Kessa Quotes

“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.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“She used to look forward to changing in the locker room when other girls stole shocked glances at her emaciated body last spring. Now they would look at her and think she was fat--just as fat as all the other girls, maybe even fatter. Nothing separated her from the parade of thunder thighs trooping up the stairs from the locker room to the gym.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“If you’re told what you should be but not helped to become it, you don’t get there. And it makes you ashamed for failing to. When a person you depend on keeps telling you that it’s time to ‘move on,’ ‘to grow up,’ it makes you feel that who you are now is inadequate or uninteresting.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“If you want your daughter to change in a profound way—to change from only trusting herself and her own behaviors to trusting others, you, her family—you will have to bring a new energy to your relation with Kessa. If she has to overcome this all by herself, it will take longer, and she may never be close to you.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“She sat for a long time in the chair, rocking gently, wishing she were thinner. Somehow that would make all of this turmoil vanish.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“Even a battered child is sure that it’s his fault that his parent beats him. He hopes someday to become good enough so that the beating will stop. I guess the scariest thing for a child to believe is that a parent might be wrong about him—or her.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“If we don’t have to change self-destructive or wasteful patterns, we won’t. But basically we are resourceful creatures, and if we can tolerate deprivation and fear, we can also change and learn how to have more healthy behavior and different values.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“All these women always on diets, and he’s telling me I don’t have to worry about gaining weight! Some of them are thinner than me and they’re just pretending to eat stupid salads. And I’m supposed to sit around and get fatter while the whole dieting world passes me by. Then I’ll really be the loser. The thinner is the winner. Deirdre was right, after all. Sandy doesn’t know what he’s doing. I can’t trust him to make important decisions about my weight for me. I can’t trust anybody but myself.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa

“I wish I felt brave.” “Do you know how a brave person feels?” “How?” “Scared.”
― Steven Levenkron, Kessa