Bite

I bite my hands sometimes.

Just to feel it. Make it hurt. Hurt enough that I stop thinking about things. I bite so hard it leaves little red marks all over my hands. When I was little and used to suck my fingers so my two middle-most fingers had dimples between the knuckles from my teeth sitting on them all night long. Like that. Only I bite so hard sometimes now it breaks the skin. So I only bite my left hand. That way I can write with my right. So I can get by in school. I don’t know what I’d do if I couldn’t write.

I used to hit my head against the wall. But my parents would come in because I would hit it against the walls so hard they’d hear it. I’d make the whole house shake the way I’d ram it against the wall like that. So I started just punching myself. Slamming my knuckles into my temples and forehead and pulling my hair. But biting my hand was easier.

And really I don’t need the wall or my fists anymore. I can make it happen. If I think long and hard enough about it I can make the world go black with all the pain. It’s dizzying. Blinding. It’s wonderful how much I can make it hurt. It must be some kind of superpower. But it’s never quite enough to completely stop thinking. I don’t know how much of my parents’ money I’ve spent because of it. How many medical bills. I don’t like to think about it like that. Because it didn’t start off that way. I used to get headaches. It’s only lately that I give them to myself. Only when the biting isn’t enough.

I’ve apologized to God. For it. For lying to my parents. And for not being able to do what He put me here for. That all I can do is write and feel and not help anybody like I want to and should. And about how I sit around and do nothing and procrastinate and get by in school and care but don’t. I am so sorry. Sorry for all I do and all I put my body through. I know it’s self-harm. It’s just not the kind you think about. I can’t cut. I could never do that. I get sick at the thought. And I don’t think it’d help anyway. That’s a sharp pain. The dull, throbbing, overpowering kind is what helps. I don’t know about the other kind. I don’t want to find out.

Because I know it’s wrong. I don’t know if it’s exactly a sin but I know it’s wrong. To do that to your body. Your body that loves you no matter what. No matter what or how many prescriptions and foods you put in it and no matter how many times you bite it or hit it into walls or how long you stand out in the cold night air for. That’s the other thing that helps. Cold night air. Trouble is the thinking happens earlier and earlier now and I can’t go outside at 9:00 with my parents still downstairs watching TV together with the dog. They’d see and ask about what was wrong and why I was crying. And I can’t tell them why because then I’d have to admit that I’d been lying for so long and I don’t think I could do that. Because then I’d lose their trust and I don’t think I can do that. I don’t think I can stand that. I’m getting a headache just thinking about it. And not the kind where I bring it on. The bad kind that makes me nauseous and makes my gut feel guilty. I’ve got so little as is I don’t think I could lose their trust. It’s be like losing writing. And I can’t do that.

So I bite. Hard. And cry so hard I drool and pools of moisture and fluid from my face drip into my hands and I waste a tissue box cleaning it up and getting it out and hoping my parents don’t realize my allergies aren’t the only cause for the piles in the trashcan.
God, it just is all so horrible sometimes. And I don’t blame You, believe me I don’t. You know it I don’t. I don’t mean it like that. I’m just trying hard not to take Your name in vein. It’s hard. Everything is just so hard sometimes and I know it shouldn’t be because really I’ve got it a lot better than most. A whole hell of a lot better. And that should help and I keep telling myself that but it doesn’t and it won’t ever. And then it’s just a matter of shutting myself up. Sticking something in my mouth to keep it quiet and biting so my head stops thinking what I’m instead not saying. And I just bite. Bite. Bite. Bite!