Secrets

I have so many weights causing me to sink lower and lower, so many hiding places I can seek out in refuge from my shame and despair.  I recognized my issues with food when I was very young.  I first practiced bulimia in seventh grade.  To this day I do not know what ignited my curiosity, be it a commercial, a conversation with other girls my age, an episode of My So-Called Life ... I don't know if I will ever be able to pinpoint the prophetic moment when intrigue became obsession.  My brother and I shared a jack-and-jill bathroom.  One afternoon after school, the sunlight parading around the faded white tiles like a girl in a princess costume, I remember leaning over the toilet.  The action must have been premeditated - my personality even then was very anal.  I color-coordinated my socks, I organized my closet weekly, I picked out my next-day outfit the night before, satiating comfort through order and regulation.  I'm sure my older brother was nowhere in sight. The weak locks in the bathroom insured trespassing, but I have no doubt I obsessively checked to make sure the nimble cylinders were locked in place. What I do recall is wrapping my long hair into a ponytail and timidly pushing my right pointer finger down my throat.  The gagging reflex was instantaneous.  I can remember my eyes watering, the taste of bile filling my cheeks, and the discomfort raging from my core.  I also distinctly recall telling myself I was foolish, even crazy for standing there, as I rubbed away the teeth marks from my finger, trying to erase the memory.  I didn't turn to my bulimia until I was sixteen, only 4 years later.  

My insipid love affair with bulimia began at the age of sixteen, a mere two months after moving to Geneva.   My family and I would drive across the border to France to buy our groceries.  I would fill the grocery cart with bags of pretzels and peach candy, opening the bags in the store to endorse my impatience.  Once home,  I would hop on my bike, ride aimlessly through the neighborhoods, until the pretzels in my bag shouted my name.  I stopped at our community pool and obliged my voice, stuffing pretzel after pretzel in my mouth until the bag was empty and my stomach was strained. I remember feeling guilty, but there was a parasitic comfort in the guilt.  In a way, the self-inflicting guilt was comforting because at least I was in control.  I found a thermostat to regulate my emotions.  I didn't have to wait for my mothers' disappointed stare to lock in my sadness.  My previous life of perfection proved inadequate, so I needed to feel sacrifice to be entitled to the guilt.  My shield became my dagger, the voice that told me it was okay to hate.

Today is day six.  I feel like I've reached a state of euphoria, a blanket of tranquility I've so often envied in you.  I'm tired of the innate behaviors bulimics adopt: checking the stalls in the bathroom before purging, buying 2-liter bottles of water to insure all of the food will come up, mapping out the restrooms all over the city to know which places offer privacy, stopping mid-purge when someone walks into the public bathroom, heart pounding, moving my feet in the other direction as I wipe the spittle from my mouth, using half a roll of toilet paper during one binge - using a few sheets at a time to cover the noise of vomit hitting the water, like a rapists hand over his prey, telling you if you make a noise it will all be over.  The marks on my stomach have finally faded.  I hid this from you for a long time.  I stopped shoving my finger down my throat after the first year of my disorder.  The frequency of my purging aided my disease's progression.  I no longer had to force myself to be sick, needing only to bend over and press on my abdomen in order to purge.  When my ED is out-of-control, I have red, raw fingerprint marks on both sides of my stomach.  I avoid taking off my shirt by saying I feel fat.  Like fat is an emotion.  I'm tired of eating disgusting fast-food. I've never told anyone this: when we lived in Santa Barbara, I would see a homeless man almost every day around Alice Keck park.  I was driving from one food place to the next one day (when we lived on Sola).  My final stop was Jack-in-the-Box.  I walked up to the register, and the homeless guy was behind the counter, asking me for my order.  His fingers were knackered in filth, his glasses covered in a film of grease, and I looked away as I requested my burgers and fries.  

I am incapable at defining a binge; this is a very personal recipe for each bulimic.  For me, it can be as simple as a glass of orange juice, or as complex as a two-day demolition after spending $350 at the grocery store.  I have experienced both, and they can be simultaneous or isolated.  I may rest after purging one large pizza (my stomach can only handle one at a time) by then drinking a glass of juice.  Moments later, I will purge this as well.  You have asked what you can do to help me.  I am going to be very vocal about my limits.  Yesterday I walked to Whole Foods only thirty minutes before you arrived to purchase the bread for dinner and the cheese for today's picnic.  I waited for you to walk through the door to slice the bread - proof to you and reassurance for me that I was not going to binge.  I then used the leftover bread to make the sandwich for you, wrapping its contents securely in aluminum foil, so any tampering with it will be fully evident.  I cannot have leftovers in the house if you are not there.  I have few foods I feel safe eating, even if they are only lettuce, kidney beans, and sparkling water.  

I don't know how you do this.  I imagine it is as equally if not harder to read this than to experience it.