“I don't want to look at something that determines me so completely.”

“I avoid looking down at my body, not so much because it’s shameful or immodest but because I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to look at something that determines me so completely.”

“I don't want to see anyone. I lie in the bedroom with the curtains drawn and nothingness washing over me like a sluggish wave. Whatever is happening to me is my own fault. I have done something wrong, something so huge I can't even see it, something that's drowning me. I am inadequate and stupid, without worth. I might as well be dead.”

“I want to be held and told my name. I want to be valued, in ways that I am not; I want to be more than valuable. I repeat my former name; remind myself of what I once could do, how others saw me. I want to steal something.”

“If I was going to do something I didn't want to do, I at least wanted to be remunerated for it.”

“I don't even glance at the herbal teas, I go straight for the real, vile coffee. Jitter in a cup. It cheers me up to know I'll soon be so tense.”

“People cry at weddings for the same reason they cry at happy endings: because they so desperately want to believe in something they know is not credible.”