Self-mutilation is a frightening barrier that keeps us from seeing a person who is lost, in pain, and in desperate need of help.

She ran her hands over her body as if to bid it good-bye. The hipbones rising from a shrunken stomach were razor-sharp. Would they be lost in a sea of fat? She counted her ribs bone by bone. Where would they go?

She began to be reassured by these pains, tangible symbols of her success in becoming thinner than anyone else. Her only identity was being "the skinniest." She had to feel it.

Repetition brings familiarity, and familiarity is the opposite of the unknown.

Kessa ran her fingers over her stomach. Flat. But was it flat enough? Not quite. She still had some way to go. Just to be safe, she told herself. Still, it was nice the way her pelvic bones rose like sharp hills on either side of her stomach. I love bones. Bones are beautiful.

She'd lost two more pounds. A picture of the models she'd cut out of the magazine flashed through Kessa's mind. And the winner is... seventy-three!

Kessa began to cut her meat into tiny pieces. As a whole it was unmanageable, frightening; but divided and arranged, the meat could be controlled. She cut four pieces. She'd count to four between each bite.