My Secret Life (5 page)

‘Losing weight takes time,’ people told me. I would take nothing from time I decided, not when it already gave so little away. Some time was required of course, but I would insist it was minimal.

Skipping breakfast was effortless, as I had never really eaten in the morning anyway. During a number of diets, I forced myself to eat something healthy before the day kicked off; usually a fruit salad or very complicated dish I read about somewhere. Even then, I hated eating breakfast. The irony is, I have always seen myself as a morning person and was never able to sleep much later than about 9.00 am. But for all my claims of being a sunny person when first out of bed, apparently my stomach could never quite keep up. Consequently, it was a tremendous relief to consciously decide against food in the mornings. More importantly, it went unnoticed. I was never expected to eat breakfast because I never had and saw that part of my day as somewhat of a free pass.

The rest of my day would prove rather difficult without the milkshakes, or so it seemed at the time. Looking at that time now, I had it easy. If ever I tried to skip a meal now, more than likely, it would be a most futile labour; all my family and closest friends know about my bulimia and would make it impossible for me to do so. But again, we’re racing ahead of ourselves now and best keep to the matter at hand. At that point, they were in the dark about the illness and I was too. So I suppose, I had a substantial degree of freedom. A simple, ‘I already ate’, would usually suffice for a while.

My family has never really been one functioning unit. We tended to unite only in crisis, like when a loved one died and a funeral would follow or when my sister and I fought. But in general, we were simply a collection of five individuals who happened to be tied every now and again by this notion of blood. We slept, worked and operated all at different times and would, in a sense, merely bump into one another along our daily journeys. My father was a labourer who toiled more than he rested and was almost always in the National Rehabilitation Hospital, where he worked. My mother, the binding gel of this collection of parties, appeared to live on another planet most of the time. From working part-time to managing finances, shopping and the overall upkeep of the household, she lived in a world I was happy to be ignorant to. My older brother and sister were both employed and living the usual lifestyles of twenty-somethings, in one way or another. With a new son on the way and his desperation to lay down solid roots, my brother Peter featured very little in this time of my life and lived an hour’s drive away from the family home. In the context of my bulimia alone, what all this meant was that we never ate dinner together. The concept of all these people sitting down together united around a kitchen table to share food was, and still is, a foreign one.

All this noted, dinners were still rather tricky. The temptation to eat would peak in the moments my mother was dishing up a meal, which she would usually prepare for everyone and leave in the oven to be eaten when convenient. I was never spurned by hunger alone, as I knew I could overcome the feeling with relatively little effort. No, I was spurned mostly by guilt. I hated letting my mother down and subsequently would become disgusted with myself for letting her hard work go to waste. At the same time, however, I felt I didn’t deserve the fruits of her dinner time efforts. My father would eat after a heavy day of lifting and being on his feet and thus, had earned his meal when he came home at night. Similarly, my sister and mother were slim-figured and as a result deserved the food in front of them. I, on the other hand, couldn’t seem to contend with these justifications and so resolved to the idea that I just wasn’t worthy enough for these meals as they were.

I’m sure you’re thinking that this is surely the most distorted logic you’ve ever heard and yes, it is. But it was my logic nonetheless and so blindly real that I could do nothing but behave under its dictation. Trying to figure out an escape route from all these thoughts was near impossible. And the only thing left to do would be the most obvious; escape the house itself and eat out. Of course, I didn’t do this. It was as simple as informing my unsuspecting family that I was going out with friends for something to eat and would be home later. Often I was given money for these outings, which I saved to buy cigarettes and to pay into nightclubs when the occasion arose. I would call to a friend’s house, claiming I had just eaten dinner and would proceed with my evening as planned. In the beginning, it was flawless and worked under perfect timing and execution. Naturally, though, it didn’t last. There are only so many times you can tell your mother that you’re not eating at home and only so many times you can bother a friend at home during dinner time. Even without the knowledge of my strange eating habits, others were still mildly suspicious. Or if not suspicious, they were at least curious about the growing eccentricities in my behaviour.

One peculiarity to be seen was my increasing need to be alone. In one sense, constantly being around others was just too inconvenient for me. I had never noticed up until this point how almost everything we do while socialising with other people revolves around food. Whether it was coffee and lunch with girlfriends, drinking on a night out with a crowd or having a movie night with close companions – which would finish with the inevitable phone call to order pizza or Chinese food – it seemed impossible to avoid eating while keeping company. It also demanded better excuses. ‘I already ate’, ‘I’m not very hungry’ and ‘I’ve gone off that stuff’ didn’t really cut it after a time. I was eventually forced to become a little more honest, if not altogether sneakier.

I told friends a half-truth and informed them I was trying a new, very strict diet, in which I ate three meals a day. Obviously, snacking while with friends was unacceptable and this very simple excuse bought me some leeway from their probing questions. It didn’t, however, buy me much with time and I was required to spend as much time with them as I had always done. If not to stay out of the house for longer periods, then simply to solidify a perfect facade that all was well and normal.

If keeping distance from my friends was difficult, it was even harder to do so from my family. Though we were in general a family that enjoyed our space, we lived in a small bungalow and were usually on top of one another. There was only so long I could shut myself away in my bedroom without drawing attention or concern. I used to do that as a child when something was wrong. Throughout my years of bullying, in particular, shame would drag me into a crevice in my bedroom and firmly shut the door behind me. The trait was unmistakable even at the age of 18 and I knew it wouldn’t take long for my mother to begin her interrogative inquiries. I had to be more careful about the way in which I carried myself and conducted my behaviour.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, upon the throne of my internal hive, she seemed to always be one step ahead of me. And rightly so, as she knew better than I and we were both aware of this. Had it just been me living in my own head at the time, I probably would have tactlessly retreated from everyone and everything in my life, as was the usual case in such circumstances of turmoil. But this time would be different because I wasn’t alone. While I sat at the driver seat, she controlled the hands at the wheel and steered me right into the heart of all undesired company. Compared to my naivety, she was a craftswoman and played games with meticulous strategy. And while directing my course was the overall objective, making it as undetectable as possible was part of the game.

For a while, she did this very well and I found myself catering both to her demands and the social standards of everyone else. I started living two lives; the one in my head that fed off both my thoughts and my body, and then the one I was required to live. The latter was little more than a pretence, a necessary fabrication that enabled me to operate in my secret hive as I pleased. I had been playing a juggling game for weeks now, since I had finished the milkshakes and I was getting better at it. Of course there had been slip-ups. There were times when I simply couldn’t find a way out of eating but I was reassured each time that tomorrow would be better. At first, she was soothing in this way. Every time I steered off-track, she would scorn me most severely with stringent words and undesirable truths before finally comforting me, telling me that every mistake would only accelerate me forward in my ambitions. More importantly, I started to understand that her somewhat brutal manner and verbal persuasion were crucial to our goals. It was as if I needed to be stripped of everything I had been before then. If she could break me down enough, then I would have no choice but to do everything she wished of me. If you make anyone – even yourself – feel bad enough about what they are, they will undoubtedly attempt to remedy the situation and ‘fix’ themselves. This was the doctrine she and I worked under for the duration of our relationship.

But wait a moment. What sane person would agree to such terms? Firstly, I don’t think I was particularly sane or of the right mind at the time anyway. And secondly, she made it easy to commit to her. I have felt alone most of my life. Please don’t misunderstand me; I come from a supportive family, have some of the closest friends one could be graced with and have seen boyfriends come and go over the years. And yet for all this, I have rarely felt truly connected with another person. Typical of any contemporary teenager, I have never belonged anywhere with much ease or comfort and thus have lived most of my young life in a rather lonely state. So when the occasion arose, I discovered that I was more than willing to give everything to this person I had created in my mind.

Though I’m sure it is entirely strange to take an illness such as bulimia nervosa and personify it to the extent I have over the years, doing so provided me with a friend like no other. She understood all that I was and appeared to know everything I would ever be. She saw every beam of light and every hidden shadow of who I was. What’s more, she loved me anyway. And as my dependency on her existence manifested, so hers did to me. I didn’t just need her; she needed me and the bond was impenetrable. I first heard of ‘suicide pacts’ when I was child. I learned how people, often strangers, would reach out for others who felt as sad as they did and how, from there, they would agree to kill themselves at the same time, as if it would take them away together and they wouldn’t technically have to be alone. I didn’t want to be alone anymore. While I didn’t want to die, I probably would have if I thought I would lose her. But that’s all rather heavy right now and not something I like to think about.

I make no attempts whatsoever to glorify bulimia, but I ultimately succumbed to my illness because I wanted to. I did not consciously agree to the repercussions it would bring, yet I subconsciously immersed myself into the darkest corners of my mind before finally, I just let go. The sensation was freeing. You see people like me don’t just ‘let go’. Since childhood, I held on so tightly to myself that now I often wonder how I could even breathe for all those years. Nevertheless I was convinced that if I let anything go, even for a moment, my world would crash and burn around me.

***

I am nine years old. My sister Natalie and our friend Maeve play together every day. Maeve is more Natalie’s friend than mine but they let me tag along because nobody else will play with me. We each have our own place in our group of three. Natalie is the leader because she’s the oldest and the best at everything we do. We play whatever game she wants to play and do everything she says. I don’t mind because I like to play with Natalie and Maeve, otherwise I’d be by myself.

Maeve is the funny one in our little group. She is Natalie’s best friend and gets second pick of everything. She makes Natalie laugh and so I laugh too. I never play with Maeve when Natalie isn’t here. When we first moved to our new house four years ago, Maeve’s mum told her that she had to play with me. On my first day here, we went into the shed in our back-garden where all the toys are. Most of them were Natalie’s and I wasn’t allowed play with them. I was showing Maeve and another girl some of our toys and reached for one I liked most. When I turned around, the girls had run away. But now I see Maeve all the time because she likes Natalie.

It’s dark outside so we have to play in the house. We’re in our kitchen, which is very small but we like it because the grown-ups can’t see us and we can do whatever we want. One of our favourite games is a racing one. Maeve and I are given a glass of water and a slice of bread each from Natalie. When Natalie shouts ‘Go!’ we must eat and drink as fast as we can and the first person to finish their bread and water wins. I don’t really like this game because it makes me feel sick and I usually never win anyway. We’ve been playing it all night now and Natalie has been putting horrible-tasting things on our bread to make it more fun. But it’s not all that fun; I drank so much water that I have a cramp in my stomach. My sides feel as though they’ve been injected with steel and every time I move, they’re digging at my body. But there’s very little I can do right now. When I play with Natalie, I always have to be very careful about what I say, do and what I show. If I step out of line in any way, she will either scorn me and I try to reduce her ammunition by never losing my myself in the moment and never allowing myself to slip up too badly. When we play together it’s as if I’m clutching a stress ball in my hand. I squeeze it as tight as I possibly can and never let it go. I can’t let it go. I can’t drop it. If I do, my life will be hell and we both know it.

We’ve started playing Twister instead, where we use a coloured sheet and have to place a hand or foot on the given circle that Natalie calls out.

‘Right-hand to red,’ Natalie tells Maeve.

‘Left-foot on blue,’ she informs me. It continues like this for some time before I start to feel really sick. I’m bent over Maeve and our limbs are now awkwardly entwined on the coloured sheet.

‘I have to go to the toilet,’ I say in desperation.

‘Not yet,’ Natalie spits. ‘We have to finish this round first.’