Chapter Nine

A Chapter by animamundix3

I realized that the worst that could happen was a few meals that would make me gain weight, so I took Tyler’s advice and drank half of my Ensure at breakfast the next day.

“I’m really proud of you.” he said, smiling and looking at me with puppy dog eyes.

We got out of breakfast that morning and Tyler went up to a girl, grabbing a container of beads and string.

“This is Hailey.” Tyler said, and I waved at her.

“Hey, I’m Ali.” she said, taking the box from Tyler and looking through the beads. “Want to make bracelets with us?” She held out a string to me. I took it nodding my head. “What are your favorite colors Hailey?”

“Uh, probably blue and green. I like yellow too.”

“Okay.” she said smiling at me, and I saw her digging through the box, picking out the blues, greens and yellows.

An hour later, she told me to hold out my wrist and she tied a tight knot. “It’s your recovery bracelet.” she said, giggling. I put the bracelet I made around her wrist and tied it tight. “And this’ll be mine.”

“Now we just gotta get there.”

Tyler gave each of us bracelets, mine yellow, white and pink, Ali’s purple and pink. We hugged him, but a nurse named Lucy yelled at us.

“P.C.” Tyler said, smirking.

“What’s P.C.?”

“Personal contact.” he said, laughing. “We basically can’t touch each other.”

“Really, what are we going to do to each other? God forbid we actually like each other.” Ali said, rolling her eyes.

Tyler just hugged us harder until Lucy came over and threatened to put us on a watch or something like that, but none of us could stop laughing. It was weird that even though it was hard being there so far from home trying to face everything I had run from, I was still laughing.

I got my first phone call that day from Josh.

“Hey, how are you doing?”

“I’m…I’m okay I guess. It’s hard here.”

“I know. You’ll be okay though. I’m just glad you’re okay.”

“Look I don’t want to talk about this…It’s hard enough being here, you know?”

“I know. I just wanted to tell you that your mom and I are going to come up and visit tomorrow. I wanted to know if you wanted Casey to come along or not.”

“I feel like she’s mad at me Josh…I feel like you’re the only one that I didn’t make hate me.”

“She doesn’t hate you, she was worried. She just wants you to be okay.”

“I am okay.” I said. Before he could say anything, I heard Lucy calling us to the dining room to eat lunch. “Hey, I’ve gotta go, I’ll see you tomorrow, right?”

“Right. I’ll see you then.” he said, and as I was about to hang up, he said, “Hey, and Hailey?”

“Yeah?”

“Please, just try at lunch, okay?”

“I will.”

I tried. I looked up at Tyler after staring at my Ensure for a few minutes and he nodded at me, taking a bite of his chicken. I took a breath and took a sip. Sip by sip, I finished almost the whole thing.

“Ask Lucy for more time, you can do this.”

Lucy overheard and smiled at me. She told me I could take an extra ten minutes, and Tyler and Ali both sat with me after showing Lucy that they had finished. I felt my eyes welling up with tears as I swallowed the last drop. My stomach felt like it was going to blow up. Tyler grabbed my hand and squeezed it.

“I’m proud of you.” Tyler said, and Ali nodded at me, both of them smiling.

“I’m not.” I said, walking up to Lucy showing her that I had finished. She smiled at me and wrote down that I had finished. “I just hope they take me off of this stupid thing if I eat what they give me.” I said, grabbing my pole and dragging it along with me.

When we walked out of the dining room, we saw that everyone was together in the T.V. room for the “post-meal group.” It was basically where we talked about how we felt about what we had, if we were okay. I sat down and everyone looked over at me.

“How was your lunch, Hailey?” a nurse named Jennifer asked me.

“I finished.” I said, looking down at the ground. I felt like I had gained ten pounds in the hour it took me to finish the Ensure.

“That’s the first time you’ve finished before, right?” she asked, and I nodded. “I’m proud of you.” she said, smiling and some of the patients nodded. Tyler took my hand and squeezed it. “How do you feel about it? Are you okay?”

“Not really.” I said quietly. “I don’t want this.”

“Ed doesn’t want this, Hailey does.” Jessica said.

I didn’t bother trying to respond or figure out what she was talking about, but later on at a group with our therapist, I figured out what she meant.

“Today we’re going to talk about separation of you from Ed.” Ellie said.

Before I could ask what it meant, a girl named Christina said, “What the hell does that mean?”

“It means that the eating disorder, or Ed, is part of you, not who you are. There is a separation that we all just need to learn to see.” she said patiently. “You probably don’t even think about the hateful things you think or say about yourself, they just come out automatically.”

A couple of the patients nodded, including me. Later that day, as I drank my Ensure for dinner, I caught myself thinking horrible things about myself. I didn’t think about it, it was automatic for me. All of a sudden, I started to cry. I felt like everything that had made me feel so safe and in control before had turned out to be nothing I thought it would be, yet I still didn’t want to let it go. I didn’t care that it controlled me, because, even though I didn’t understand why it mattered, it kept me thin, and that’s what I so desperately tried to be.

I didn’t sleep at all that night. I was tossing and turning uncomfortably, thinking about why this mattered so much to me. I couldn’t come up with an answer. I didn’t understand why it mattered so much. I cried through the night, the feeding tube hurt my throat and I couldn’t stop thinking. A nurse came in and asked if I was okay, and I told her I was fine, wiping my eyes pretending I was okay.

“I’m fine.” I lied. Same old story.

I woke up the next morning dreading seeing Josh when he came to visit. I didn’t want him to see me like this, tubes up my nose, my eyes red from crying. I was convinced I had gained weight too. He couldn’t see me that way. I looked like a wreck. It seemed like every day I woke up more depressed, dreading the day to come more than I had the day before.

I got weighed that morning, the nurse still recording sixty-three pounds next to my name before telling me I could shower. I drank my Ensure for breakfast in hopes of having the feeding tubes taken out before Josh and my mom visited me. I was out of luck when they called me in, I thought they were going to take them out, but it was just time for therapy.

When I walked into the room, I saw a big couch in front of me, and when I looked to the left I saw Ellie sitting in a big swivel chair.

“Hi, Hailey. Sit down, honey.” I sat down on the couch. “How are you today?”

“I’m fine.” I lied.

“I hear that a lot. What’s really going on? You know there’s confidentiality in here. You can talk to me about anything.”

“Right.” I said, looking down at the floor.

“How about we do this: I want you to make a pro and con list of the eating disorder. Do you have a journal?”

“Yes.”

“Can you get it? I’d like to talk about your list as you make it.”

“Okay.” I said, and I got up to go to my room. I dug through drawers and the closet until I saw the thin green ribbon that held it closed and I leaned down, my throat hurt as the tubes were tugged, and I picked it up.While I walked back to the room, I untied to ribbon and an envelope fell out. I saw Josh’s neat handwriting on the front of the envelope and I knew it was the letter that he had written to me. I tucked it behind the last page and closed the diary as I walked into the office again. “I got it.”

“Okay, so I want to make a list of the good things and the bad things about your eating disorder.” she said, handing me a blue pen. “Let’s start with the good.”

“I lose weight.” I said, almost automatically.

“Okay, write that in the pros column. Anything else?”

“It makes me feel good. I get like, a high from it almost. I don’t feel anything.”

“What are you trying to numb yourself for?”

“I don’t know…” I lied.

“There has to be something. Think.”

“I don’t know, there have just been a lot of things that happened.”

“Like what?”

“My friend died.” I said, and for a second, she seemed shocked, like it wasn’t what she had been expecting.

“I’m so sorry, Hailey. What happened?”

“She died from complications because she was… Well, she was anorexic.”

“Don’t you think she would want you to get better?”

“She didn’t want to get better.” I said, and I felt like I was going to cry. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

“Okay, let’s get back to your list.”

I told her that being skinny would make people like me. She disagreed, but told me to put it on my list. Once we got to the negatives of the eating disorder, I was stuck.

“I can’t think of any.” I said, doodling on the page.

“There has to be something. Health problems, losing friends, dying? Any of those hit home for you?”

“I don’t have health problems.” I said. She nudged her foot against the pole for the feeding tubes. “I don’t need this.” I said trying to defend myself. “I don’t.” I said as she raised her eyebrows at me. The little timer on her desk rung and I got up to leave.

“Wait, I want you to try to think of the bad things about the disorder. Be realistic, okay?”

“Okay.” I said, and I walked out of the door, dragging my feeding tubes behind me.

I thought about the “cons” of my eating disorder the rest of the day. I brought it up to Tyler when I realized I wasn’t getting anywhere.

“You need to figure it out yourself.” he said, then walked away.

I got frustrated and gave up slamming the journal shut and the envelope fell out again. I had forgotten about it since the session with Ellie. I slipped my finger under the flap, opened the envelope and carefully pulled out the letter. It was long so I got comfortable in my chair and tried to drown out everything around me. I took a breath and read the letter:

“Hailey,

I don’t want you to be angry with me, but I just need you to know that I’m worried. I’ve been worried since Annie passed away, everyone has been worried…you haven’t been the same. I understand it’s hard, I really do, but I see what you’re doing to yourself and it kills me. You look like you’re losing weight by the minute, like you’re disappearing. I regret not telling you this before now, but…I’m in love with you Hailey. I can’t lose you, and I’m sorry that it has to come to this but…I think you need to tell someone. If you don’t tell someone soon, I will. You’ve seen what anorexia does to people. Anorexia is what took your best friend away, and I’m not going to lose you, even though I feel like I’ve already lost you. You always told me everything, and I’ve known you’re hiding something. You never a liar but something changed in you. You’ve lied to me so many times since all of this started, and I hate it. If you don’t get help I can’t watch you destroy yourself. I just can’t. I need you to decide, Hailey. I would never want to give you an ultimatum but maybe this will make you realize what all of this has done for your life. You’re too skinny, you always tired, you look sick, you’re losing friends…Don’t you see that it’s destroying everything in your life?

I hate seeing you destroy yourself like this. It’s a horrible thing to have gone through, but you need to accept what happened and move on with your life. I don’t want to preach to you. I’ve been there. I’ve been depressed, but eventually you need to get on with your life and actually live. What you’re doing is slow suicide, and that’s the last thing that I or any of the people who love you would ever want. You’re my first love, and I don’t want my chance of being with you to be taken away from me because you hate yourself enough to kill yourself like this…If you saw the beauty that I see in you, Hailey…I want you to see it. I need you to see it. Life doesn’t stop and wait for you to get yourself together. You can let it pass you by and waste years dwelling or live your life. By the time you decide to, it could be too late. Your body can only take so much before it gives up.

I want to be with you more than anything, but even if you want to be with me, I can’t until you’re better. I love you Hailey and I just want to see you happy and healthy…right now, though, you’re dying. Please. I love you. Know that I’m always here for you, and I always will be as long as you let me.

Love always,

Josh.”

“Hailey?” I looked up and saw Tyler looking down at me. I realized I was crying. “What the matter?”

“I just…I read a letter from a friend. He said some things I just didn’t expect…”

“Well, come on, we’ll talk about it during lunch, okay?” he said, holding out his hand to me. I took it and he put his arm around my shoulder as we walked to the dining room.

I told him everything, swirling my Ensure around in the cup. He smiled as he ate his lunch, telling me that all of this should be a good thing.

“But I can’t do this.”

“One meal at a time.”

I took a sip of my Ensure, and Ali said she was proud of me. I finished the Ensure and smiled. I decided right then and there that if I couldn’t do it for myself, I would do it for him.

When visiting hours started an hour later, I watched as the patients’ families came in. I kept looking at the door and after a few minutes, I saw Josh walk in the door.

“Hey. Your mom was afraid to come in…She told me I could be with you for a bit, then she’ll come in a little later.” he said, and I nodded. I saw him keep looking at the tubes, then down at the floor. I took his hand and pulled him to the room in the back of the Eating Disorder unit. Only Jane and her family were in the room, so we sat on the opposite side and he looked at me for a minute. He looked like he was going to cry.

“So, how have you been doing?” he asked, looking down at the ground.

“I’ve been…doing better.” I said, and he looked pointedly at the feeding tubes. “I really have. I’ve been drinking those Ensure things they’re giving me. I just want these things out of me.”

“Good. Casey wanted me to tell you that that guy John asked her out. Who the hell is John?” he said, crossing his legs in the chair making himself comfortable. I was glad he dropped the subject, and I smiled. “She told me absolutely nothing, but expected me to tell you when I didn’t understand it.”

“Okay, so once when we were at the diner…”

Josh and I talked for almost two hours, but none of it had to do with the eating disorder. I was glad to finally have a release from that constant push they were always giving me to recover. It was like things were back to normal for those couple of hours. My mom came in the last ten minutes of the visiting hours. She hugged me with tears in her eyes and then left to give Josh and me a few more minutes. I felt horrible for making her such a wreck.

“So, I’ll come visit either tomorrow or Sunday, okay?”

“Okay.” I said, and I looked down at the floor for a second. When I looked back up he was looking me straight in the eye and I leaned forward and kissed him. I was on my tip toes and the tubes were being tugged, but I didn’t care. All I knew was that right in that moment I had decided that I knew what I needed to do. I would get better for him, for us, and I knew eventually it would be for me too.

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