The doctor blinked. “Ah, no. That’s not how this test works. These results indicate several severe personality disorders. You can’t get rid of those by exercis-”

“You’re right! No time like the present!” I exclaimed, leaping to my feet and flailing my limbs wildly. “One, hy-yah-yah! Two, hy-yah-yah! Come on, doc, count with me! Three, hy-yah-yah!”

He never did give me a lollypop.

THE END

Excerpt:

“It started when I began vomiting blood. Whatever, no big deal, I was like ninety percent sure that everything was fine. There had been blood in my stomach and now there wasn’t. My body fixed itself! Thanks, body. You are a champ even if you do have weak ankles so you could never rollerblade in the ‘90s like everyone else and you made me walk everywhere like a sucker.”

Read the full article here:

Coming off anti-depressants is sometimes hell

Last night was the launch of an awesome new website for young women called The Peach. No talk of celebrities, diets, or how to find a man here. How refreshing.

I was lucky enough to contribute an article, which you can read at The Peach by clicking the link below. Here’s a little teaser so you can decide if it’s what you’re into:

My Self-Harm Scars Were Photoshopped Out Of My Wedding Pics and it Kinda Made Me Angry

by Bridget Phillips

I got married to my manfriend Amos last year. Wooooo gross – love! I never expected to get married. True story: When I was little, I told my mum that when I grew up I wanted to live in an apartment by myself (presumably with a stable out the back for the ten horsies I planned to own).

When I got engaged, I had no preconceived ideas about what weddings were supposed to be. I’d only been to one and that was hastily arranged due to VISA issues that you needn’t trouble yourself about, The Government. My parents were fantastic enough to never fill my and my sister’s heads with nonsense about “When you get married” and “The perfect day” and all that pressure-causing balderdash. I didn’t know a thing about weddings when I started planning my own, and that was awesome.

Read more…

Mostly it’s been well-received. Danke for de RTs and referrals and nice replies and things.

One reader’s comment, though, really grinded my gears, particularly in light of the victim-blaming that’s been exploding all over Melbourne’s face recently like [censored] when Sasha Grey did the thing with [censored] in that online video I never watched.

Someone on ye olde Book of Face rejected my blog post not because he didn’t realise it was satire, which I’d worried about when I posted it, but because he “refuse[d] to believe” that the things I described were the common experiences of most women.

I replied that he is very lucky to not be a woman so he can choose to believe that.

The thing is, the stuff I wrote about (getting yelled at by guys in cars, being physically intimidated on the footpath, being groped in clubs) was deliberately chosen to be broad and undeniable. I didn’t write about specific instances of hard-core harassment and rape, which absolutely do happen with horrific frequency as well, because I wanted that post to be about the more general, everyday harassment that is often overlooked.

It’s easy for anyone, male or female, who’s been raised with Australian/western sensibilities to look at gang-rapes and honour killings and denounce them as the actions of savages. It seems to be less clear cut when dealing with harassment that’s less physically devastating, which makes it all the more insidious.

I’m not writing a debate about this because my views are so strong – particularly regarding the culture of blokes turning a blind eye to their mates’ behaviour – that if I start, I will write a book. For a more comprehensive and better-written analysis of the mindsets behind everyday sexism and victim-blaming, please refer to articles by people like Clementine Ford and Catherine Deveny.

This post is a list. I wrote my other “bro-shaming” article based on real things that have happened to me or to women in my life. I am going to list them in greater detail here. This kind of thing does happen, incredibly frequently, and if you are a man then you need to accept that. I’m not saying that all men do this, because they absolutely don’t, but I am saying that most women experience it. Hopefully it will give some context the next time a woman in your life reacts in a way that you see as extreme when this subject comes up, or when another man does something that you see as innocuous.

The following things have happened in Melbourne, Australia, to either me or my female friends/family:

• At a club, last weekend: A man pins a 23-year-old woman up against the wall. Gropes her, hugs her, won’t let go. She pushes him away. He snaps, “Come on, you’re not wearing leopard print for nothing.” She’s wearing a high-cut black dress, thick tights, ankle boots and a leopard print cardigan.

• On the street, last weekend: Another 23-year-old woman is walking down the street. Man yells, “$50!” out the window of his car to her.

• On the street, a couple of months ago: My mother (age withheld because she’s prim like that) was walking her dogs. Man yells, “Old hag!” at her from his car.

• On the street, last week: Young woman walks past a group of construction workers to her house. They make her squeeze past them, laughing and making comments about her as she does. They keep watching as she gets out her keys and enters her house, alone.

• Train station, last month: Mid-20s woman needs to validate her Myki to board the train. Male Metro workers are crowded around the only Myki machine that’s working. Woman says, “Excuse me,” and tries to get through. They don’t move, forcing her to squeeze through/against them as she touches on. They stare, laugh and make comments.

• At a club, years ago: A young girl is dancing. A random man sticks his hand down her pants, into her underwear. He tells her she shouldn’t have been dancing like that because it got him worked up.

• At a house party, years ago: A girl is passed out in a bedroom. Her friends know this. Two of her male friends see another man go into the room. They do nothing. Later, she tells friends that she woke up to find someone having sex with her. One friend shrugs awkwardly. A female friend says that “it takes two to tango”.

• On the street in the CBD, every day: I (27, wearing conservative office clothes) walk around at lunchtime. Businessmen walk 3+ abreast on the footpath, not yielding when I pass. Whatever their motivation/lack thereof due to obliviousness, the result is that I’m either slammed into a building as they shoulder-check me because there’s no room, or forced to squeeze between them.

• On the street, a few months ago: My sister and I walk past a construction site, wearing jogging clothes. Workers stare at us and make comments for the entire length of the building site. We feel judged, exposed, threatened and kind of nauseous by the end.

• On the street, last week: Me again, hello. Walking home from work, still in my office clothes. Two men in a construction truck hoot and yell at me while I wait at a crossing. As usual when this happens, I’m grateful for my ipod which prevents me from hearing exactly what was called out.

• On Brunswick Street, last year: Three young women are cornered by three men, who herd them against a wall so they can’t leave. The women don’t want to seem/be called rude, so they try to leave without making a fuss. One man puts his arm around a girl, who sidles away. Another man whispers filth in another girl’s ear. Third woman finally snaps at them to please leave. One of the men gets in her face and says, “You would say that, you’re the fattest, ugliest one here.”

• Years ago, at a train station: I was 14. A male friend of a friend asked if he could kiss me. I said no. He grabbed me and did it anyway. When I pulled back, he said, “Are you frigid?”

• On the tram, last year: I’m dressed in jeans and a nice top to go to a friend’s dinner. Men across the tram start loudly commenting on what I’m wearing, rating my appearance overall and talking about how much of a bitch I must be because I can obviously hear what they’re saying but I’m not talking to them.

• On the train, too many times to count: I’ve caught public transport (alone) to school and work for over ten years. Many times, groups of men have sat down around me, putting arms around me, trying to talk, asking what I’m reading/listening to/thinking. More than once I’ve been asked which station I’m getting off at and where I live. When I ignore them or only engage with short dismissive answers, I’ve been called rude, frigid, a bitch, not even that hot, ugly, fat, and a lesbian.

• At a club, last month: I wrote about this one. I’m out having birthday drinks for a friend in a baggy but appropriate dress. A man I don’t know tells me that I look like a prostitute, and is baffled when I don’t consider it a compliment.

• At a house party, a couple of years ago: A man who was twice my size grabs me from behind and picks me up, putting me on his shoulder like a puppet/weird parrot. He didn’t ask if he could do this – he just could so he did.

• At a train station, several years ago: Trains are broken so everyone files out to catch the connecting buses. I’m going to school, so I’m in my uniform with a backpack on. In the crush as we’re walking, someone gropes my butt and squeezes their hand between my legs, up my dress, from behind. It’s too crowded to turn around and see who it was.

These are just the stories from my own experience, and that have been relayed to me by friends, that I can recall off the top of my head. I’m sure there are more I could tell you.

The point is that if you know a woman, she’s probably had at least one experience like that. We know, as women, what we’re potentially facing when we leave the house: Not just major assaults like rape or abduction, but comments, looks, leers, gropes… It doesn’t happen every day and it definitely isn’t something that all men do or condone, but it’s too common to ignore.

The Real Man’s Guide To Dealing With Chicks

Written by Real Men for Real Men who aren’t sissy lame faggots

Chicks are mental. Everyone knows that. If you don’t pay for their meal they crack the shits, but if you open the door for them they start throwing their burning bras at you. WTF, right? Pretty much the only thing that women have going for them is their pussys (as long as they keep them shaved because gross, I don’t wanna feel like I’m face-fucking Grizzly Adams while I’m plowing her).

You’d think women would be smart enough to realise that if we want to fuck them, it’s a COMPLIMENT, but apparently the part of a woman’s brain that makes her think Sex In The City is the greatest show ever also fucks with her ability to be logical and rational, whether she’s bleeding out her vag or not. (It’s a rookie mistake to assume that a woman’s being a bitch or psycho because of her rag. That’s pretty much just their natural state.)

To help you, our bro in manhood, gain entrance to the great and awesome pussy, we’ve written some basic dos and don’ts to help you get around chick logic and the weird resistance they put up because they think playing hard to get is cute or something. Women don’t have the same sex drives as men but they have clits and read 50 Shades of Grey so we know they’re not all totally frigid.

SETTING ONE: At a club

Chicks go to clubs to pick up guys. Forget all that bullshit about wanting to dance or have fun with friends. They dance to show us that they’re coordinated enough to be a halfway decent lay, and all that time they spend with their “girlfriends” is just designed to make us think up hot lesbian fantasies. Next time you see a girl looking good on the dance floor, just remember: She’s doing that for you. It’s totally your right to take what’s yours.

Do:

• Get all up in her personal space. It’s intimate. Pheromones and shit – just imagine a real-life Lynx commercial.

• Touch her breasts, stomach, and butt. If she’s wearing a short skirt or tight pants, the crotch is totally up for grabs (haw haw) too. Mind games are a girl thing: If you want sex, be a man and grab her sex parts to let her know.

• Pin her against the wall. Chicks love dominant men. If she tries to push you away, she probably just has bondage fantasies. Come on, there’s a reason she’s wearing that low-cut dress.

Don’t:

• Be a pushover. If she gets shitty and seems like she’s really not up for it, don’t let her feminist entitled high horse bullshit make you feel bad. Remind her: She’s the one who went to a club looking like a hooker.

• Be a dick – be a dude. If your bro is tuning a chick and she looks like she’s not into it, don’t be That Guy and tell him to back off. Why wouldn’t you want your bro to get laid? Because you want to lay him? Is that it, you’re a fucking fag? If you don’t let your bro pull his chick then you’re a total fag. Don’t be a fag.

SETTING TWO: Walking down the street

You’re with your bros, you’re walking down the street, and there’s a chick heading your way. If you pass up this opportunity, you’re a total douche.

Do:

• Walk shoulder to shoulder with your bros across the footpath. This will make her squeeze through your group and you can totally touch her ass and shit. If she really didn’t want you to grab her, she’d walk in the gutter.

• Laugh as she tries to get past you. Laughing shows that this is just fun and makes her feel non-threatened, which is apparently a “thing” for chicks these days. Plus, it’s funny! She’s trying to get past and you get to grab her tits. Ha!

• Get in her personal space if she tried to walk around you (see Setting One).

• Say hi. Ask her name. Crowd around her a bit: Imagine how hot it would be if a group of sexy chicks crowded into your personal space and asked for your name. It’s exactly the same. I know you don’t really care what her name is, but it shows her you think she’s hot.

Don’t:

• Let her get away with being a bitch. Dude, you’re just being friendly. If she doesn’t reply or tries to back away from you, she’s probably frigid or a lesbian. That doesn’t mean she has to be rude. Let her know that you’ve figured out that she’s frigid or a lesbian, but don’t be nice about it. Every time you’re polite to a chick who’s been a cold bitch for no reason, your penis shrinks half an inch.

• Forget that she might be fat or ugly. If you and your bros have crowded a chick and you realise she’s fat or ugly, make sure you abort that mission fast. Let your mates know, talking as loudly as you can to make sure they all hear, how gross this chick is. Otherwise one of them might not realise, and friends don’t let friends bang ugly bitches.

• Yield to let her pass without getting into her personal space. I’m sorry I have to keep asking this, but are you a fag? Why don’t you want to touch her boobs? Jesus, dude. Stop being such a pussy fag.

PRO TIP: Don’t ever think that these rules don’t apply when you’re at work. I don’t care if you’re in your Metro uniform, your business suit, your overalls, whatever – if you and a bunch of co-workers are on the street, you might be at work but you’re still dudes. Don’t ever act differently just because you’re on the clock. Your boss didn’t take away your man card and balls when he hired you, did he?

SETTING THREE: In your car

A bunch of your mates are in the car with you and there’s no chicks so it’s kinda faggy. WRONG. There’s always chicks. Look out the fucking window, dude. Is there a chick? Bam! Done. You’re welcome.

Do:

• Yell out the window at the chicks you see. If she didn’t want you commenting on the fact that she’d left the house, she wouldn’t have done it.

• Make a snap decision. You’re driving by her pretty fast, man, you don’t have time to think about what you’re gonna say. Pick her most obvious physical attribute and run with it. Do you think she’s hot? Yell something about how you want to fuck her. Is she older than you? Call her an old hag. Is she with her kids? That means she’s had sex! Comment on that. Worst case scenario and you can’t think of anything, just yell out how much you reckon she could charge: “$50!” is a pretty good one because it’s not too low so she’ll get that it’s a compliment.

• Give your mates a chance to yell something out. Has Robbo had a turn? Don’t be shy, Robbo. Help him out and give him ideas about what to say. He does want to yell something, because he’s not a pussy fag.

Don’t:

• Yell sexy shit at a chick who’s not at least, like, 13. Once they’ve got boobs they’re fair game, but don’t be a creep about it.

• Yell something that’s too long. “Fuck you, bitch, you’re way too fat to be in front of my eyes and it’s making me wanna puke!” might be TRUE, but it’ll take way too long to say. Keep it short and simple: “Fat bitch!” and maybe a gagging noise gets the same message across in way less time.

• Crash the car while you’re shouting stuff out. It’s all in fun but car repairs are fucking expensive.

Obviously there’s more to fucking chicks than just this, but if you stick to these basics then you should be sweet. Remember, every girl you don’t talk to or crowd the personal space of is a girl you’re DEFINITELY not gonna bang. Don’t cockblock yourself. You deserve all the opportunities out there. The world is your oyster vag. Grab it by the tits and fuck it.

Since he donated over $15, Mike got to request something for me to do in my dress. He requested: Daggy dancing.

I’m not saying this is definitely the coolest video on Youtube, but it’s hands-down the best one featuring me dancing to Die Antwoord in a school dress for charity.

If you’d like to suggest something similarly amazing for me to do, and help give a girl in Africa an education, donate $15 or more here:

Do It In A Dress

I only got the chance to be educated properly because of where I was lucky enough to be born. The women of Sierra Leone deserve nothing less. They are more likely, though, to be sexually assaulted than attend high school. Those that do attend school miss up to a full week per month due to lack of access to proper feminine hygiene products. 

I’ve signed up to do a 35km walk-a-thon in a school dress on October 20 with my sister Dee and anyone else we recruit between now and then.

If you donate $15 or more, we’ll also take your suggestions for things to Do In A Dress. I’ve already taken ulcer meds, dressed up the dog and posed with a banana in a school dress: I’m sure there’s at least seven more things that we could do. If your suggestion isn’t too lewd or expensive (eg: “Make out on the back on a giant gold dragon”), we’ll do it and post photographic evidences. 

Click below to read more about this incredibly worthy cause and/or donate. 

Do It In A Dress

Thanks for reading this. It’s way more important than my usual blogs. Y’all are awesome.

xo Bridge

I’m really bad at being a competent grown up.

The worst part, in the sense that it seems to bother my longsuffering loved ones the most, is my disinclination to ever see a doctor. I like to think of it as an adorable quirk! You can too.

I mean, I’m not CRAZY about it: As I very sensibly explained to my manfriend Amos last night, I would of course go to a doctor if I was hit by a car or if a piano fell on my head or something. I would obviously need medical care in those cases. I’m not AFRAID of doctors the way I’m afraid of, for example, spiders, driving, men in business suits (WHAT ARE THEY UP TO???), things that look like spiders from a distance, people looking over my shoulder at something that might be a spider, or groups of judgemental schoolgirls on the tram. It’s not that I have an emotional, moral or religious objection to seeking medical help. I just don’t think it’s always obvious, the way it would be if your legs were trapped under a large piece of farm equipment (eg: a cow), that there’s actually something wrong.

The last three times I’ve waved aside people’s concerns and not gone to a doctor for ages and ages and ages, I’ve had totally rational, valid reasons for it. Bodies are weird and mysterious and ambiguous sometimes. You can’t always tell that there’s something really wrong. It’s just been my bad luck that in my case(s), there actually was.

CASE ONE:

Last year. Manfriend and I had just gotten back from India where we’d spent part of our honeymoon, because it’s not a really romantic getaway if you don’t walk past at least six people pooping per day. Awesome trip, highly recommend if you’re up for an adventure.

My stomach didn’t agree however, and I’d been unable to eat or keep anything down or not feel really weak and fevery for several days. We got back home and it got worse. I was losing weight and couldn’t even drink water and my friends said I looked all grey and dead.

BUT. Okay. I’d just been to INDIA. Everyone gets stomach problems over there. It’s normal. All the guidebooks say that you should expect it and to wait at least 72 hours before worrying. I was giving it some time to get better! Plus I couldn’t really stand up so I couldn’t go to the doctor anyway, but if I did, they’d just think I was a spoilt little first-world traveller: “Um, yeah, of course you feel sick. You went to INDIA, you delicate little orchid. Drink some Gatorade and harden the fuck up.” I felt too fragile to deal with that kind of professional scorn.

After several days of not feeling awesome and having all my friends, family and workmates express serious concerns (of course I went to work – I was FINE), I finally relented and went to the doctor to shut them all up. A couple of days later, she called with the results.

Doctor: “Hi, where are you?”

Me: “At work. Sup?”

Doctor: “You have dysentery.”

Me: “What? Like, the actual dys? WOAH! Cool!”

Doctor: “No, not cool. This kills people. It’s very contagious and serious.”

Me: “Oops?”

Doctor: “You need to start medication right away. Don’t touch anyone. Don’t come in contact with pregnant women. Don’t prepare food for anyone. Try not to come in contact with anyone who works in the food service industry.”

Me: (thinking about my restaurant-manager husband) “Oops again?”

Doctor: “I have a prescription waiting for you. Get it as soon as you can.”

Me: “Okay.”

And then I took the pills and the World Health Organisation called me because they have to monitor every case of The Dys in Australia because they get all alarmed about it and I was FINE. Eventually. But you can see why I didn’t really worry, right?

CASE TWO:

Last year again. It was winter, I was sick, flatmates were sick, workmates were sick, you were probably sick, everyone was sick. My throat hurt heaps and I couldn’t talk, swallow or touch my glands (haw haw “glands” sounds like “glans” and that is a part of the peen!), my ears hurt and my right eye went all weird. Whatever, it’s WINTER. Everyone gets sick. Harden the fuck up again, am I right? No reason to get antibiotics for something that’s just going to go away with some Vitamin C and rest.

I vitamin C-ed, I drank hot lemon and ginger drinks, I rested kind of, and I even got myself some eye drops from the pharmacy. It was all good. I didn’t take anything for my fever because a fever is your body’s way of burning out the sickness I’m pretty sure, and it knows what it’s doing.

I went to work because I’d been sick for ages so I wasn’t contagious anymore, probably, but not being able to speak made it a bit hard to do my job because I’m the lady that answers the phones. At my lunchbreak, I went to a doctor down the road and he looked at the parts of my head that were causing all the fuss.

Doctor: “How long have you felt like this?”

Me: “Maybe two weeks? I know that’s not long – I know it’s just a cold and I should let it heal. I’m being a hypochondriac, sorry.”

Doctor: “You’re being an idiot.” (He actually said that. It was brilliant.)

Me: “So… I’m not really sick? I’m sorry for wasting your t-“

Doctor: “You have a serious sinus infection and conjunctivitis.”

Me: “Ew!”

Doctor: “If you’d left this untreated, you could have risked permanent damage to your vision and hearing. You’re on your way to developing tonsillitis as well.”

Me: “Oh. So… I should keep taking Vitamin C?”

Doctor: “I’m going to give you prescriptions for all this and tell you to rest. Are you going to take the antibiotics?”

Me: “Yes.”

Doctor: “I’m not trying to be mean. These are the facts: If you don’t take care of yourself, you’re going to get permanent damage. It’s your body though; you can do that if you like.”

Me: (quietly) “No. I bought eye drops?”

Doctor: “Those do nothing.”

Me: “Oh. (sad face)”

Again, probably regrettable in hindsight, but completely understandable. It was winter! Everyone’s sick! How was I supposed to know the difference between just normal sick and “blah blah permanent damage” sick? Like I said before, bodies are mysterious.

CASE THREE:

Yesterday. And I maintain that this one, like the other two, was NOT MY FAULT. Here is why: I was all nauseous and dizzy for a couple of days, but Amos and I had road-tripped to Apollo Bay so I figured it was just the Great Ocean Road making my delicate tummy all sad. I took some ginger tablets and tried not to be such a big baby. Then at work on Monday I kept throwing up, but I didn’t have any other symptoms except constant nausea and a really sore stomach, but that’s all part of the same “throwing up” package. I wasn’t sick-sick.

After work, I went home and felt all weird and dizzy, so I swooned a little as my body took care of itself. I’d been throwing up, hadn’t eaten, my blood-sugar and hydration levels were probably all crappy: The swooning was my body sorting itself out. Clever body! It doesn’t need me to do anything. It knows what it needs. After a few minutes, I could stand up again and I was fine. Amos didn’t seem to understand this.

Amos: “You look green.”

Me: “I’m standing up! I’m fine.”

Amos: “I want to take you to a doctor.”

Me: “Pfffft no.”

Amos: “You’re really not okay. Please let me take you to a doctor.”

Me: “I can’t go to the doctor. I’m not wearing a bra.”

Obviously that was the winning argument in the sense that it was perfectly rational and it made Amos not want to talk to me anymore for a bit because I was being so annoying, but a few minutes later he called me over to the computer.

Amos: “So I’ve googled your symptoms and it says you need to go to a doctor RIGHT NOW.”

Me: “It does not. (reading over his shoulder) Oh. It does. But that’s for people who are throwing up blood.”

Amos: “YOU ARE!”

Me: “Yeah, but, okay, maybe it’s not blood. Maybe it just looks like blood. I’d go in and they’d be like, ‘You just ate something weird, stop wasting my time.’ Like that guy on Scrubs who thought there was blood in his stool but it was just pimento.”

Amos: “It says you could have cancer.”

Me: “Everything online says you could have cancer.”

Amos: “Yellow fever.”

Me: (reading over his shoulder) “Yes. I have a serious disease caused by South American mosquitoes. From all my recent jaunts to Brazil.”

Amos: “Go to a doctor!”

Me: “NO!”

But then I did end up going to a doctor the next day (yesterday). I apologised for wasting his time and assured him that I’d probably just eaten something bad and apologised again for being so lame about it. And I was right, I’m FINE.

I mean, “fine” in the sense that I have a bleeding ulcer and the doctor said if I throw up one more time I have to go to hospital, but ulcers aren’t that big a deal anymore and I’m just going to take some pills for a month and I will be all better again. The doctor also wanted me to have a blood test to rule everything else out and make sure I hadn’t lost too much blood, but I’m choosing to take that as optional because I have the pills now and I don’t feel that dizzy or anything, so I’m just going to take the meds and let them fix me without clogging up the system with my blood tests that will show nothing wrong.

So as you can see from these three stellar examples, I’m bad at taking care of myself, but it’s not my fault. Bodies, man. They be trippy.

Visit http://www.doitinadress.com/ for more info on how you can Do It In A Dress to help send women in Sierra Leone to school and provide her with education, medical fees, textbooks, and school supplies. A girl born there is more likely to be sexually assaulted than attend high school. Help give her a chance for a better life.

Taking my ulcer medication… in a dress!

Trying to remember what this other pill does… in a dress!

Making the “Not Bad” face at some junk mail… in a dress!

Raking a tiny sand garden… in a dress!

Holding the manfriend’s copy of Bio Dome… in a dress!

Posing with a banana… in a dress!

Putting the dog… in a dress!

Cleansing the aura of the room with this bell… in a dress!

Making this face because I don’t feel well… in a dress!

Letting the dog on the bed… in a dress!

Smelling nail polish… in a dress!

When people say “body image”, heaps of mental pictures spring to mind. Men sucking their guts in when pretty women walk past, women fretting over the numbers on the scales, men measuring their biceps and women measuring their waists. What the hell is “body image” and when isn’t it normal?

I can’t answer that from a “normal” perspective. I’ve had eating disorders and body dysmorphia for over 13 of my 27 years of life. I can only tell you what body image is to me.

When you have “body image issues”, it doesn’t mean that you’re vain. In my experience, vain people are actually pretty self-assured. They think they generally look good and believe that they’re capable of being all hot and sexy, so they want to ensure that they’re meeting their full potential at all times. Vanity has nothing to do with body image.

People with body image issues don’t fret over a bad hair day or pimple. Very few people outside of commercials for hairspray and Clearasil actually do – at least, that’s not the most stressful thing in their lives. People with body image issues aren’t trying to be the prettiest, fittest, strongest, or most overall attractive person in the room. They’re just hoping to not be the worst.

It’s easy to dismiss body issues when they’re not a problem for you. Can you leave the house without stressing about it for half an hour or more? Can you look in a mirror or see your reflection in a pane of glass without feeling nauseous, or having your heart skip a beat at the grotesque thing you see? If someone looks at you, can you handle it without breaking into a sweat at the thought of all the terrible things they must be thinking about you?

If so, then you don’t have body image issues, and that is freaking awesome. I mean it: Everyone deserves to be able walk down the street without being paranoid or crippled by self-doubt and -loathing. I’m just trying to illustrate the difference between normal insecurities and life-altering body issues like dysmorphia and eating disorders.

Why is body image and eating disorder awareness important? Well, we who hatheth these issues walk among you in plentiful numbers, so you should learn how to deal with us. We aren’t necessary identifiable by extreme body shape or disfigurement – at least, not outside of our own minds. We aren’t so delusional that we can’t function in normal society or recognise that what we see might not be the truth. But like a nicotine addict recognising the source of their craving but still desperate for a smoke, a person with body image issues doesn’t automatically become “cured” when they recognise that their obsession and insecurities are, to other people, unfounded and irrational.

A few years ago, I met up with an older female relative who spent nearly half an hour describing her daily workout routine to me. At over 60 years of age, she was very thin and clearly worked very hard to be so. Her body image was wrapped up in an obsession, and I remembered watching her demonstrate her exercises with a dull horror as, at barely 40 kilos myself, I was grappling with my own serious problems with heath and food.

“I don’t want to be like that when I’m old,” I remember thinking. “I want to have so much more in my life than this stupid disorder.”

I still feel that way. It’s so unbearably sad that my relative, a mother and grandmother, was still in the grips of her issues when she should have been enjoying her retirement, travels and new experiences. It’s just as sad when a young person, or middle-aged-person, misses out on enjoying life – or even handling the not-so-enjoyable parts – because of an issue about their body, weight, exercise or food.

So why can’t we all just stop? This is clearly a first-world problem, right? God, if only everyone had nothing more to worry about than a bit of a muffin top.

Hey, you, thinking that? Fuck off.

You have no idea.

It’s not your fault, you don’t know any better, but shut the fuck up.

Comments like that aren’t helpful. “It’s not real.” “No one else sees what you do.” “You’re fine!” “You’re so pretty!” “You’re thin.” “You look better with a bit of meat on your bones.”

Shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up.

I can only speak for myself, but: I know no one else sees what I do, okay? Reaffirming that fact just makes me feel even more alone and stupid because my brain and eyes are broken. I don’t care what you think about my body. I don’t care what you think about the way I live. I’m the one who has to live in my body and I’m the one who’s stuck with me 24 hours of the day, so it’s about what I can live with, okay?

This is not a first world problem. People develop eating disorders and body issues all over the world, in all social and financial classes. This is not an “emo” problem. People can develop eating disorders regardless of their upbringing: Whether they had an amazing home life or not. This might be the biggest problem in a person’s life or just a drop in the ocean. Eating disorders and body issues affect men, women, and children. Fuck you if you think it’s a “rich girl’s problem”. Fuck you if you think it’s something a sufferer can just ignore.

When I walk down the street and someone glances at me, completely neutral, just registering that there is a person taking up that particular space as they walk past, my heart speeds up. I can’t bear that they’ve looked at me because I can’t bear what they see. I know what I see and I imagine that they’re just as harsh. When they glanced my way, did they catalogue my pasty skin, my bloated face, my unsightly flabby body? Were they rightfully disgusted? Were they on the verge on spitting on me, catcalling, physically abusing me in retalliation for offending their senses by forcing them to look at me and taking up space that someone else, someone more worthy, could be occupying?

Every time a car drives past me, I think brace myself because I think it would be completely valid for the people in that car to honk their horns or yell something at me, abusing me for being so hideous and daring to leave the house. Every time I meet a new person, I feel like I have to apologise for forcing them to look at me while we’re introduced. I marvel at my friends’ and family’s tolerance, that they can converse with me and maintain eye-contact like everything is normal when really they are looking at a monster. I hate being in the same room as ANYBODY because not only am I automatically the worst person in the room, physically, emotionally and spiritually, but I’m also inflicting my physical presence on others.

I have never met anyone as disgusting as me. I have never looked at anyone and felt so repulsed as I do when I look in the mirror. Some days I want to stab myself in the face, to destroy these grotesque features and inflict on myself the pain I deserve for inflicting myself on others. I am repulsive, horrible, and terrible and my inability to craft and/or maintain a reasonable face and body are symptoms of my failures as a person. I am terrible at life, I’m not clever or funny or social or good to be around or intelligent or talented at anything, and the least I could do would be to NOT be hideous to look at but I can’t even get that right. I am a walking failure and anyone who looks at me can see how terrible I am in every misshapen cell of my skin.

THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is a slice of what it’s like to have body image issues. Take a minute and imagine that you feel that way every single second of every single day. Imagine how pervasive it would be and how incredibly difficult it would make everyday tasks like shopping, going to work, socialising… Imagine how exhausting it would be to hate yourself that much, and to live in a world where you image that everyone else (rightfully) hates you that much too.

Imagine that, and show a little sympathy the next time the subject of body image or eating disorders comes up.

If you don’t have to imagine, then imagine how nice it would be to live without all of that shit screaming at you in your brain every day. You can’t switch it off, but you can consciously choose to fight against it. Talk to your GP, get a referral, check out the Butterfly Foundation’s page on where and how to get help: Accept that you don’t deserve to feel this shitty. Life is hard enough without hating yourself.

Don’t be the 60-year-old who gets up at 5:30am to obsessively exercise. Work to be the 60-year-old who has a rich and awesome life and barely ever looks in the mirror. Hell, work to be that person as soon as you can. No one deserves any less.