You cheated. First time since the getting better began. It hurt me and confused me and worried me. My truthful, conscientious daughter. I always hoped that particular anorexic trait would elude you. You seemed to be behaving deliberately stupidly and I just didn't get it - wanted to slap your tiny, angular face and yell into it.
It was such a small cheat - but one you clung to because "they" said you could alter your regime slightly. But 70 calories fewer is the difference between me crying with relief when you stand on the scales and me crying with despair when the numbers (those damn numbers that smother our lives like a rotten blanket) go down. How ever would I be able to look at you and muster up from my boots any ounce of optimism and positivity about the battle all over again? "They" hadn't taken into the equation this mathematical stumbling block. But you had and you ran with it, head down and saying nothing. A silent lottery win for you there, dearest one.
Such a small slip - when you've been so fastidious and exemplary - but it became magnified and giant between us. It made me cry with worry. And it made you cry with shame and guilt at my discovery. Probably with a fair dose of hatred too. I know you felt such fury towards me for picking it up and picking on you. You tried to bow your head and grit your teeth and speak in civil tones but you might as well have ranted like a loon at me for all the good your control did you. You can't hide. It's always writ LOUD on the planes of your face and in the hunch of your knobbly shoulders.
So you're sticking stubbornly to the new breakfast and the 'lessness' of it and you know it's not right and still you maintain it's what you're going to do. And I have to let you and pray it isn't the backward slide I've dreaded. It's crazy, anorexic thinking to believe - to say out loud - that it's ok to do this. It's pacifying the demon inside you. Different food but fewer calories. That's the trade off. You're brave to eat something not on your safe list but only because it's less frightening than persevering with a banana. This makes me sad and I feel sucked dry of the will to battle it with you. So I gave in. Just this once. I am pathetically weak to have acquiesced.
Anyway. Apropos of nothing, your legs may well be the same size as Lydia's (they're not - I looked today when she was here) and she may well be perceived as normal and I know you want to say that this means your legs must be normal too and I am making a fuss when I tell you they're like sticks. But she isn't anorexic and she doesn't feel terror when she eats. So yes - your legs are too thin, my love, my precious little girl. (Who should be nearly a woman by now.)
1 comment:
Quite a few people I know have a grim fascination of some kind - the holocaust, serial killers, slavery . Mine, ironically, is anorexia and starvation. I wish it wasn't. I've read far too much and I fill in between the lines of what you write (as if it weren't evocative enough already) with all I know, until the reality of what you both live daily makes me ache with pain for you. And yet I realise it's the merest hint of what it must be like to actually live through it.
It's not suppose to be like this. Grace had everything going for her; the best possible foundation. I really believed that she would be free of all the old family cycles and fly high and brilliantly, with all the fire and intensity and complexity she's inherited, but well and happy. Foolish of me, perhaps, and certainly foolish for me to forget that I was only ever seeing the surface she chose to present to an outsider. But still, all this fills me with boiling rage against the wrongness of it.
But most of all when I read what you put, more than sadness, more than anger, I feel humbled. Mother-love is amazing. You are amazing. And all the more so because you do what you do despite the despair and the exhaustion and the fear. It's not just the intensity of the love that gets me though - it's your ability to channel it to heal and calm and soothe and make things as ok as they can possibly be for her.
I'm here going on about your strength, and I know that can feel weird when your tank is nearly dry and you just want not to have to do it any more. I guess almost all of this is between you and Grace and there's nothing anyone else can do, but I hope at least you don't feel alone. I hope there is someone that you don't have to be strong in front of, that you can break into little pieces with just for half an hour, and be held and put back together. I wish I could do more. If you ever want, you can lean your whole weight on me - I'm here always.
(This is turning out rather longer than I expected - oh well.) This is for Grace, if you feel it's appropriate:
I've known Bec for a long time and apart from just being friends, there's a particular role I think we have in each others' lives. I am her bright mirror - I point out her goodness and courage; remind her how beautiful she is and how far she's come. She is my dark mirror - with her, I see my flaws and meanesses and become uncomfortable enough to do something about them. (That's not the slightest bit a criticism, by the way - it's a much rarer and more difficult gift to give someone.)
If you will indulge me for a couple of paragrahs, I would like to reflect some bright things to you. In you, I see immense dignity and integrity - a spirit that will not lay down its ideals for an easy life. I see courage. I see passion and depth. I see intelligence (even in physics!) - but not just academically - also about people and life itself. And most importantly, I see greatness of heart and beauty of soul. I believe that everyone has a spark of the Divine in them - the same thing you might call Buddha-nature - but in some people it's easier to see than others. In you (and Bec) I see it very clearly.
I'm terribly sorry you're ill, and I hope with all my heart it will be short-lived. But that doesn't take away from what you are, and in fact, it might add to it. I once wrote to Bec about her agorophobia being like a container - an enclosed space where she could grow into all that she is. Many of the things I love about her are there because she has suffered - her wisdom and gratitude and her ability to heal and comfort. For you, I would use a different metaphor - perhaps more like the polishing process that makes a gemstone. Through your illness and your recovery you will find more who you truly are, and shine brighter and more clearly. (Not that knowing the truth about oneself is always pretty and sparkly - speaking as a recovering perfectionist, if you discover that you're not always kind and rational and capable, that's fine and probably a great relief!) But I will see you on the other side, older and wiser, stronger and surer.
There - ok - back to Bec for one last paragraph. One thing that's struck me through this is the twistedness of me having the opposite problem to Grace - eating too much instead of too little. Well, I'm happy to tell you that you might need to change one of the details in your very first post on here. It's not three people you know with eating disorders - it's only two now - or near as damn it. My own recovery is going well. I finish therapy in six weeks. I have refused to piss about with my little hillock of a problem when Grace is facing a mountain. And I am almost there.
Love always, admiration for your beautiful (if painful) writing, and wishing you the serenity, courage and wisdom for the next day. m xx
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