lately panic has been overtaking me and leaving me glassy-eyed and vague. i am continually surprised to be attached to this body which is lumpy and unfamiliar. indignant that i am required to feed it, clothe it, to make it comfortable.
in five days i am going to visit my parents for the first time since last Christmas. they know something's up but not what. my body is so unreal to me now that i cannot even determine if it will be immediately apparent what's going on. i am 96.8 lbs. i look fucking fat.
i do not know how to eat three meals a day. fuck that, i don't even know how to eat one meal. i do not know how to use silverware. i eat out of boxes and drink out of cartons, eat scraps off the floor and lick my fingers and cram too much in at once. i do not understand the concept of putting down the fork to speak, then eating when someone else speaks. my therapist explained this and i was shocked. all this civility is lost on me.
not to mention the extreme amount of vomiting to occur in that house which is still full of the demons i left there eight years ago.
not also to mention all the boundaries i must carefully construct with my parents who have never known boundaries. i rehearse my lines now with 2600 miles between us and still i cannot grasp it. still they make me cower and eat and vomit and consider the finer points of death.
in five days i am going to visit my parents for the first time since last Christmas. they know something's up but not what. my body is so unreal to me now that i cannot even determine if it will be immediately apparent what's going on. i am 96.8 lbs. i look fucking fat.
i do not know how to eat three meals a day. fuck that, i don't even know how to eat one meal. i do not know how to use silverware. i eat out of boxes and drink out of cartons, eat scraps off the floor and lick my fingers and cram too much in at once. i do not understand the concept of putting down the fork to speak, then eating when someone else speaks. my therapist explained this and i was shocked. all this civility is lost on me.
not to mention the extreme amount of vomiting to occur in that house which is still full of the demons i left there eight years ago.
not also to mention all the boundaries i must carefully construct with my parents who have never known boundaries. i rehearse my lines now with 2600 miles between us and still i cannot grasp it. still they make me cower and eat and vomit and consider the finer points of death.
how to pretend and not pretend at once? to find some integrity amidst the lies?
how do i say what i need to say and withhold that which i need to withhold when i can think of naught but food, when my mouth tells too much and my mind freezes white and blank with panic?
how do i say what i need to say and withhold that which i need to withhold when i can think of naught but food, when my mouth tells too much and my mind freezes white and blank with panic?
i dance for my mother but she does not watch. i dance for my father and he watches with the wrong sort of eyes. in neither case do i stack up. adult now and alien, unruly and ambiguously afflicted, they are afraid. only i must bear the hurt for all of us, and continue on the dance.
i am not ready for this.
i am not ready for this.
No comments:
Post a Comment