Besides the more prominent side effects of my sobriety(I make two months tonight!), i.e. being able to stay awake, write, exist in the world without too much trouble(which is all very lovely), like all speed freaks when they stop chasing the dragon, I've gotten fat.
Now, with my politics, of course I'm not intellectually upset about this. At this point, after my History of Body Issues, I've settled on just being a passenger in my meat suit and I don't have that much interest in feeling much of anything about my body at all. However, there's this tiny kernel of despair, in a sense I've lost "progress".
As a lifelong fatty, I have extended experience with how people treat you when you're not petite and, by and large, one gets treated much better the more weight they lose. Even if they're starving and miserable, I'm afraid. And there's a joy, in trimming the fat. I still think fondly of the laps I've run around my high school(even on weekends! I was so motivated), the feeling of control, the societal approval.
Part of being a speed freak, for me, was the fact that it would rob me of my hunger. I could play video games, hunt for dick, stare into space, and rot in my desk chair for hours on end and I'd rest assured! Because, in my rotted mind, at least I wasn't eating. I could recline in the regal knowledge, again, in my rotted mind, that the longer my addiction went on, the skinnier I'd get.
I haven't spoken of this to anyone, largely because most don't really want to hear about a drug addict's interior life once they're aware of the addiction. Most care and dignity get swiftly discarded, I'm afraid, but that's something I'll bemoan another time.
In any case, that era has ended and two months later, I'm fat, and truth be told my feelings are gravely dubious.
On one hand, I feel I've lost my edge. Even though I couldn't function, think or do much of anything when I was abusing myself with substances, I felt like I looked great! Like a honed weapon. I was horrible, and mean, nothing mattered more to me than having my own way, but I enjoyed it. There was a thrill to playing the game of manipulation and lies.
On the other hand, I feel much more alive now. Even if I don't really recognize myself in the mirror anymore, and, though I know I'd definitely get fat-shamed more on The Apps now(if I hadn't deleted them out of foresight) , I can actually write and game and work and read and do all the things that I've come to enjoy, there's light in my eyes again. At least, so I've been told.
Perhaps. I've lost my cutting edge. Maybe my writing's looser than it once was but, by God's grace, at least I can do it again. So I don't think I'll be paying the extra chub very much mind. Trade, be damned.
