Truth Undressed (Exposed Series, #3) (14 page)

Then for about three years, I became convinced that if I just
stopped feeding my curves, they would stop growing. So that’s what I did. I
tried all kinds of stupid diets like drinking cayenne pepper, trying to swallow
whole hard boiled eggs, and only eating mandarin oranges. I never made myself
throw up, but I did deliberately try to stunt my horizontal growth.

And I spent a ridiculous amount of time looking at the fat
between my inner thighs and wondering if it was as offensive to everyone else
as it was to me. So to answer your question, yes. I am probably partly to blame
for your eating disorder. And I understand how difficult it is to think food is
the enemy. Which is part of the reason I felt compelled to try and help you.

Fortunately for me, I went away to an intense volleyball camp
one summer in high school. Within a few days I discovered that the training was
so strenuous that if you didn’t eat, you wouldn’t have enough energy to
complete the workouts. Simple as that. As a result, I learned to eat normally
again because I was forced to remember the whole point of eating: to fuel your
body so you have energy for life.

But the truth is, having a complicated relationship with your
body- or even an eating disorder- doesn’t make you special or more attractive.
It just makes you miserable.

If you really want to be comfortable and confident in your own
skin, stop weighing yourself and buying into the idea that your self-worth is
determined by your size. Then start choosing clothes based on how they fit.

I can’t tell you how many times I bought a smaller size because
I wanted it to say six on the tag in my pants even though no one would ever see
the tag. Whereas if I just got the eight, I wouldn't have felt fat every time I
put the pants on. Plus, I would’ve looked fabulous because they actually would’ve
fit properly.

The thing to do is focus on your health and on the habits that
make you feel good like eating fresh foods, getting enough sleep, and staying
active. I promise you that treating yourself with compassion will keep you
slimmer than any diet.

And stop comparing yourself to celebrities. Their job is to be
red carpet ready and they get paid handsomely for it. Your job is to stay sane
and be a good person. It doesn’t pay as well, but at least you’re allowed to
eat carbs.

Number 3: I took things too personally

Until I was in my thirties, I took things too personally. More
specifically, I took the words and actions of others to heart more than I
should’ve. This caused me a lot of needless stress and exhausting doubt that I
really could’ve done without.

For example, I had this acquaintance in college, and I slept
with her ex-boyfriend a few years after they broke up. One night, I ran into
her at a bar, and she slapped me and threw a drink in my face out of nowhere.
For the record, I didn’t slap her back because I was in shock, and I have a bit
more class than that.

Anyway, after she got kicked out of the bar, I was pretty upset.
For years. Not because I hurt her feelings or slept with her ex, but because I
thought of myself as a nice person, the kind of person that didn’t provoke
hatred or physical violence in other people. So naturally, being attacked in
public really upset me. I even lost a few friends who ended up taking her side.
It was kind of traumatic.

But then years later, I was at a concert and there was this
woman who was dancing up on me and totally encroaching on my personal space.
Finally, I asked her politely if she could
please stop grinding on my leg
for god’s sake I’m trying to listen to this guy play the keyboard
. Anyway,
she went completely ape shit, battered me with a bunch of nasty insults, and
even asked the guy I was with at the time if he wanted to go outside.  

And in that moment I realized that the incident in the bar so
long ago wasn’t about me at all.

Some bitches are just crazy, and it’s as simple as that.

So never give someone else the power to determine how you feel, how
you see yourself, or what kind of day you’re going to have.

And don’t take other people’s constipation personally because
carrying around anger and hate only poisons you and no one else. Plus, you
don’t know what it’s like to be them, and when it comes to most people, you’re
better off not knowing. 

Wow, once again I’m feeling like if I had a chance to do it all
again, I could really kick ass at life. But I can’t. So you’ll just have to do
a good job and let me live vicariously through you. That is, if I’m an angel
watching over you. If I’m not, just learn from my top three mistakes for your
own benefit.

Of course, I’d like to add that even though I made a lot of
mistakes, I did do some stuff right.

For example, of the mistakes I made, I’m proud that one of them
isn’t “I worked too hard and spent too much time at the office.” On the
contrary, I
worked to live
my whole life, never the other way around.
Most people in America forget that they can choose that.

And honestly, now that I’m about to die, I have zero regrets about
all those beers I drank on work nights and all those Friday afternoons I took
off early. Because life is about what happens outside the office, and you have
to make room for it.

Also, unlike many women, I don’t feel like
I wasn’t selfish
enough
. On the contrary, I was always really selfish. Not in a tantrum
throwing childish way. I just knew from a young age that no one was going to
look out for me like I could. So I made a point of following my heart, and I firmly
believe that the reason I’ve always been one of the happiest people I know.

And now that I think about it, everything I ever did right I did
because I was following the wise advice of flight attendants.

Basically, I always put on my own oxygen mask first.

It was my last boozy night with Annie and Danielle before I left
for college. I don’t know if it was just the sentimentality of it or the amount
of vodka we’d poured into our bellies, but the way the moon lit up their faces in
the park was incredible. They were both so beautiful I wanted to cry.

But it wasn’t just their beauty that was making me emotional; it
was the heavy sense of an ending. Everything was about to change. Any semblance
of routine or predictability we’d come to enjoy the last few years was about to
disappear.

In a few weeks, we would all have new friends (fingers crossed),
new love interests, new classes, and new surroundings. With all that newness in
the air, it was hard to believe we wouldn’t change.

I couldn’t imagine the impact college would have on our
friendship. The best I could do was picture each of us with exaggerated traits that
we already had. For example, I could imagine Annie becoming even more cynical
and godless out in Colorado where she hoped to get a job on a marijuana farm to
help pay for school. And I could picture Danielle becoming a little more
introverted without me and Annie around to force gregariousness on her.

“How did Rob take getting dumped?” Danielle asked Annie.

Annie shrugged. “He knew it was coming. I think it was okay.”

“I wish I could say the same for Kevin,” I said.

“I didn’t think you wanted to break up?” Danielle tipped her
head back and held a wine cooler vertically over her mouth.

“I didn’t.” I crossed my legs. “I wanted to give the distance
thing a try.”

“But he didn’t?” Danielle asked, nudging Annie and pointing to
the bag of booze.

“I tried to talk him into it.” I shook my head. “But no matter
what I said, he just felt like he was being left behind.”

“Well, I’ll be left behind, too,” Danielle said. “I’ll keep an
eye on him.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I’m sort of hoping he regrets it and drives
across the country, shows up at my dorm, and begs me to take him back.”

Annie shook her head. “That’s stupid.” She passed Danielle
another wine cooler.

“Why?” I asked, shaking my water bottle to remix my screwdriver.
“I really like him.”

“But you don’t like him enough to change your plans,” Annie
said.

“So?”

“So it’s not love,” she said. “If it was love, you’d change your
plans.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Well I do,” Annie said. “That’s why I broke it off with Rob. I
mean, we had some good times, but not all good times are supposed to last
forever.” She leaned back on her hands in the grass. “And there’s nothing worse
than taking a good time and dragging it out until it becomes a bad time.”

Maybe she was right. Maybe someday I would change my mind and
think it was for the best that we broke up when things were good. Maybe we
would’ve just gotten bitter and resentful of one another if we’d stayed
together. At least the way we’d left it, if we were meant to be, things might
still work out.

Danielle pulled a knee to her chest and rested her chin on it.
“What about us?” she asked. “What about our good times?”

Annie put her arm over Danielle’s shoulder. “That’s different.
They never have to end.”

I smiled and hoped she was right. “To us,” I said, lifting my
drink.

“And the good times,” Danielle added.

“We all have to visit each other,” Annie said. “You guys have to
come out to Colorado and stay with me. It’ll be so fun.”

“Maybe I’ll have games out there,” I said, “but you guys will
have to come to Maryland, too.”

“Count me in,” Danielle said. “I want a preppy boyfriend.”

Annie rolled her eyes. “I don’t get you sometimes.”

Danielle shrugged. “What? We don’t all have to date snowboarding
hippy deadbeats.”

“More for me then,” Annie said, taking a sip from her water
bottle, her nostrils flaring as the vodka burned its way into her belly.

“At least you’ll both get to see me every time you come home,”
Danielle said. “And it won’t be long before Thanksgiving.”

“Don’t count on it,” Annie said. “I don’t know if I ever want to
come back here.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said, registering the hurt in
Danielle’s face and my own heart. “Of course you will.”

Annie shrugged. “Are you kidding? I’ve been waiting my whole
life to get the fuck out of this place. If I never have to see any of these
people again- besides you guys obviously- it would suit me just fine.”

“You might miss it,” I said. “After a while you’ll want to come
back.”

Annie’s mouth formed a straight line and she looked at me like
she knew exactly what she’d said.

And I think that was the first time I really understood how much
she hated it there and how eager she was to start a new life somewhere else.

I took a deep breath. “Are you gonna stay at home, Danielle?”

“No,” she said. “Didn’t I tell you? I’m going to live on
campus.”

“That’s great,” I said.

Annie nodded along with me. “That will be way more fun.”

“And convenient,” Danielle said.

“Plus your Mom can still do your laundry on the weekends,” I added.

Danielle’s face twisted. “My Mom hasn’t done my laundry since
eighth grade.”

“Oh. Never mind then. It’ll be just like you’re far away, too,”
I said, trying to redeem myself. But I couldn’t help but wonder why I didn’t
know that, and what else I didn’t know about her.

I mean, these were supposed to be the two people I knew best in
the whole world, and there were lots of things they didn’t know about me either.
Big things. Like the fact that I binged and purged every day for years and that
my Mom wasn’t even my Mom.

And that made me scared for the future. Just for a moment.
Because I realized that at the rate I was learning about myself, I might never
have the time or resources to really know anyone else. But maybe you didn’t
need to know someone to know that you needed them.

Plus, how well we knew every detail about each other didn’t matter.
What mattered was that we made each other laugh and that we knew when to listen
and when it was more helpful to change the subject. What mattered was the
chemistry we had, not the mutual depth of understanding.

Like I didn’t know what Annie’s favorite color was (probably
black), but I knew that thanks to me she might never have to take the morning
after pill again. And I didn’t know much about Danielle’s relationship with her
parents, but I knew that I could always count on her to pick up the phone
before the end of the second ring.

And I didn’t know if Annie would ever find happiness, but I knew
that no matter what, I would always be happy in her company. And I knew that
even though Danielle couldn’t afford to go away to school, someday she would be
more successful than any of us. Because she worked harder and wanted things
more than anyone I’d ever met.

As the booze saturated our bodies, the conversation became
lighter and sillier. It was like the future was a sun none of us wanted to look
too hard at.