It's a universal truth: I am not a dog person. Now it doesn't mean I don't love them. I grew up with dogs my entire life and have never regretted any of them. I'm a huge sucker for puppies and fluffy dogs. If I see a dog on the street, sometimes I'll coo at it even if I know it can't hear me. But my heart has always belonged to cats, even if they like to throw up hairballs in the most inconvenient of places.

Another sad, but universal truth: I've dealt with an eating disorder for a good part of my life. My (long since) ex-friends were mean and skinny and, at the age of 10, it wasn't hard for them to break me down. I was never told that eating disorders take a toll on you after some time when it started. Mentally and physically. Once I went down that spiral of making myself look better, it only continued to get worse. I altered everything I could. My poor best friend had to watch from the sidelines as I broke myself down.

What I didn't realize would happen when I started this trek of insanity was that I would learn to hate myself. Despise my entire being and then some. Fix my quirks and little habits, such as repeating a phrase or word that I found funny. I tailored myself to fit others, even after I had moved away from those I wanted to be most. My new friends attempted to help me, and when they couldn't, new people came in and fed into my eating disorder even more with talks of dieting and monitoring our meals together.

This amount of self-hatred left me empty. No amount of cuddles with my cat, Twinkle, could fix it. Then we got two dogs, Sato and Mount Rainer (Rainey, for short). We had to give up our cats to make room for my dad's dream of having his favorite dog and I was even more bitter than when I had to skip saying goodbye to my old friends to visit my new middle school. I ignored the dogs as much as I could. How dare my family take away the one pure thing in this world that I had? My meals became less frequent as I dealt with the loss of the animal I had raised and grown up with.

Fast forward a couple of years, I've just ended my long-standing abusive relationship with a boy no one thought was capable of doing what he did to me. I refused to let myself be broken by this. I was stronger than this. So what if my meals suffered and my clothes got baggier? It meant I could get through this like I had done before. As I lay in my room, trying not to let my brain claw itself apart, I hear a scratching at the door. Sighing, I open it, only to find Sato. He saunters into my room and plops himself down on the middle of the floor, refusing to leave even with my constant badgering. I huff out a breath before collapsing against his side. He grunts, a usual occurrence when he's jostled, but stays right there with me.

This goes on for a week at least before I have a major breakdown. I'm talking hyperventilating, snot running down my nose, tears-dripping-onto-my-clothes-because-I-can't-be-bothered-to-wipe-them breakdown. Dogs must have a sixth sense for this sort of thing because, before I knew it, Sato is in my room and he's licking my face and whining. And I can't help but laugh. It shouldn't have even counted as a laugh. It was more like a pathetic, raspy noise, but the message got across. Even if I hate myself, at least this dog will always love me. Every time I had a breakdown, Sato would be right at my door, waiting for me to let him in.

This went on for around six months before I stopped and looked at myself hard in the mirror. Whenever I had before, it had been to criticize something; my dimples, my cleft chin, things that made me different. I stared at my reflection and, for the first time, I didn't feel the need to be harsh with myself. All I could think was: "Dear God, my poor dog is the kindest soul on this Earth for still loving me, even if I look like this." I looked haggard with hollowed cheeks and enormous bags under my eyes. Remember when I said an eating disorder takes a toll on you, physically? Well, this was what five years of an eating disorder did to me. I looked like a ghost. I knew if I kept going at the rate that I was, I was going to live a much shorter life and wouldn't be able to give my dog the love and attention he deserved. It was hard, but I started eating more, just so I could get some more strength to take Sato on walks. I was still much too weak to take Rainey (our 120 lbs dog) on any walk. It wasn't much, but I felt like I was doing something. I felt like I could accomplish anything. I managed to get my eating stabilized and maintained a consistent weight for longer than a couple of days.

Now, feeling like you could accomplish anything doesn't mean you actually can. My next goal is to fall in love with myself. Love myself like that stupid dog loves me when I was at my worst. Obviously, that's a huge challenge to try to do all at once, so I'm going slow. First, it was my freckles. I stopped hiding them in makeup. I let myself go in the sun more so my skin could produce even more of them. Thinking of the tiny constellations that could be made with them made it even better. I had tiny stars and, if I traced the dots across the bridge of my nose, all the way to my hairline, I could create anything I wanted.

Next came my eyes, followed by my nose itself. Slowly, inch by inch, I fell in love with myself, physically. Right now, I'm working on loving my personality, which is a feat of itself. Letting myself do those "annoying" habits again, treating myself gently when I have a difficult time. I know it will take a long time, but I'm willing to wait. Some days I'll be right back at that scale, counting the calories I've eaten, staring accusingly in the mirror. But no one's perfect, and I know I'll get there. I'm learning to love myself just like my dog loves me.