Triumphant
Journey:
A Cyberguide To Stop Overeating and
Recover from Eating Disorders
What follows is a synthesis of many overeaters' stories
to convey the nature of the secret-keeping strategy commonly used by people who
overeat and/or binge. This one is selected to show the complexity of what goes
into creating and maintaining an inner secret.
Four year old Mary sits cross legged on the gold-braided
living room rug looking up at the TV. Behind her on the big, brown couch sits
her father reading the newspaper. He grunts and shakes the paper.
She hears the sharp rustle and cringes, but stays seated
on the floor. He slams the paper down on the wooden coffee table. Her hands
tremble, and her heart pounds. She breathes short, fast gasps. She sits very
still, trying to become invisible.
He growls softly, deep in his throat. Her body stiffens
as she stares at the TV, focusing her eyes, ears, heart and soul on the screen.
She hears a thud as he jumps awkwardly to his feet. She keeps watching TV,
trying to get inside the set, the story, the figures on the screen.
He kicks the couch. She hears the wooden legs scrape
against the floor. Her body tight and unmoving, she tries to be as hard and
still as the floor. The colors on the TV screen seem to become more vivid to
her. She tries to pour her entire being into the screen, making the pictures
and sounds her whole world.
He roars at the walls. "Nothing gets done around
here. What kind of mess is this?" Mary's eyes glaze. Her heart beats
faster. Her mind is totally absorbed in a soap commercial. Her body attempts to
retreat into a numb calm. She ignores the pounding of her heart.
From the coffee table, her father picks up a small box of
crayons and throws it across the room. She breathes deeply and stares at the
Bugs Bunny cartoon now playing. She is oblivious to all but the cartoon. She
has achieved invisibility and nonexistence.
He bellows, "Nobody does a damn thing around
here!" and sweeps an end table with his hand, sending a lamp and ashtray
flying. She has lost awareness of her body, the floor, the room, sounds,
sights, smells. To Mary now, only Bugs Bunny exists. Her father lurches around
the room, mumbling unintelligibly. In the cartoon Bugs Bunny steals a carrot.
Mary laughs.
Her father whirls at her. "What's so funny, you lazy
good-for-nothing brat, making a mess everywhere and laughing at me!" She
looks up, dazed. She doesn't know what he is talking about. She is so removed
she doesn't know who or what he is.
"Answer me, you worthless, no-good!"
He picks her up and throws her across the room. She
crashes into the wall. She may feel terror and pain. She may cry out, "No,
Daddy, please," or, "I'll be good," or "I didn't do
anything," or "I'm sorry."
She may say and feel nothing. She may remain dazed and
feel body pain later. She may not remember this happened. She may remember the
events but not the feelings. She may remember body and emotional feelings, but
not the event. Lack of memory or partial memory shields her from the
unendurable knowledge that she lives with a dangerous person. This person can
explode at any time, frighten her, hurt her for no understandable reason, and
she can do nothing to stop him or protect herself.
All she can do is blank her felt existence out of
existence. For a while, Mary does not exist to herself.
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