wrote another in three.

I thought I was the shit. No one could touch me. Turns out I'm fucking crazy, and I did all of those things while in a manic state.

They diagnosed me with bipolar disorder and I had another stint in a mental hospital. It made no sense, but it made the most sense. I knew what I was doing wasn't normal, but I'm not in control when I'm manic. And then when I would come down from a manic state the guilt I felt would make me want to cut my skin off with a dull razor blade. But that was then.

Things are far from perfect, but with psychiatric help, medication, and therapy, I've managed to keep a hold on things most days. Stress is a trigger for me. I have to watch for the signs of mania, pay attention to my moods everyday. I have an alarm for sleeping, an alarm for waking up. Too much sleep and I could trigger a depression, too little and the next thing you know I'm bouncing off the fucking walls.

I just need balance and to appreciate myself despite my flaws, despite my illness. We all have obstacles to overcome, some of us have more than others and that's okay. You just have to keep fighting. Get help, because you can't do it on your own, and it's okay to lean on other people sometimes. You don't always have to be strong, you can be vulnerable and people will still love you. I promise.

Things are going to be okay because I am not my mental illness. I will have a life.

Love,
Kris

Excerpt from Logost, a Novel

My calves were sore from walking when I came across a stone, snow-covered bridge. It was icy, and I guessed that it would be unwise to cross it. But as I always went against my better judgment – trusting my own thoughts and opinions had never been easy for me – I trumped across it. It covered a small, man-made brook where water fell upon smoothed stones. An innate happiness flowed from the sound, and before I’d taken three steps to cross the stone bridge, I found myself retreating. I jumped down, and walked along the small ledge where the sound of the brook was heaviest.

The sound grew louder – a pulsating noise like the beat of a faltering heart. The act of blocking was becoming natural for me, and it took me only a moment before I realized that the sound was someone trying to break through my mental defenses. Someone stood behind me, attempting to cause me great suffering. I turned around to see Cassandra there, her friends Amy and Sasha flanked at her sides. Without hesitation, I froze several streams of water and shot the sharpened icicles at them. But Cassandra was clever and quick. She shattered each icicle in to tiny speckles of frost.

“That really is the best you can do.” She scoffed at me, and Sasha and Amy giggled. Cassandra’s eyes bore in to me, and I felt my access to oxygen cut off. She choked me with the strength of her mind, and I couldn’t scream out in pain – there was no air left in my lungs. The timing of my death beat closer and closer, but I refused to be killed by someone as trivial as Cassandra.

“I’ll be sure to tell Lucas how much you despise him,” she said. “And how peculiar it was that with your last dying breath, you told me that you wanted him to know you hate him,” she laughed, that piercing metallic sound. Happiness was unobtainable for Cassandra. She wasn’t happy even now that she would get her wish. To watch me die. Her eyes were dead, dark and emotionless. And even though she was killing me, I pitied her still. Poor girl, I thought as I waited for death.

The Earth quivered as it tried to save me from my untimely end. But I wasn’t the one controlling it. Cassandra fell to her knees and shrieked in torment. Her limbs flailed, and her body jolted upward towards the sky. Sasha and Amy made no move to help the girl, who they called a friend. They stared at me with horror-struck eyes, and jolted away from the scene. I got up from the brook and stood over Cassandra, watching as her eyes rolled to the back of her head. She would die soon, and I had no inclination to save her. But I also had no desire to watch her die, so I turned to leave.

It was then that I saw him there, out of the corner of my eye. He leaned against the bridge, wringing his hands and watching me. He came over to me and stood behind me to whisper in my ear.

“She’s not dead yet,” Drew breathed, his voice a low, creaking sound. “She made an attack on your life. It’s only fair to end hers. Look at her, Mina. Focus on her heart stopping.”

“No, I can’t.” I thought about leaving, but I couldn’t stop watching her die. She looked like she would ask me to save her if she could speak.

“You were meant for greatness, my love,” he whispered. “And this is what it takes to be great. She’s nearly there. It wouldn’t take much,” he said, persuading me. But I made no move to end Cassandra’s life. “Fine,” Drew said as if murdering her were inevitable. And I watched her body stop shaking.

Her eyes didn’t shut once she was unmoving. They stayed open, and I kneeled beside her lifeless body. It twitched again, and I felt her tormented spirit escape her chest. I waved my hand over her face and shut her eyes. Drew kneeled behind me, slowly placing his hands on my shoulders.

To read more purchase Logost.



Love,
Kris

In Search of the Great American Novel

When I was little I kept a running inventory of all my toys, and the names of every person I had ever met.

I sat on the sidelines during kickball, scribbling in to a beat-up composition notebook; crafting poems, drafting short stories.

When I was little I had a nervous habit of chewing on my fingernails and pinching babies when no one was looking.

I once went eight weeks without combing my hair, and wore the same pair of jeans for a year without washing them.

When I was little I pined over Judy Blume, R.L Stine, and recorded every early-morning episode of Sailor Moon.

Back then, I walked slower, rested more often, and had the time to stare up at the drifting clouds. I watched the stars at night, and waited for the leaves to fall. I felt change, noticed it through the seasons.

When I was little I dreamed, hoped, believed that the world would one day be a place I could call home.

When I was little a felt an emptiness, a hollowing out inside my chest. And I didn't know it then, but now I know that I was searching for something I had yet to find.

Love,
Kris