"It's like we talked about. You control this world. Let the pain go, let the hurt go, let the guilt go. What you're imagining right now, that world you control. That place can be as real as any pain."
-Dr. Vera Gorski, Sucker Punch.
The World You Control is a blog by Lizz Matthews, who studies psychology- dealing with depression, anxiety, and addiction to self-mutilation.
So today we shall be talking about body types, insecurities, all that snazzy jazz.
So I have an... Odd body type. I'm skinny, like really skinny. Most people would tell me to stop bragging but I honestly HATE my body. Like I despise my body. It sickens me.
If you've seen me all up close and personal, you'd see I have like no curves. I've just recently discovered sexy = curvy and not sexy = you look like you've been photoshopped.
I'M NOT CURVY. I'M... THIS. *gestures to ugliness*
Okay curvy girls, I know you're so pissed at me right now. You may want to look like a "photoshopped-to-look-anorexic-but-not-sooo-anorexic" woman, but you're stunning! Why would you want to look like me, a girl who doesn't even eat lunch most of the time?!
People starve themselves to look like me. I honestly hate it. I hate it so much. You're gorgeous! Please don't hurt yourself. Honestly I've been trying to gain weight to be curvy, not way too skinny.
I understand that there's two types of people, women that love their bodies, and women that hate them.
Most women dislike their bodies. It's sad. I'm one of them. When people tell me to name something about myself I like I can't even think of one thing.
Society is ruining everyone.
I hate myself because I cannot be what is really attractive.
But I also understand that everyone has a different type. Hopefully one day someone can love me from my personality all the way to my looks.
And I swear to you, one day somebody will love you from your personality all the way to your looks and you'll love them too and you'll have an adorable relationship and adorable pets and adorable-
This is a poem I wrote in school... hope you like it.
Cowardly she walks along the hall,
Covered in broken hearts and shattered dreams
Surrounded by those who shall never know her name
For she's too scared to tell.
Everyday she looks in the mirror thinking what it would be like to be beautiful,
Realizing the only thing close to that are the crimson stripes upon her thigh and arm.
Her only friend is a blog covered in blood splatters and empty streets.
She writes once a night to her so called "friend" before being
Dunked into a pool of medications and drowning in her shame.
This short poem is actually a timeline from the beginning of 8th grade to the beginning of 9th.
This girl is me before I started getting better.
Hey regular The World You Control visitors...
Tonight's post is a letter to a person that has been in my life since she was born. I didn't put a name in it because I share a bit of personal info. I really hope she sees this, a lot of terrible things happened between us and I heard she may be feeling suicidal... so I wrote this for her. I hope you like it.
Hey You,
I named this post after a song we used to dance to together back in 2003. Hopefully you'll listen to it.
We were best friends since birth... but one day it went totally wrong. What happened was not okay.
I remember you as a very out-spoken, yet quiet person. You've always been short, brunette, and your feet take up most of your body. I remember because we spent almost every day together. Our parents were such good friends and your baby sister... Jace loved taking care of her sometimes. I think he misses that.
I heard that she is now in what? 4th grade? Hell, I remember whenever we both went to see your mother in the hospital after she had her. You were my best friend...
My other friends, well, you didn't like them. That was okay. I learned that it was normal for you to dislike my friends because we were so close.
You were going through a hard time then, I believe... I think that was maybe when your mum became addicted to something... I don't really remember what... Or maybe not...
She used to make chocolate pie. She was a very sassy woman, shall I say. I remember when she would be rude to you and your sister. Inside I wanted to slap her across the face, but outside I agreed never to do whatever we had all done ever again...
I remember upstairs in your room you introduced me to Michael Jackson and Taylor Swift... what an odd combo. I remember you teaching me to say "Oh my God" instead of "Oh my gosh" because it didn't really matter what other people thought of what words came from my mouth.
I remember you telling me you didn't want me to be a part of your life anymore.
I understand you were still going through that hard time...
But I feel it's time to come back into your life...
So here I go...
I heard you've been cutting yourself.
By who? I shall not name. He saw scars on your arm as you insulted him in school.
Honey, you will be okay. Hurting people is not okay.
Not that guy, not me, not my old friends and not yourself.
You hurt me, and you hurt me good. I won't even start with the physical pain you brought me only because you didn't know how else to deal with your family issues. You've been moving from house to house because who knows why... You may be going to court soon... I don't know how I can get to you but I am writing you this letter because I'm worried.
I am addicted to self-harm. That cutting you're doing to yourself is not worth it. I don't know for sure if this is what you're doing because I haven't seen it, but you and your sister can not go on like this, and I do not want either of you to end your lives with that rope tied to your tree that we would swing on years ago.
No matter what you did to me, I love you.
Nothing is ever going to change that because I love everyone. Everyone deserves happiness.
What you're going through will pass. You are an amazing human being and so is your sister. I miss you both so much and if I could run over to your house right now, hug you, and tell you it was okay I would.
I know you don't want me in your life anymore,
but it's time I come back.
Love,
Angel Elizabeth Matthews.
And I will never get over seeing your sister last year, whenever my dad came over to fix your dads truck, with curly strawberry blonde hair in the same style as mine at the time, yelling "Angel!" through the screen door and begging to come give me one last hug...
Hey guys! Sorry it's been a while... Tech week, GISHWHES, starting another show... wow. So today I'm actually going to talk about self-harm. I just read a book called Cut by Patricia McCormick, which one of my friends told me to read a few months before I left Southern. This book.. just..
wow.
In this book you follow Callie, a quiet girl sent to a mental facility due to cutting. She stays silent for most of the book and I know the exact feeling. Callie is me from about 2 years ago. It's crazy.
Today I am sporting a self-harm awareness necklace, an anchor for the anchor project, and a "Survivor" bracelet which I have decided not to take off. I am doing this because last night I cut. Not because I wanted attention, or missed my scars... I was feeling emotionless. Cutting gives me emotion. I guess it's the chemical it releases. It was at night, when I usually cut, and when my medicine usually wares off. When the only thing really keeping me okay is the thought that I can sleep without Melatonin.
But I can't.
Meaning that I will stay emotionless until 8 in the morning cutting and cutting waiting for something good to happen. Last night I thought to myself I wasn't going to wake up the next day. I just had a feeling, I guess. The feeling that death was coming in a matter of minutes. I wrote some stuff. It sucks though. In Simplicity, my autobiography, I have noticed you don't really learn about my personality so much as that I have depression. I'm writing another movie, where I can express my personality through who I want to be. A strong, independent, attractive, awesome chick who happens to die, but dies a hero.
Yep.
Soo.. I guess this was just kind of about everything...?
I dunno.
Hello, family!
Sorry that I didn't blog last night, a lot of things were going on. I couldn't stop thinking. I had been emotionless all day. I couldn't sleep. Couldn't blog.
I couldn't really think of anything to write about but Insomnia tonight, so if you like my opinion posts more than personal problem posts, I'm sorry.
Let's get to the blog!
Thinking of what song to pick for tonights post was pretty easy. Brain Stew by Green Day off of their album Insomniac. Totes my goats.
For those of you dealing with Insomnia, you totally understand my pain here. Usually the things keeping me up are my creative thoughts or my scary thoughts. I'm probably not going to talk about my scary thoughts this early in the blog... A lot of people think I may be going insane... I think it's a mix of sleep deprivation and what I've learned may be panic attacks. I didn't know I was having panic attacks. I thought it was completely normal.
SO ANYWAYS.
It's not that I want to stay up, I really want to sleep. I usually have work in the morning and soon I'm going to be going to school every morning. Plus, I live in Burlington and we have to get to Saxapahaw every morning... plus some quick makeup... and the stress of finding something to wear (it's not easy hating your appearance.)
Trust me- I want to be able to wake up early and have a nice cup of coffee or whatever normal people do, but I can't. I have to worry about if my new medicines are working, if I need something else done to help me sleep... Plus I tried coffee when I was like six and I hated it so much.
For three years, going on four, I've tried so many different things to help me go to sleep. Sometimes I'll try forcing myself to sleep by watching terrible things on Netflix. Sometimes I'll watch Stuck In Love because I've seen it like 50 times and I just discovered it like last month. I'll stare at the things I put on my wall right next to my bed. Like I'll study the details of the cute little Union Jack picture that came with a comb I bought, I'll read an Anne Frank quote I wrote over a picture I drew of a corset being tied, I'll read the lyrics to Flakes by Mystery Jets that I put over a self portrait I drew, I'll look over all of the tattoos carefully drawn onto a picture in memory of Jimmy Sullivan, I'll even read a beautiful note written to me from Hannah Ficklin that begins with "Dear Peachez," and nothing seems to help.
Sometimes I'll listen to my own breathing... then I'll stop breathing because of habit. I remember whenever I was little I used to listen to my own breathing like I do today, but I would stop breathing to see if I'd black out or something. I'd also speed up and slow down my breathing... no reason really...
I've noticed sometimes I write. I found a note to myself that said "my ovaries hurt like a pregnant baboon," that I had written after sunrise while PMSing. (TMI)
But really, sometimes it just takes a bit of talking. Like talking to whoever is reading this.
I talked to my mother last night and after shedding many... many tears... I was able to sleep.
I've realized I don't have close friends anymore, but my blog is definitely the one thing keeping me sane.
Love you guys.
I can't believe it's not butter - Maybe it's Maybelline.
Now listen, as a teenage girl I am totally NOT ready to be a parent. It would suck to be a parent at this point in time... But that doesn't mean I haven't thought about how parenting is going to work for me.
I was recently told that a person in my family told my parents they were raising me wrong.
WRONG = NO JESUS
Now believe me, I have nothing against parents that raise their kids around "da lawd" but I don't really get some things. Like... Are you gonna be okay if your child believes that there isn't a god? Whoa whoa, I'm sorry, am I crossing a line? It's cool if you want to raise your child with Christianity or Judaism or whatever you believe in, but you have to remember that there is that possibility your child may learn what a belief is and then realize they don't believe in anything they thought they did.
You may ask... How do I know this?
THAT'S RIGHT CHILDREN!
I was once an extreme Christian. Like... EXTREME.
It got to the point where I wouldn't talk to Jace because he believed in Atheism, and I wouldn't listen to Tool because they're Atheists...
Good times.
Turns out, my father is Agnostic, my mother is Christian, and my brother is Agnostic Atheist.
THEY'VE BEEN LIKE THAT FOREVER.
For me, I was raised with Christianity due to my grandparents and my great aunts and all that jazz, and in their church everybody had to be Christian or be hated by pretty much EVERYONE and live eternity in HELL! Little Lizzery learned that even though she knew nothing about the Christian faith, she had to hate everyone that didn't believe in it! Yay!
I'm not the kind of person to judge or hate people nowadays but when I was like 8 I was.
These are the kinds of people I stay away from... Judgmental, rude, etc.
They classify themselves as pure, nice, and kind people EVEN WHEN THEY ARE HOLDING UP HUGE SIGNS SAYING "ASK ME WHY YOU DESERVE HELL!!!"
I've seen it.
I got a "question" an my ask.fm saying "ew, you're an atheist."
Why is this a thing? I was raised with Christianity if that makes you feel any better, but I believe some things are outrageous.
Believing in something means you personally think something is accurate. One second, I'm gonna Google belief.
be·lief
biˈlēf/
noun
1.
an acceptance that a statement is true or that something exists.
"his belief in the value of hard work"
2.
trust, faith, or confidence in someone or something.
Oh wow! Look! "An acceptance that a statement is true or that something exists."
Like really, believing in God is just like believing in Unicorns. NOT believing in God IS STILL JUST LIKE BELIEVING IN UNICORNS!
Annnd let's take a look at the 2 on the board children. "trust, faith, or confidence in someone or something."
Wow. Look at that. It doesn't say "that you force on your children or you will rot in hell."
Maybe because that's rude.
I'm not raising my children with any religion because I want them to figure out what they believe in.
Who knows, maybe I'll marry an extreme Christian...
But I still think my kids should believe in what they actually believe in.
Cool.
If you disagree with my opinions leave it in the comments below and maybe we can have a sophisticated chat about these things.
I do not mean to offend anyone in these posts. I know religion is a difficult subject but I accept those of all religions and really hope we can get along, ha.
Love and fried potatoes,
Lizzery.
OH YEAH. The song for this post is Inertiatic ESP by The Mars Volta off of my favorite album of theirs, De-Loused in the Comatorium, which is an album of songs based on the dreams a man had while in a coma I believe. Highly recommend their music. Like totes my goats.
As my family and I were riding home from a full day of volunteer work, we stopped at a gas station. This gas station is not particularly known for it's delightful customers. Of course everything was just dandy until a car happened to pull up next to us. This family did not look like they were actually "family-worthy" shall I say. These people, who looked in their late 30s to early 40s, had a young daughter who looked maybe 6 or 7. They might have been her aunt and uncle or maybe just her caretakers...
We happened to hear them being very rude to her, but couldn't quite hear what they said. The little girl in the back seat stared at me for a while. I smiled at her and she smiled back. I then waved at her, making her smile even more. She waved back. You could tell seeing me she was happy, and having me wave at her got her mind off of what the rude driver was saying. She did not look like she was well taken care of. I felt like she deserved to have a kind smile and a wave.
For me, this is an everyday thing. Whenever I see someone being disrespected I always step in and assure them there are good things in life. For this girl, her guardians seemed to mistreat her... I've met many people who's parents did not treat them in a very great manner, so I've learned kind of what they need. Hopefully, I have shown this girl that she is cared about and that there are nice people in the world that can treat her better than she is being treated. A lot of times the children being disrespected will learn to treat others with disrespect and spread that. I really hope that the smile and wave from me to her shows her to be respectful to those around her. I really hope that I helped. Don't think that one small thing cannot make a difference. A smile and a wave could have changed how she views people. You never know.
Next time you see someone being disrespected, give them a smile and a wave. It may change things.
Love and magic,
Elizabeth.
The song of this post is Hold On Till May by Pierce The Veil featuring Lindsey Stamey, a song about a girl who was neglected by her parents and dealt with depression from the perspective of the young man who helped her through it.
