I don’t want you to know that I exist. I don’t want anyone to know that I exist. I want my body to be a secret from everyone but myself and my love. While growing up, I wish someone had told me more often to be kind to myself. I wish I was taught to respect my body. I wish I never knew what self harm was. What rape was. What it means to be taken advantage of. I sometimes wish that I was ugly. Because maybe then I wouldn’t hurt this way and maybe I wouldn’t have been touched the way I have been. I wish that I was taught how to say no. How to be strong. How to fight temptation. Because I have failed at these things and it brings shame. I am more than what they have made me out to be. And I am more than what I have made myself out to be. My skin deserves better. I deserve better. It is only wishful thinking, but I wish I would have known how to have the respect I am learning to have.