Time-Travel Dysmorphia

Puberty is put forward as this crazy time when your body undergoes unbelievable change and wow it's hard to deal with oh man don't panic guys.
But really, the rapid change in my body was easy to keep track of. These days, when my body changes it goes so slowly that I hardly notice. Then one day I'll scratch my shoulder and think "holy shit that's a different shape than before!"

Back story though. When I was younger, I felt a strange breed of dysmorphia. I didn't really recognize my face as my own. In my imagination, my face looked very different. The face I saw in my mind was my own, but what it would look like 3-5 years later. When I came to college, I had the last face that I had imagined. I thought: "This is what I will look like forever."

If only it were so simple. Since then my face has become longer and thinner. My body has changed too. Some of it has to do with the change in lifestyle (read: Life of the Mind) so my legs are less muscled. But that doesn't explain away these hips. That doesn't explain this waist. I can't see the future anymore.

They gradually feel more and more like they belong to me, but there's been a wee setback in the last week or so. I don't think I've been eating enough. I can feel many more bones in my shoulders and hips than I could before. I don't feel particularly skinnier, but that could be related to my cycle. Bones. I feel exposed. I feel pokey. It doesn't feel like me.

All of this is part of why getting dressed/facepaint is so important to me. It's how I own my body, either by making it the shape I recognize or making it so unrecognizable that the disconnect doesn't scare me.

If only I could dress my name. I'm feeling more and more like "Julia" though.