There was a child inside the kitchen light,
counting every silence in the room,
learning that hunger could be safer than crying,
that sweetness could soften the shape of doom.
Food became a blanket, warm and faithful,
a secret door, a steady hand,
when no one came to name the hurting,
when no one helped me understand.
The body did what bodies do:
it built a shelter from the storm.
It carried grief in tender layers,
trying to keep the spirit warm.
So I will not curse this flesh for surviving.
I will not shame the child who ate to breathe.
I will thank the weight for standing guard,
then teach my heart it is safe to leave.
Healing is not a war with dinner,
not punishment, not rules made tight.
It is learning to pause before the craving,
to ask, “What wound is awake tonight?”
It is water poured like a promise,
protein, color, fiber, grain;
meals that steady blood and memory,
movement chosen without shame.
It is sleep that softens old alarms,
breath that tells the body, “Stay.”
It is therapy, truth, and trusted voices,
one brave choice made every day.
When the hunger is not for food alone,
I can feed the ache another way:
with a walk beneath an honest sky,
with music, prayer, a call, a page.
I can plate my life with gentler portions:
less blame, more patience, room to grow;
fresh beginnings at the table,
roots of mercy planted slow.
I am not the pain that raised me.
I am not the pounds I wore.
I am the one who crossed the fire
and found a key inside the door.
Today I eat to nourish, not to vanish.
Today I move to feel, not flee.
Today I hold the child within me
and say: “You are safe with me.”
