Purge

by Sarah Darer Littman

  Danny grabbed my arm to keep me from falling. As hot water beat down on my back, I remembered the gentle look of concern as he asked me if I was okay, the way he put his arm around my waist to steady me, and it made me want to cry — but I couldn’t. It was like I’d used up a lifetime’s allotment of tears and there were none left to shed.

  I tried not to remember what happened when over Danny’s shoulder I saw Matt making out with Haley. I knew, completely and irrevocably, that I’d been used. What had been so special to me was just another fuck to Matt. I tried to forget how I wrenched myself out of Danny’s arms and left him standing alone on the dance floor, how I ran out of the ballroom, past Jenny and Brad, past Dad who was dancing with Brad’s mother, and Mom who was dancing with Brad’s dad, past Kelsey who shouted, “Janie, what’s the matter?” as I raced by, how I didn’t stop until I’d made it to the safety of the ladies’ lounge and locked myself in a stall, how I stuck my finger down my throat and out came a waterfall of canapés and loup de mer au vin blanc, chocolate wedding cake, and champagne. How it spattered into my hair and onto my outfit and how I didn’t even care because I hated that hideous dress anyway.

  I tried not to remember Kelsey banging on the stall door shouting, “Janie, are you all right? Open the damn door!” and refusing to go away until I obeyed. I tried really hard not to remember her shocked and horrified expression when she saw the puke on my dress and my chin and in my hair, and I especially tried to forget how I felt my stomach heave again and couldn’t turn around fast enough and heaved up canapé-chocolate cake-champagne puke on the designer dress her mother had let her borrow with dire warnings about Kelsey’s life expectancy if anything should happen to it.

  I tried not to remember her shriek of dismay, me slumping onto the floor in a puddle of puke, crying my drunken apologies until snot came out of my nose. I told her about losing my virginity to Matt, about seeing him with Haley, and about being bulimic. I can’t help remembering how surprised I was that she was really mad at me instead of being the understanding and sympathetic friend she normally was. I tried not to remember looking up and seeing Danny and wondering why the hell he was in the girls’ bathroom, and then hearing one of Clarissa’s friends screaming because there was a male in the ladies’ lounge, and her asking Danny if he was some kind of pervert until she caught a glimpse of me. I tried not to remember my mother and Clarissa screaming at each other and at me, but most of all I tried to forget the sight of Perfect Jenny in her wedding gown, tears streaming down her face, crying, “Janie, how COULD you?” Because when they asked me if I was sick, I had to tell them the truth, that I had done all this to myself.

  I felt something dripping down my face, and I thought I’d finally managed to cry, but when I opened my eyes and looked down I saw blood dripping, drip, drop, splat, onto the shower floor. Great, another nosebleed. Normally, I would have got out of the shower and stuffed some toilet paper up my nostril to make it stop, but I just stood there and watched, drop, splat, drip as blood continued to flow out of my nose. I watched it hit the tiles bright red and then fade to pink as it swirled its way into the drain.

  I wanted to follow it into nothingness. I wanted myself to be able to disappear down the drain. I wanted to never have to face anyone ever again — most of all me.

  That’s when I decided to do it — the thing that got me put in here. Yeah, I know I’ve been making out like it was just the bulimia that got me in here, but I’ve been lying to you — and to myself, in a way.

  What earned me my one-way ticket to Golden Slopes was the decision I made as I stood there under the hot spray watching my blood fade into pink oblivion. I ended up here because I got out of the shower, threw on a clean pair of pajamas, and snuck into my parents’ bathroom, where I knew my mother had a bottle of Xanax, prescribed to help her get through “Wedding Stress.” I ended up here because I went into my bedroom and swallowed them all, then lay down on my bed thinking about how much better off everyone would be with me gone. Thinking about how much better off I would be with me gone, because when I was dead, I could finally stop hating myself.

  I only know what happened next from what the doctor told me when I came to on a gurney in the hospital emergency room after they’d pumped my stomach — or so I’m told.

  “You almost died, young lady,” he said, sternly. “You can thank your younger brother for the fact that you’re alive.”

  Harry? I thought, still woozy from all the Xanax in my system. Harry saved my life?

  “When he told your parents something was wrong with you because you wouldn’t wake up and they wouldn’t believe him because they thought you were just sleeping it off, your brother called 911.”

  Harry?! Harry called 911 even though my parents said I was okay? I bet Dad was ready to beat the crap out of him when the ambulance showed up.

  “He’s a brave young man, that brother of yours. I hope you thank him for saving you.”

  Yeah, I’ll thank him all right, I thought. I’ll thank him right before I kill him, because if I’d wanted to be saved, I wouldn’t have taken all the fricking pills in the first place.

  But there I go telling fibs again. If I’m going to be really honest with you — and myself — I’m glad that Harry called 911. Even though life is certainly going to be no picnic, especially when I get out of here and have to face people — and worst of all go back to school, where no doubt the entire world has heard about Crazy Insaney Janie — I actually feel a little bit of hope. Maybe someday things are going to get better for me. Maybe I might be able to deal with things without sticking my fingers down my throat. Maybe I might actually learn how to speak up when I’m upset about things instead of stuffing my feelings and eating to distract myself from feeling them. Not so long ago, I would have laughed in your face if you’d said that to me. But now I see a glimmer of light in the black tunnel of my future. I see this strange something that I’d forgotten about. I think it’s called possibility.

  No one says anything right away after I finish reading the journal entry. Great … here I’ve disclosed the most humiliating and painful experiences of my life, and no one’s got anything to say. I knew I shouldn’t have listened to Dr. Pardy about sharing ….

  But then Tom says, “What an asshole!”

  “What do you expect? He’s a guy,” says Missy.

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Royce says. “Like girls don’t ever cheat on their boyfriends?”

  “I bet a girl wouldn’t take a guy’s virginity and then start making out with someone else in front of him — at a wedding, no less!” Missy retorts.

  I think she’s got a point there.

  “So what did your dad say when you told him what happened?” Tracey asks.

  “Are you crazy? I didn’t tell my parents.”

  “But why ever not?” Tracey asks. “If you were my daughter, I’d sure want to know if someone had treated you so badly.”

  “Besides, why do they think you tried to kill yourself?” Bethany asks.

  I give a bitter laugh.

  “As far as they’re concerned, my trying to kill myself is just another example of me being a drama queen and trying to get attention.”

  “But why don’t you tell them the truth?” Tracey persists.

  “Well, let’s put it this way — I know if I told Dad, he’d want to go after Matt with a shotgun, and Mr. Lewis, Matt’s dad, is one of his bigger clients. How am I supposed to put him in that position?”

  “That’s bullshit!” Missy explodes. “Your dad should totally care more about you than some client with a son who’s a complete asshole.”

  “Exactly,” Tracey agrees.

  “But … you guys don’t understand. My father’s always held up Matt as this shining example of ‘a fine young man’ … like the kind of guy he hopes Harry will be one day.”

  To my horror, I feel a lump in my throat and my eyes fill up with tears; it’s hard to believe that only a few days ago, P.C. (Pre-Cucumbers), they wer
e as dry as the freakin’ Sahara Desert.

  “The thing is … I’m afraid that if I do tell them … that they’ll blame me. They’ll think it’s all my fault … that I was the one who screwed things up, because … I’m s-such a godawful f-fuckup.”

  And then it’s like a wall falling down, and I’m sobbing. I’ve finally shone a flashlight into that dark, frightening place, where my deepest fears hide — the fear that ultimately my parents won’t believe me, that they’ll think it’s just me being “dramatic,” and, most scary of all, that they won’t love me.

  Tom hands me a box of tissues.

  “I really think you should tell them,” he says. “Take it from me … even if they do react badly — like my dad did — at least you know how it’s going to go down, instead of obsessing about all the awful things that might happen.”

  “It’s important to remember that every relationship we have — be it parents, friends, spouses, lovers — every single relationship we enter into entails risk,” says Dr. Pardy. “Sure it’s a risk for you, Janie, to tell your parents the real reasons why you reacted the way you did at your sister’s wedding, and why you felt hopeless enough about your future to overdose on your mother’s Xanax. But if you aren’t willing to even try to explain to them, they’ll continue to stick with their own ideas for why they think you did it, which might have nothing to do with the true reasons.”

  “Like I said, I’d want to know about this if you were my daughter,” Tracey says.

  “It’s also important for another reason,” says Dr. Pardy. “The only way you are going to be able to learn and grow is to put these issues on the table where they can be seen and discussed, instead of trying to submerge them. Otherwise, they’ll just continue to run you around in other relationships in your life.”

  It sounds like it makes sense — but every time I think about talking to my parents about this, I just want to purge. I tell Dr. Pardy that, even though I know it’s going to go in my notes and might end up causing me to stay in here longer.

  But surprisingly, she doesn’t write on her clipboard or look disapproving. What she does is smile and nod her head like I’ve said something really profound.

  “That’s terrific, Janie,” she says.

  What?! Terrific that I want to purge? Who the hell are you and what have you done with Dr. Pardy?

  It’s like she reads my mind. “Not terrific that you feel like purging — but that you admit to it,” she says. “So I’d like you to try and describe what emotions you’re feeling right now, while you’re sitting here thinking about purging.”

  I hate when she asks me to do this.

  “The main emotion I have is that I want to purge,” I say. “And frustration that I have to sit here and tell you about it and can’t go off and do it, without some watchdog following me to make sure I don’t.”

  “Okay, but let’s try to get beneath that feeling of ‘I want to purge.’ If I were to say to you, ‘Go ahead and purge, Janie,’ what emotional payoff would you get from sticking your finger down your throat?”

  “Lightness,” Missy says.

  “Emptiness,” I say. “Like I don’t have to feel anymore.”

  “It makes me feel calm,” Callie adds. She gives me a pointed look. “The same way cutting does.”

  Ouch. I guess I was waiting for that. I didn’t see Callie yesterday after I’d snitched on her to Nurse Kay. They moved me out of Callie’s room and back into my old room with the new anorexic girl, which was a huge relief because I was afraid Callie would smother me with a pillow while I slept or something. She completely ignored me at breakfast, like I was invisible, and I guess she’s still pretty pissed. I can’t say I blame her, either.

  “So now we know the payoff,” Dr. Pardy says. “What I’d like to explore are the feelings that are so heavy that Missy thinks she needs to purge to feel light, and so overwhelming that Janie wants to purge to empty herself of them, and so completely agitating that Callie feels the need to purge — and even cut herself — in order to feel calm again.”

  The silence is long and heavy.

  “Don’t all speak at once,” Dr. P jokes. I didn’t think she ever joked. I figure I owe it to her to take a stab at answering.

  “It’s hard to name just one feeling,” I say. “Because usually when I want to purge it’s like … this nameless feeling that’s so big it doesn’t have a name ….”

  Suddenly, I picture Joe handing me the gloves and telling me to let loose on the punching bag.

  “But I guess you could say anger is one of them.”

  Dr. Pardy smiles.

  “Which makes perfect sense, given what you’ve been through,” she says. “But it’s important to recognize that anger and to let it out in a constructive way, rather than turning it inward on yourself.”

  I tell the group about Joe and the punching bag.

  “You know what? I’m getting Joe to take me to the gym later,” Callie says. “Then I can imagine someone’s face on the bag.”

  It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that someone’s identity.

  “But isn’t it more to do with the reason why we binge than the reason we purge?” Missy asks.

  Dr. Pardy does the typical annoying shrink thing and answers Missy’s question with a question.

  “What are your reasons for bingeing, Missy?”

  I think Missy was just asking the question rather than actually prepared to answer it.

  “I don’t know.”

  Dr. Pardy just looks at her.

  “Well, I mean … I guess … sometimes it’s just to try to fill the emptiness inside.”

  So Missy binges to fill the emptiness and I purge to get it back. I guess there’s no “one size fits all” reason why we Barfers do what we do.

  “One thing I can assure you is that food will only fill the emptiness temporarily,” says Dr. Pardy. “What’s more, since people tend to binge on sugary foods, the sugar surge and subsequent fall will exacerbate mood swings. But let’s get back to Janie telling her parents.”

  How about let’s not and say we did?

  “I’d like to brainstorm ways other than purging that Janie can cope with her anxiety that her parents won’t believe her, that they might not love her, and all the other ‘what if’ worries she’s expressed.”

  “Exercise,” says Royce. “When I’m stressed out, I go for a run or lift weights. It helps clear my head.”

  “Why doesn’t it surprise me that you would suggest that?” Callie snorts.

  “Royce is right,” Tom pipes up. I can’t believe he’s sticking up for Royce after the guy’s been such an asshole to him. Tom’s obviously a much better person than I am. “Exercise does help with stress. Well, unless it’s my dad who you’re doing the exercise with … but that’s another story.” He gives a rueful laugh. “And for some of us, exercise is off-limits right now, so we’ve got to come up with other ways of dealing with stuff.”

  “I always see Janie scribbling in her notebook,” Bethany says. “I mean, she’s already on her second one. I’ve been here twice as long as she has and I’ve only filled up half of mine. Maybe she could write more about her feelings.”

  “Both good suggestions.” Dr. Pardy asks, “Any other ideas?”

  “My father’s been in and out of AA,” Callie says. “The few times that things actually went well, he called his sponsor when he felt like having a drink.”

  Wow. So her father’s an alcoholic on top of everything else. I guess maybe it’s not surprising that Callie’s so mad at the world.

  “That’s another good strategy,” Dr. Pardy says, “Speaking to someone else when you feel like bingeing or purging.”

  When no one else seems to be able to think of anything else, Dr. P turns to me.

  “So, Janie, you’ve been given some great ideas of how you can try to deal with your emotions in more constructive ways than bingeing and purging. Do you feel any more equipped to have a dialogue with your parents?”

  N
ot really. To be honest, I don’t think I’ll ever be equipped to have a dialogue with my parents.

  “Uh … yeah, I guess.”

  “Well, I’ll speak to your parents and try to set up a family meeting for tomorrow morning.”

  Tomorrow morning?! Why so soon? Can’t she give me more time to figure this all out? But maybe she figures she’d better get me to strike while the iron is hot or something, to get it over with before I have a chance to think about it too much and chicken out.

  My stomach churns and I want to purge more than ever. Okay. Think, Janie! Exercise. Talk. Write. As soon as group ends, I’m going to go beg Joe to take me to the gym.

  August 6th

  Steps one and two — Okay, I’ve been to the gym, beaten the punching bag to within an inch of its leather-bound life, and talked to Joe about how nervous I am about talking to my parents later and how just the thought of it makes me want to stick my fingers down my throat. Now it’s time for step three — writing.

  “What’s the worst that could happen?” Joe asked me when I’d worked up a sweat.

  “I don’t know. I guess that they wouldn’t believe me, or that they’d think I’m a slut or something and blame me for having sex with Matt in the first place.”

  “I’ll tell you something that works for me,” Joe said. “When I’m feeling anxious about a situation that could have multiple outcomes, I think of what the absolutely worst outcome could be — and I try to accept it. Once I do that, I’m not afraid of facing the situation anymore, because in my mind I’ve already made peace with the worst thing that could possibly happen.”

  So that’s what I’m trying to do here, before I meet with my parents and Dr. Pardy in half an hour. I’m trying to accept that my parents might well think I’m a slut and that it’s my fault. Or that they just won’t believe me at all, and they’ll think it’s all just something I made up so they aren’t as mad at me about Jenny’s wedding and the Xanax. But how do you go about accepting the possibility that your parents don’t believe you when you tell them that something awful happened? Or if when you finally get up the courage to tell them, they think the worse of you for doing so?