“I felt free to like all three of these men now, because I’d realized I didn’t have to become them.”

“I didn’t have to look at him to know I’d just lost everything I’d ever wanted because I felt it. I felt the loss seep into bone and tissue. I felt it settle between the cracks in my heart and the empty holes in my soul.”

“I hated men because they didn’t stay around and love me like a father: I could prick holes in them & show they were no father-material. I made them propose and then showed them they hadn’t a chance. I hated men because they didn’t have to suffer like a woman did. They could die or go to Spain. They could have fun while a woman had birth pangs. They could gamble while a woman skimped on the butter on the bread. Men, nasty lousy men.”

“My head was spinning. I felt like I’d been drifting, lost at sea all my life, and now that I’d found dry land, I couldn’t quite get my bearings.”

“As a teenager, I didn’t want to be me; I wanted to be many different people. Maybe I realized that they all lived inside me and that if I managed to connect with them, they would become aspects of me.”

“For the first time in months, I felt together. Sharp. In hurting myself, I had at last found a way to release the pressure.But it was more than that. I was now different. I felt different. I’d discovered a way to control my feelings. Just because self-mutilation wasn’t deemed an acceptable coping mechanism didn’t mean I was going to stop doing it”