Dear Mirror(s),

Hello All,

I hope you all are fueling your bodies, giving yourselves the nourishment you are all so deserving of.

Today I would like to express something that most people feel when struggling with an eating disorder, yet know one really talk about it much because it is hard to explain.

My name is Rachel Steele. I am almost 21 years old. I have lived in this body my whole life, but I do not know what I look like.

How is that possible, that with all of my years of body checking, picking at my skin, pointing out each and every flaw, that I still am unsure of what I truly look like.

Every mirror is different to me. If I feel smaller in one, I immediately know that it cannot be true. If I feel bigger in one, I am suddenly motionless in a body that doesn’t feel like mine. If I cover the mirrors up I will be unable to leave my house. If I feel pretty enough to leave the house, there must be a flaw somewhere.

I have 6 mirrors that I constantly body check in everyday. No mirror is the same, and I am convinced I look different in each one. I will not believe the one I feel slightly better in, and I cannot help but fix each perceived flaw in everyone until I am able to leave. I hate not being able to feel content in the body God has so graciously given me.

Most of the time I am nervous to be seen, always nervous to be touched. Terrified to be vulnerable and uneasy to know that the second I am out of my cave I give people the power criticize me, to see what I perceive as unloveable.

Why do we do this? Why do we body check until we are sick, why do we assume the worst outcomes, why do we give our brains and thoughts so much power to show us the negative in our bodies.

Dear Mirror, I do not like you. Sometimes I see me when I look, sometimes I see a stranger.

I share this today to let you know that it is normal. That it is possible to see a stranger when looking at your own reflection.

But friends — a reflection is just a reflection, and I promise you that most of the time when you see a flaw, the mirror is lying. We have altered our brains to see flaws that are not there. We have created a negative in spaces that are supposed to feel safe.

You are worth so much more than how your body looks, and I promise you, that you were not put on this Earth to fit in small spaces.

I believe in all of your recovery journeys, and I am so thankful for the people who have supported me on mine.

Reach out if you need it, know that I see beauty in each and every one of you.

Love Always,

Rach