anorexia

I went to the hospital when I was four, because I wasn't eating. My dad always told me he suspected that I was anorexic because my mom had left. But I finally remembered why. Well, it's not really a conscious "why," because I was four and because anorexia isn't like that. Maybe some forms are. But for me, and as far as I've read, it's not something you think about, like "hey, you know what sounds awesome? Not eating. Maybe then I'll get the attention I deserve." Food just becomes sand. Flavours don't exist. Everything is grey. Nothing has animation. I do not wish to eat because I am not hungry.

I've always remembered the feeling, but never the cause (as I write this a part of me is trying to escape, it feels like I have a fever or I'm underwater, and my ears are ringing high pitched, and I feel nauseous). I realized that (I'm so scared of writing this, it's so stupid!) that that that my dad, my dad never paid attention to me. There. It doesn't sound like a big deal. My mom left so I already felt unsure of myself. My dad didn't hold me, didn't comfort me, didn't talk to me very often. I remember all the times he talked to me and I loved them, I loved him, I clung onto those moments. I thought it was normal, to be four and live in a silent home. My dad was usually drunk. He drank and sat and stared, or watched television or typed.

There were other people, but no one who gave me the nourishing communication and love I desired: there was my aunt, who molested me, and my babysitter, who was insane. My mom was gone and my dad never spoke. Sometimes I'd get angry and once I hit him and he shut himself in his room until I apologized. I was crying so hard he couldn't hear me.

I always thought my dad was my friend, my saviour from dark places. When I was a little older, after the divorce, and my mom would yell at me and hit me, and I wished I was dead, I would remember my dad and I thought he would save me. I told him this later, when I was 17 or 18, I said "I have to tell you, I'm mad at you because you never saved me." And he was very defensive, snapping that he did, that I had no idea what he went through blah blah blah. Both of my parents love the "you have no idea what I went through" "defence". It's insulting, to assume that one's child isn't paying attention, for one thing. It always hurt my feelings that they thought I never watched them. I was always watching. And for another thing, my parents are two of the most self-centered, whiny people I have ever known. It was impossible to live in their home and not know their most intimate business. My mother told me everything, well, yelled me everything. And my dad told me things I never wanted to know as a teenager, about his sex life, or his genitals, or hormone levels.

It took me a few months away from them to realize that I was still a child, as a teenager. I always thought I was so grown up. I blamed myself for most of their shortcomings.

It's only now that I'm realizing how damaging my relationship with my father was. I knew my mom was abusive, because I had adults who told me, and because it was much more tangible; I could tell which actions of hers had made me feel humilated, dirty, miserable. Worthless. But with my dad, I thought it was all me.

I have to write this down because if I don't, I don't think of it, and then I forget it. I want to remember, because I need to live.

diary entries

January 30th, 2008. Arbitrary time. Couldn't sleep, so I come out into my room and eat sugar?! I feel like there's something --many things-- fundamentally wrong with me. I'm aching to do the "right thing". I don't want any more reminders of what _____ [my mother] wants, I look at myself and see it. My brain recycles music over and over and what is success, anyway? Purely subjective, and therefore... no, see, my heart wants to calm down and enjoy life, and I can do that on my own, without joining anyone's cult. It just requires calming down. And enjoying life. Enjoying... the pain, too. Or rather, accepting it. I accept that I am in pain right now, that I am panicked and scared and a little hungry. My lips are dry, I'm afraid that everything some things I do are wrong, I'm afraid that people will notice and hate me, I fear disgust. Who do I know that feels that way about me? No one who matters. I'm afraid of being a lesbian. I'm afraid I'll leave my honey for a new one with a vagina and then I won't like it and will be a scary middle-aged panicked dyke with emotional problems. What a silly fear! I take it apart and it antagonizes me until it morphs into an overwhelming-crushing-fat-man-breathing-heavy-on-top-of-me feeling, and an unpleasant odor, of fart and bacteria and sweat and vinyl, a trace of those smells teases me. And my supposed dualism; an astrological curse to be a certain way. I'm caught in the age-old dilemma of wondering how much control I really have. I try to mimic _______ but that makes me angry. I don't want to mimic anyone. I want to be myself, and unique. I want to be lovable to myself, self-sufficient, but able to ask for help when I need it; smart, but not snotty, beautiful, loving. And calm.

March 5th? 2008....All this backlash, all this frozen terror and numb self-hatred is flinging in its last throes. It is difficult, and there are times in which I feel hell catch me and drown me and rape me but it passes and I'm me again. And I'll always be ______ [me]. I'm a little worried that I'll lose awareness; become insensitive to others once I find my security, but I don't think that's possible. I've got a good idea of what and how I want to be. I believe again that my body will heal. And though sometimes I don't, I believe my heart will heal up, too. I deserve my love and health. Still sometimes I get terribly sad, wanting my mommy, but the older I get, the less it eats at me. That is not to say that it doesn't, or rather, not to minimize my pain. Ultimately, I know everything will be just fine, lovely in fact. I have the strength and the willpower not to panic myself into a bad place. I have my friends and my self and my _______, whom I've been waking next to every morning....he helps me--no, when we are bound together it silly--the whole heavy bleeding angsty world becomes light, silly, loving, heavy, pregnant; we can use that possibility because we ARE that possibility and I am safe. That concept has been hardest for me to grasp but I believe-- I am safe in my own body, out of my own body, and no matter what happens, I will be able to protect myself and those I love. I love so much, it trickles down my skull, my spine, into my lungs...