“I have done it again.
One year in every ten
I manage it—–
A sort of walking miracle, my skin
Bright as a Nazi lampshade,
My right foot
A paperweight,
My featureless, fine
Jew linen.
Peel off the napkin
O my enemy.
Do I terrify?——-”
Sylvia Plath, extract from Lady Lazarus
Sylvia Plath scares me.
I could hear my eating disorder in her voice.
I could feel the anorexia in the taunts and the mockery; in the red hot anger and the reckless self-destruction.
When I first got ill, this was what it was like.
Anorexia feeds off and fuels anger. It is like living in a perpetual state of rage. It takes the anger that you’ve got; then, when that’s exhausted, it will provoke you into getting angry– and then move onto the next supply -
Plath says it better than I ever could:
“Dying
Is an art, like everything else.
I do it exceptionally well.
I do it so it feels like hell.
I do it so it feels real.
I guess you could say I’ve a call.
It’s easy enough to do it in a cell.
It’s easy enough to do it and stay put.
It’s the theatrical
Comeback in broad day
To the same place, the same face, the same brute
Amused shout:
‘A miracle!’
That knocks me out.
There is a charge
For the eyeing my scars, there is a charge
For the hearing of my heart—
It really goes.
And there is a charge, a very large charge
For a word or a touch
Or a bit of blood
Or a piece of my hair on my clothes.
So, so, Herr Doktor.
So, Herr Enemy.
I am your opus,
I am your valuable,
The pure gold baby
That melts to a shriek.
I turn and burn.
Do not think I underestimate your great concern.
Ash, ash—
You poke and stir.
Flesh, bone, there is nothing there—-”
Sylvia Plath, extract from Lady Lazarus
Suicide and holocaust allusions aside, Plath’s tone is bang on.
Anorexia made me savage and cruel. It wanted me to self destruct – spectacularly. It goaded me to scratch and scream at those trying to help me.
It’s okay to be angry, it’s human to rage and hurt –
- but there are better ways of doing it and dealing with it that break the cycle.
An eating disorder keeps the anger going – but never addresses it; recovery meets it head on – and let you sort it out.
Tags: Living With an Eating Disorder, poetry and prose
