Ever since I can remember I've played pretend. I adored dress-up as a child - fairy princesses, Snow White, anything pink with frilly tulle. My mom is a shopaholic, and as a little girl, I went everywhere with her. We spent countless hours at Parisian Clearance, where I would coddle the evening dresses even at 3 feet tall, petting the silk and dreaming of the day I would carry one home in my arms. Somewhere along the way, my fictitious innocence spoiled, my dreams rotted into lies. In fourth grade I made a C on Mrs. Spain's spelling test, an unconquerable sin for my 9-year-old throat to swallow. When asked about my grade by my friends, I reported my score as a B. One Saturday (like most in the 6th and 7th grade), I spent at my best friend Michelle's house. She owned a beautiful swimming pool, where we spent most mornings making handstands and somersaults underwater. Afterwards, as we were washing our hair, Michelle moistened hers with conditioner, informing me she leaves it in her hair for 3 minutes. I responded by saying I left my shampoo and my conditioner in for 3 minutes. So there. She just looked at me quizzically, her mouth open to retort, her lips eventually closing, probably thinking it's better to say nothing at all.
My mom and I discussed our tactful facility in lying, like it's a sex-linked disorder passed down through our female heritage. But this is not so. Lying is a behavioral trait, not genetic, absorbed through observation from what's familiar. I have taken care of many little children, watching them as they test their lies like they're probing their toes in bath water, adapting their senses to their environment. It wasn't just normal to lie in my house. It was obligatory, like a defense mechanism for survival.
ED patients are often diagnosed with a perpetual void. As a bulimic, I was stuffing my emptiness with food, alcohol, nicotine, anything to fill the hole. This analogy is not well-suited, though. My manifestations began as sheer curtains for humanity, concealer for my errors or misjudgments. I wasn't filling a hole, but covering the deceit with sand. I wanted nothing more than to prove I was perfect, superhuman, unnatural beyond all measures, for then I would measure up. I hid everything from my mother, fearing if she uncovered my fallacies, the minute tenderness she felt for me would be yanked away, my family laughing at my expense. And she always knew my lies; her mind as sharp as a serpent, her hands ready to strike for my journal, her thoughts trained for the unknown. I found my ED not to fill my void, but to cover up the lies already existing there. I found a secret my mother could not know, as long as I was careful. I was brilliantly perfect with my ED, burying my secret deeply in the sand, finding a cool, dark spot to hide it and nest. But I got lost along the way.
I once asked my mom why she didn't try to help me. We were discussing my behavior in Geneva, and she mentioned knowing there was something fundamentally wrong. This was her reply: "I didn't have a clue how serious this disease is. Not in my wildest imagination. I think I thought it was something you controlled. I didn't realize it was controlling you." By the time I indulged my mother in my secret, it was too late. No one could help me. The manifestation had clawed itself deeper, like my brother's Transformer toy buried somewhere in the beaches of Pensacola. I eventually stopped digging, my fingers raw with torture, my back strained from bending, my throat scratched with sand. My ED took control as I sat back, too tired to search any longer. Finally I had revealed my darkest secret to my mom, proud she never could uncover the hidden truth.
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