I've been doing a lot of *sober* thinking tonight. I'm too tired to say it all, but ill try. I am trying to love myself, but I do think I need to be more aware of my eating. Can I love myself at any size? At this size? I'm trying. I read somewhere recently that posture is 50 percent of your state of mind. I try sometimes to practice that...

I am in a sad place tonight. I want to just be myself and live people and be loved, let it flow organically... But I am kind of too abrasive. I guess I don't show love as easily or well as I'd like. I think I have a offended a couple of my friends lately... That's neither here nor there, I think I can handle that with an apology.

But Jesus... My parentals. Both of them. They are just not the kind of people who loved me freely and unconditionally in my formative years. God bless them, they just don't know how. They really don't. My dad has a rough time with his parents... I think early on he felt some kind of rejection from his mother. He rejects her a lot now, because of it. More complicated than I understand, I'm sure. And I'm almost certain my mother was sexually abused in some way by my grandfather, and later date raped... That has caused her a lifetime of fuckedupness. Here's the problem. Even though my parents aren't capable of loving or accepting me the way I am, I really want to do that for them. If they could feel loved by me, certainly that wouldn't fix everything, but what a difference it would make for them. Have either of them ever felt that from anyone before? Maybe my Dad has on occasion--his wife is awesome. But I know he needs it from me the same way I crave it from him. The plain and simple truth is that I am not going to get it from him. He is not going to freely give that to me... But can I give it to him?? I want to. I want to do that for them, but I'm not sure I know how to lavish love on my parents in ways that are meaningful and not painful to me.

Maybe love means pain. Really, maybe it does. Maybe loving them means putting myself aside even though I hate it and it hurts. I am so desperately lonely (it could just be hormones...) and want to have it lavished on me. But I can't sit around waiting for that. Maybe the secret of life and love is lavishing first and then hopefully getting a return on that. You know, better to give than receive. Somehow the thought of not getting my needs met rises up inside me and is threatening to choke me and suffocate me, to kill my spirit from the inside out. But that's only when I think about it as self denial.

Even now I'm asking myself if I can make space for my sorrow. I think I can. Both loving me and sad me can coexist together. I have permission to be sad and I also have the strength not to act out of that sadness, but from somewhere else. I'm not sure I know the first thing about loving people, but I'm gonna try. Really, really try.

I still desperately want to be accepted and loved, but I can't sit around waiting for it like a shell of a human being. In the meantime I'm going to keep living and trying and loving. And maybe it will work out.