My mother found my stash.
I finally got it. That phone call. The phone call that I clandestinely predicted but kept pushing to the back of my brain because I couldn’t face it, and, let’s be honest, didn’t really believe would happen. I don’t tend to trust those predictions that just kind of happen, like “It’s going to rain around 3 pm today” when I haven’t checked the weather or “I’m going to end up meeting a guy this week who loves musicals and who will never like me back” when there is no evidence to support that hypothesis. And yet, those are the things that end up happening. Which is how I know, have always known in fact, that this conversation with my mother would inevitably take place over the phone when I am unable to gauge her feelings by her body language, only her voice. Which of course makes having a difficult conversation that much more difficult. It is a sick kind of fatalism.
That’s right folks. My mother found my stash, and God, how I wish she had found a stash of heroine or pot or vodka. Anything but what she actually found, which was several drawers full of food wrappers and remnants. She called me yesterday with that serious “We need to talk” sound in her voice that always bodes ill and I knew, before she even told me the reason for her call, exactly why she was calling. I felt it in my gut, a feeling so overwhelmingly visceral that I wanted to throw up right then and there. Then of course, she actually told me what she wanted to talk about. She had gone into my room to get some mail or whatever while I have been staying at my dad’s house. She moved my desk to get something behind it and my drawers slid open because they’re always doing that, blah blah blah. The rest you can figure out. I knew this conversation would take place on the phone because I knew there would come a day when I wouldn’t have time to clean out my drawers, go through the tiresome process of gathering all the evidence into a white trash bag and taking it out to the garbage while my mother is at work or asleep, and then go to my dad’s house for a few days. I knew at some point, my mom would need to get something from my room or she would need to leave some mail on my desk for me, or maybe she would just get curious. She would open up my drawers or they would slide open accidentally. Either way, that day would come when she would see what I had left behind. And this would of course take place while I was out with friends or at my dad’s, meaning that she would inevitably call me to have this talk.
Like any addict, the worst thing that can happen to you is to be found out. Except that this is not the first time I’ve been found out. The first time, I willingly told my mother because I wanted help. It was right after I figured out that I am suffering from a kind of disordered eating. Back then, though I didn’t know it yet, I was only in the beginning stages of my journey, or rather, my descent. You see, when I told my mom that very first time, after rehearsing it with my best friend, I thought I was at the end. I thought it had gotten as bad as it would get. But that was only the beginning. She found me a therapist whom I stopped seeing after 5 months. We had the conversation a second time a year later when I asked to see the therapist again. I stopped seeing her after 2 months this time. And we had this conversation one more time, when she asked me why there were credit card charges at McDonald’s and why I would take out money from ATMs at odd hours or odd places. And once again, I had to explain to her that I have an eating disorder, that it doesn’t just go away, that just because she doesn’t see me destroying myself doesn’t mean I’m not. It’s like after we have these conversations, she just forgets. You know how I know this? She always says the same thing: Shira, I want to know what’s going on with you. She says this in a tender, motherly, concerned way, which always makes it 10 times worse because it makes me feel guilty for distressing her. I don’t know how and I certainly don’t know why, but my mother makes it impossible for me to tell her the truth when we talk about this. At least, the whole truth. I can tell her snippets of the truth, but not the whole honest-to-God truth. So this time I told her part of the truth. The good part. And here is this particular snippet of truth: I’m having a good week. I mean, a really good week. This week, I found the strength (and I mean full-on Odyssean/Herculean strength) to be kind to my body. I told myself on Monday that on Tuesday, I’m quitting cold turkey. That I will not, under any circumstance, eat to fill a void or relieve stress. I will not leave the house to buy a treat (or several) at the convenience store. I will not waste my mother’s hard-earned money on food products that will only hurt me, rather than help me. And I said that I would set a reminder to myself a week from Tuesday (because it is a proven fact that the first 7 days of quitting an addiction cold turkey are the absolute hardest) to congratulate myself for making it through the worst week. And you know what? Today is Sunday. It has been 6 days since I made that promise to myself. And I’m doing great. I have been on vacation from school for a few days now. Vacation is always the worst time for me. Too much free time, too much free brain space. I usually fill that free time and space with food. It’s a very time consuming process, getting money, going to the store, picking out exactly the right combination of food, paying for it, bringing it home, sorting it out into food that needs to be cooked (AKA microwaved), food that needs to be hidden in the freezer, food that needs to be eaten so it doesn’t go bad, and the food that will last me for days as long as I wrap it up in my drawers. Then of course I have to eat that food. Then eventually dispose of it. Are you starting to see why this process takes so long? It’s a great activity for vacation, “great” being a relative term. The significance of all this is that I have been on vacation for 4 days now. 4 whole days, the most dangerous days for me. Days when I have an abundance of free time, cash in my wallet, and of course the omnipresent freedom that my parents give me because I’m generally a good kid. But in those 4 days, not a single binge has occurred. This triumph might have been assisted by a record-setting blizzard that happened to keep me locked up in my house for around 36 hours, but still, when one is determined to binge, one will always find a way. Of course, I’ve thought of a million ways to binge. But I haven’t. And that makes for a good week. A very good week.
I don’t know where I’m going to go from here. I’m not sure if that’s something I should figure out or if I should just let the chips fall where they may. This was not intended to be a hopeful blog post. Blog posts usually fall into two categories: Tragic rants/reflections (my drug of choice) or “A New Hope” (not usually my preference. Tragedy is so much more entertaining). This blog post seems to have synthesized the two. I began writing this Odyssey of a post in order to make sense of my feelings about my mother (God, Freud would have a field day if he were given the opportunity to analyze Tumblr) and it seems to have morphed into something much more productive than that. I seem to have failed at writing the Poor Me/I Hate My Mother blog post that this was intended to be, most likely for these two reasons:
a) I find self-pity to be a waste of time and
b) I don’t hate my mother. Not even close. As much as I make my mom out to be a villain, she’s not, nor has she ever come close. As far as moms go- hell, as far as people go, my mom is about as good as they get. She’s strong and intelligent, resilient, funny, sharp, warm, genuine, and dead clever. She has an unlimited store of love in her heart and she is never sparing when it comes to the dispensing of that love to her children. But she’s my mom. And what kind of a teenager would I be if I didn’t complain about my mother? Moreover, what kind of a daughter would I be if I didn’t recognize that my mom will always do things that piss me off and that I will always do things that piss her off, and that we will sit and stew in our mutual pissiness until we remember just how much we love and need each other?
In order to give credit where credit is due, I’m posting a link to what I believe I can call “my savior.” Please take a look at Superbetter.com and consider signing up. It really will, as it claims to do, give you the power and resilience to quit anything. And if you still don’t believe me, watch this TED Talk. You will not regret it.
