The Girl With A Curse

At 15 years old, a terrible curse befell my body. A black, thick, long, curvy curse. Sprung from my face, my hands, my leg, my chest. For a year or two, it was a curiosity to me, I couldn't understand what's going on exactly, but the curse wasn't on full force yet. It was annoying, but not debilirating.
At the end however, the curse grew enough. It made every part of mine uglier but face and legs were the worst. I felt something ticked me wrong way when I was in photos with my face or leg visible. I hated to feel it with my fingers, or water touched it or worse, other people...
I could try to remove the curse from my face time to time, but it never went away, only lessened it effects, which brought me merely temporary comfort. It grew, I fought back, it grew, I fought back, it grew, I fought back... I hated to deal with it. But when I didn't fight back, it grew worse, and I hated dealing with it even more. The fights were tiresome, felt like a waste of time and often ended with cuts and rashes.
But I accepted my fate at the time, other people had that curse but they seemed not to mind it, some even like it. That always baffled me but I came to believe I was in the wrong one. Maybe that wasn't a curse after all, I would just get to used with it, like other proper men of my age did...
That never happened, I felt more and more disillusioned with my body, I never care about what I wore, or whether the curse was visible on my body. I didn't care whether someone would find me pretty or that was I told to myself. Years past, the fights never became any less painful. I usually fought only when my hatred of the curse grew enough to endure the pain. For weeks, sometimes more than a month, the black plague would stay infested my face and I would only intervened when I was on my breaking point or people around me pushed me to do it.
To contrast, the moments where I lessened the curse felt like a blessing, even if it was never like the days before curse found me. I enjoyed greatly to touch my face without having to feel the curse. The feeling of the wind and water freely meeting with my skin was so precious. People would find me young, even they understood it was something my face was not meant to carry. My looks, my smiles became a little brighter, I became a little bit like myself, however momentarily.
Yet, when the curse slowly grew back, I only helplessly watched as my connection with my body deteriorated. I yearned the moment that I could have my face back and detested the fight I had to have to achieve it at the same time, only acting when the former was surpassing the latter. I never got used to it, never became the 'proper boy' everyone told me I was going to become one day.
Well, it's obvious now that I know I am a girl, after all, how could I be a boy? But knowing made it worse in a way. I always doubt myself, often think my reluctance against my curse means I am not really a girl when I look at the girls with the same curse. Sometimes knowing myself makes me hate myself even more, making the mirrors a vicious enemy for me, makes me yearn about the past, I become jealous of girls who don't have to deal with it, jealous the days I missed when I was teen and resentful over the curse I have to deal with. Sometimes, it al feels so unfair. Why I have to deal with this, what great sin I have committed, what I did to deserve to lose my freedom like this, I ask myself sometimes.
But, this is not the whole story. Now I know my feelings are right when I am temporarily free of the curse. Especially when I free my legs, it gives me a bliss I didn't feel for a long, long time. A genuine sense of selfhood grows inside me. Not all of my thoughts are painful now, sometimes I can imagine a future where I can be fully free of the curse, where people would see me as who really I am.
Now, with girls that has the same curse as me, I know there is such a future.  I am at a tunnel, I can see a faint light far, far away. It's not easy to walk in this tunnel, it's cold and filled with thorns. But I know I am not alone, I am walking with girls like me. We are carrying this burden together and we will reach at the end of the tunnel. With so many supporting to me, the light feels a little brighter every day.

If you have this curse, you can do it too! You are beautiful, the curse cannot conceal the truth, and you are never alone. Let's find the light together, shall we?
This article is written thanks to my dearest Patrons and special thanks to: Alexandra Morgan, Laura Watson and Spencer Gill.