| "Flesh and Bone,"
Submitted to The Writer Magazine, 1986 |
Backed
against the wall, hiding in a corner in my bedroom, I hold
my breath, listen, and wait for the sounds of voices and footsteps
to pass. Moments before, I had fled the livingroom, afraid
that the people walking by my apartment would see me and know
why I locked myself in my apartment with the drapes drawn
and phone unplugged. I look into the fearful eyes of the woman
across the room in the mirror. She reminds me of a captured
animal, cowering in fright. I can't bear the sight of her,
and I bow my head into my hands, hoping that when I looked
up again she will be gone. But when I raise my head, she's
still there. "What is happening to me?" she whispers,
tears running down her face. I have no answers. Shakily I
stand, and so does she. We walk toward each other until we're
just inches apart. "I hate you," I spit at my reflection,
then spin away from the mirror.
Creeping into the livingroom I return to the coffee table
where I left a quart of melting ice cream, an open bag of
cookies, a box of assorted chocolates, and a partially eaten
layer cake. Emotions petrify me, and these are my methods
of avoiding them. Anger, in particular, I fear will consume
me like a fire, so I fight with the only weapon I have. Possessed,
as if by a demon, I eat. Each bite suppresses my raging anger
and fills the emptiness inside. Loneliness, depression and
disappointment ease with each gluttonous mouthful; I slowly
calm down. Waves of nausea wash over me, but I force myself
to finish every bite, regardless of discomfort or pain. Time
is of the essence. I have to finish quickly and get rid of
it. When my stomach is twice or three times its size and about
to burst, and I'm reeling from the enormous surge of sugar
in my system, I stagger to the bathroom, lean over the toilet
and gag myself, expelling what I'd eaten with such force that
when it hits the water, it splashes out of the bowl onto my
face, and onto the walls and cabinets around me. With each
heave anger is released, but guilt and self-hate grows. Afterwards,
I sit on the floor in front of the toilet weak and weary,
asking myself why. It's an exhausting procedure, after which
I collapse on the couch, or wake up on the cold tile floor
hours later. I despise myself for doing this, but other than
eating them away and throwing them up, I have no idea how
to confront my emotions.
"Dry" binges are the worst. That's when I gorge
on cakes, cookies, nuts, and breads without drinking enough
to liquidize the food. When I try to get rid of it, the mass
wedges itself in my throat. Unable to breathe, I frantically
attempt to clear the passage by using my fingers as a shovel. It's
horrifying and disgusting, but it isn't death that I'm afraid
of--it's the shame at being found dead that way. In my fervor,
I sometimes scratch the back of my throat with my nails and,
watching the water turn red, hope that I will bleed to death
and put an end to this once and for all. In moments of desperation,
I drink laundry detergent and salt water to accomplish what
gagging could not.
At the turbulent age of 14, I forfeited family and social
interpersonal relations for the happiness I believed would
be found in thinness. Food and weight obsessions dominated
every aspect of my life and, left little room for anything
else. Normal emotional growth came to a screeching halt. Instead
of examining and conquering my fears, I evaded them by bingeing,
or fasting for days or weeks at a time. "Getting sick,"
besides allowing me to eat fattening foods without gaining
weight was, more importantly, an emotional diversion; fasting
led to a heightened sense of well being, clear thinking, and
exhilaration, and the pounds melted away. 17 years later my
body issued warnings that something was going wrong. My defense
mechanisms had turned against me, and I was faced with a physical
rebellion. Food, or lack of it, no longer provided a means
of escape. As a drastic solution to uncontrollable eating
frenzies, in May 1985, I threw all edibles in my kitchen away
and began a fast bearing the marks of malnutrition. Because
of nutrient
deficiency, I had not menstruated for over a year, a condition
in which I was pleased. Due to the strain of self-induced
vomiting the glands in my throat had enlarged to the size
of golf balls.
During June of 1985, I developed insomnia. Rationalizing that
sleep would only hasten the next unbearable day's arrival,
I saw insomnia as a blessing. Lack of sleep, though, took
its toll in fatigue and exhaustion and the resulting discontinuity
of thought, disorientation of time and space and, within two
weeks, extreme confusion. Moment-to- moment memory loss contributed
to a profound feeling of displacement. One after another,
major glands throughout my body became infected. The first,
the lymph nodes behind my ears began to burn. Within a month
they were noticeably swelled. On the right upper thigh below
my groin, another gland swelled and became so inflamed that
my skirt lightly brushing against it sent fire searing down
my leg. Two weeks later, the gland on the opposite side reacted
identically. Shortly thereafter, I discovered a sore on my
left foot that blistered and filled with a thick, foul smelling
white and green liquid. After it healed, the infection moved
to my right foot where it festered between my two little toes.
Intense throbbing coursed down my legs when both glands near
my groin simultaneously flared up.
In July my sight was affected. Images were wavy; inanimate
objects moved, and I began to actively hallucinate. Bright
white sparks flashed in front of my eyes, which had become
hypersensitive to all light, natural or artificial. In the
initial stage of blindness, peripheral vision began to diminish,
and my sight blurred, then dimmed altogether. Even though
my ribs, shoulder, collar bones, spine, and hipbones jutted
out, I was not thin enough. The mirror confirmed my worst
fears: weighing in at 97 pounds and 5'5" I was fat. |
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