She was smart enough to want more but tired enough to accept the way things were. - Roxane Gay

With my tattoos, I get to say, these are choices I make for my body, with full-throated consent. This is how I mark myself. This is how I take my body back.

If you survive, you have to prove it was that bad; or else, they think you are.
Surviving is some kind of sin, like floating up off the dunking stool like a witch. You have to be permanently écorchée, heart-on-sleeve, offering up organs and body parts like a medieval female saint.

I deny myself gentler kinds of affection — to touch or be kindly touched — as if that is a pleasure a body like mine does not deserve.