Читать книгу MY BODY, MY ENEMY: My 13 year battle with anorexia nervosa - Claire Beeken - Страница 11

‘Don’t bloody start that lark again,’ says Mum. ‘You’re going to sit down and you’re going to eat that.’ ‘I don’t want it! I can’t,’ I protest. ‘How do you think we feel? Lisa’s so ill, and here you are making yourself ill,’ says Dad. Desperate to get me to eat, my parents try various tactics. Making me feel guilty is one; issuing ultimatums is another. ‘You’re not going out, my girl, until you eat something,’ Mum says one evening. I go to the cupboard, get out a slice of Nimble, and ram it in my mouth. ‘There, I’ve eaten,’ I say and flounce out. ‘My God,’ gasps Mum, ‘you ate that like an animal!’

Every meal is a battle-ground, and I have honed my defence strategy. If it’s shepherd’s pie I eat some; then skim off the layer of mashed potato, hide my greens underneath and flatten down the mash so nobody realizes what lies below. Other bits of dinner go under my knife and fork. My most powerful allies are Drummer and our new Alsatian Sheba, who lie beneath the table – their mouths ever-open – waiting to devour the enemy.

‘You’re going to kill yourself,’ Mum and Dad keep saying. But I am trying to live: being light and empty is my way of living with myself, of surviving. Granddad hasn’t touched me since the day I stopped him, but I still hate my body. I can’t help thinking that if I could just rid myself of my dirty, disgusting carcass and float round the world, perhaps I’d be truly happy.

Each day I monitor my disappearance. Mum has banished the scales, so I go to work early and jump on those in the medical room before anyone else arrives. At every opportunity I sneak back in to weigh myself, and each night in the bathroom I run my body through a series of checks. We don’t have a full-length mirror at home, just a half mirror above the toilet. If I stand in the bath and twist round I can watch my fingers count down my ribs in the reflection. Then I get out of the bath and stand on the toilet to inspect my bottom half. I have to be able to put my hands round my waist till they almost join. ‘You’re still too big though,’ says the little voice, ‘you still take up too much space.’

‘Can I talk to you, Michael?’ I say to my brother one night, after a bad day at work. I am cold and in almost constant pain from the laxatives, which frightens me. ‘Mum and Dad are having a go at me about my eating again,’ I say. ‘Well, you’re stupid,’ he says matter-of-factly. ‘But I’m scared of eating because I’m scared of getting big,’ I say, starting to cry. ‘And I’m taking laxatives,’ I snivel. It is the first time I’ve admitted this to a member of my family and I don’t really know why I choose Michael – he doesn’t have a clue what laxatives are. ‘They, er, make you go to the loo,’ I explain hesitantly. ‘Why are you taking them?’ he asks incredulously. ‘I feel lighter after taking them,’ I mumble, ‘but I’m scared because I’m in so much pain.’ He looks horrified. ‘I’ll tell Dad,’ he says, getting up to do so. ‘No, don’t tell Dad,’ I say. ‘I’ll tell Mum then,’ he insists. ‘Don’t tell either of them,’ I beg. But he does.

Mum and Dad go through the roof. I just want my family to understand me, but they are frightened by what’s happening to me, and fear makes them lash out. ‘What are you trying to do – kill yourself and kill us with you?’ yells Mum at the top of her voice. And Dad hits me across the face, hard. I go into hysterics, screaming so much that I can hardly breathe. I grab my handbag and run from the house. My brother tears down the street after me, but I am running so fast I give him the slip. Mum and Dad jump into the car and start to scour the streets.

I get as far as The Favourite pub and ring the McCanns. ‘It’s Claire. Please help me, please!’ I yell into the telephone. ‘Just tell me where you are, and we’ll come and get you,’ says Matt who’s picked up the phone. Ten minutes later I see Claire and her dad draw up outside the pub. As I come out of the building, Mum and Dad pull up as well. I run to my friend who bundles me into the back of her dad’s car. ‘You’re coming home with us,’ says Matt, getting out of the car to speak to my parents.

‘Come on, Claire,’ says Mum, peering at me through the car window. ‘You’re showing us up. Come home with us now.’ I bury my face in my friend’s shoulder. ‘What shall I do?’ ‘Stay. Stay with us,’ she whispers. But I’m scared to: I know my parents won’t like it. Matt’s saying to them, ‘There is no point taking her home and having a go at her. Your daughter is not well.’ ‘We just don’t know what to do,’ says Mum, starting to cry. I say goodbye to Claire and get out of the car. ‘Your daughter needs help; you’ve got to see she needs help,’ I hear Matt saying as I climb slowly into Mum and Dad’s car.

Too shocked to speak, we drive home in silence, and troop into the front room. Dad sits on the organ stool, looking beaten. Mum flops on the settee, her eyes fixing on her treasured photograph collection of pet Alsatians past and present. I curl up in an armchair in the corner and look at my lap. ‘I am so sorry,’ I say eventually, starting to cry. ‘I don’t want to hurt you.’ ‘We’ve got to get you sorted out,’ says Mum softly. ‘I’ll make an appointment for you to see the doctor.’

‘What can I do for you, Claire?’ says Dr O’Donnell, looking at me over his half-spectacles. ‘I’m having bad period pains,’ I lie. ‘Can I have some Ponstan Forte?’ Period pain? I’m not even having periods! ‘Of course,’ he says, writing out the prescription and handing it to me. ‘Thank you,’ I say, picking up my handbag. ‘Is there anything else, Claire?’ he asks. ‘No,’ I reply, starting for the door.

‘Can you step on the scales for me, please?’ he says, casual as you like. I freeze. ‘Why?’ I ask. ‘I just want to have a quick check on your weight,’ he replies. ‘No,’ I say, panicking. ‘Why not?’ he says. ‘I can’t,’ I reply, fear creeping into my voice. ‘You look very thin to me, Claire,’ he says. It suddenly dawns on me that Mum must have been to see him. ‘Well, looks are deceiving!’ I retort angrily. ‘I’m about 8½ stone – that’s how much I am!’ ‘Well, let’s just check, shall we?’ he says, patiently. The floodgates open – ‘I can’t, I can’t!’ I weep. He walks round the desk, guides me back to the chair and pushes a box of tissues towards me. Then, after I’ve dried my tears, he says softly, ‘I need you to get on the scales.’ So I do, and I weigh just under 7 stone.

‘For your height you should be anything from a minimum of 8 stone 11 to a maximum of 10 stone 12,’ he says, consulting the Body Mass Index. He points to a red bit on a chart. ‘Your weight is right down here in the danger zone.’ Then he takes my pulse. ‘You are emaciated and your pulse is too low,’ he says, making notes in my file.

‘Have you heard of anorexia nervosa, Claire?’ he asks, putting his pen down and eyeing me over his glasses. ‘Yeah,’ I reply sullenly. ‘That’s what you’ve got,’ he says. But I don’t believe him. ‘No I haven’t,’ I insist. ‘What makes you say that, Claire?’ he asks. ‘Those people are really thin,’ I say.

‘Right,’ says Dr O’Donnell finally, ‘I’d like to see you every week and I am also going to refer you to the hospital, to someone who is experienced in these matters.’ Hospital! ‘Will I have to go to hospital?’ I ask, mortified. ‘You might have to,’ he says gently.

‘You shouldn’t have told them,’ says the bullying voice in my head. ‘That was weak, and now they’re going to make you extremely fat.’ An army of people are joining forces against me and I have to do something.

I tell Mum that I’m not going to take laxatives any more; but I lie and bury them under my bedroom carpet. I start to eat more regularly. For breakfast, I have a slice of Nimble toasted with the lowest of low-fat spreads. Dinner is a bowl of Weight Watchers minestrone soup. In the evening I have a roll with a wafer of cheese melted in the middle. It is a starvation diet; but I get away with it, because Mum and Dad know nothing about calories. They are just relieved to see me eat.

I am scared. I want to stop taking the laxatives which make me feel so ill, and I don’t want to end up in hospital. In a rash moment I give all my laxatives to Claire McCann. She puts them in her locker, and the instant she shuts the door I regret it.

I spin a story to Shirley, a girl at work, and she promises to get me some laxatives when she goes out at lunch-time. On her way back Shirley bumps into Claire and hands her the tablets to give to me. Claire goes ballistic. ‘Keep ’em, keep ’em!’ she shouts, taking all the laxatives from her locker and throwing them at me. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry!’ I plead, scrabbling around the floor to gather up the packets and thinking, ‘I’ve pushed her too far.’ ‘I can’t deal with this any more!’ she yells at me. ‘Please don’t stop being my friend,’ I cry. ‘I won’t,’ she says, calming down, ‘but I can’t cope any more.’ ‘Listen,’ I say, ‘I’ll have a sandwich’ – anything to pacify her. So we go up to the canteen and I eat a sandwich. Afterwards I go to the toilet. I am so intent on getting rid of the food that I don’t notice that my friend has followed and can hear me throwing up.

In desperation, Claire McCann rings her GP. She gets talking to the doctor’s receptionist, who says that her daughter Lesley is anorexic and has been for years. She wonders if Claire and I would like to come to her house the following night to meet Lesley.

‘So you hide yourself in baggy clothes,’ says Lesley, eyeing me up and down. ‘I always dress like this,’ I protest weakly, feeling awkward. Lesley is quite a bit older than me, and has short brown hair and massive eyes. Her top half is very thin but her legs are quite muscular because she exercises so much. ‘You won’t have any friends – I don’t,’ she says. ‘They stick you in hospital where you won’t be allowed visitors; you’ll be made to stay in bed and they won’t let you wash your hair. But,’ she adds, ‘your hair will fall out anyway.’ It sounds barbaric. ‘You’ll lose everything,’ she continues, ‘so, stop! Stop it now while you still can.’ But I don’t know how.

I start going to Lesley’s house on Sunday afternoons: Mum would stop me if she knew Lesley was anorexic, but she just thinks Lesley’s a friend of Claire McCann’s. When Lesley picks me up in her Mini, she’s usually wearing a duffle coat to keep out the cold and her little nose is always red. Lesley is a hardened anorexic, but she does allow herself proper meals after she’s been to aerobics: I am subsisting on fewer than 250 calories a day.

‘Get in the car, skinny,’ says Lesley, eyeing my stick-like legs beneath my black skirt. I am feeling cold and ill. My eyes have started to sink in their sockets and Mum and Dad are in despair. Up in Lesley’s room I huddle against the radiator. She’s been given a box of Quality Street. ‘I like the fudge diamonds,’ I say. ‘Would you like one?’ she says, rooting for the distinctive pink wrapper. ‘I can’t,’ I say, as she fishes out the sweet and holds it out to me. I want it, but can’t bring myself to take it. I am fat, dirty and disgusting and don’t deserve anything nice. ‘Go on,’ says Lesley. ‘I can’t,’ I insist. Lesley keeps on at me so, to shut her up, I say that I’ll eat the sweet next Sunday. Lesley carefully sets the fudge diamond aside; and I spend the entire week fretting about it.

‘God, you look awful!’ exclaims Lesley, the following Sunday. We go straight up to her room and I take up my post against the radiator. Lesley hands me the fudge diamond and picks a sweet out for herself. ‘Okay,’ she says, ‘I’m going to have this one – you have the fudge diamond.’ The radiator burns into my back, but I am so cold I don’t feel it. ‘I can’t,’ I cry, tears streaming down my face. ‘Okay,’ she says, taking the sweet from my hand and opening it up, ‘I’ll get a knife and cut it in half.’ She gives me half, but I am too frightened to put it in my mouth – once I start eating I mightn’t be able to stop. Lesley cuts the half in quarters, but I sob and shake my head. Eventually, Lesley coaxes me into eating a bit smaller than the top of my fingernail. I feel so bad that when I get home, I have to take more laxatives.