April 2026 - Vol. 23, Issue 2

Maybe the appeal of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was finally feeling understood by a creature who awoke in a body they didn’t understand. Maybe I felt seen by Gregor Samsa in The Metamorphosis. Maybe I gravitated towards stories from “the monster’s” point of view because I understood what it was like to be trapped in a body that people feared—one that I feared. Maybe I liked zombies because they show visibly what I feel on the inside. Maybe I liked werewolves because I could imagine the pain of their bones and muscles ripping and reforming every full moon. Maybe what others call “body horror” is, for me, finally feeling seen.

A few years ago, when I was in pain and doodling to cope, I realized that most of my art was body horror. My illnesses are invisible to the world but never to me. So I drew what I felt: the knives ripping open my tendons, the needles stabbing through muscles and nerves, the blood, the bruises, the swollen bursa. I drew the things that would have shown the world how I feel. The things that, had they been real, would have led to medical treatments. The things that, unlike my conditions, could be stitched back together and fixed.

Over time, I have grown sick of fantasy stories. I didn’t want to see a character get beat up by the villain then feel better in two days because of supernatural healing. Not when one mild inconvenience could put me in a month-long symptom flare. I didn’t care for the protagonist who never had to consider whether they could afford the energy to hang out with friends before a big fight to save the world. I wanted the character who had scars, who held pain in their bodies, who had to make hard decisions for themselves, who weren’t a size 2, and who struggled to love themselves. But these characters were rarely the protagonist. At best they were the side character you would simply forget about. But, more often than not, they were the villains.

Because that’s what people are scared of. I am what people are scared of. A body that doesn’t work right. A body that sends you constant reminders that it is there—and it screams. The Pain. The Brain Fog. Never getting better. That is body horror to them, but daily life for me.

Nobody wants to imagine that one day their body will break and never get better. That one day they will feel a pain that never goes away. Nobody thinks about their body until it’s broken. They live in their quiet, transparent, weightless bodies, fearing the zombies, the monsters, the “disabled villains.” And I’m here, rooting for the villains, the disabled, the sick, the monsters, knowing that they too are just scared, trapped, and in pain. Knowing what it’s like to live, not just in a body that hates you, but in a world that hates your body.

Your body horror. My body.