The story of: Marie Claire
Marie Claire first started feeling unhappy with her body in 8th grade. Four years after her mother died. Every night she would pound on her abdomen with her fists. She knew her belly growing was from puberty but she was still disgusted with it. So she decided to make it disappear. First she lost 5 pounds, then 10, then 15 and soon she became addicted to losing weight. Her mother never even told her she had cancer. Marie felt that everything was beginning to crumble in her life. She felt that she was losing everything she could count on. She was once a strong Catholic but she could no longer believe in God. She couldn't believe in her father. She even didn't believe in her own worth. But she couldn't completely stop believing in God. She decided she must be damned if her mother had been taken away. She decided she was flawed and cursed. Dieting became a way for her to impose an external value system on her flesh. She said, "If I could control myself enough to lose another pound, I was that much closer to good." She tried to purify her soul by transforming her body.
By October she was eating only 250 calories a day. She was amazed she had the energy to keep up with varsity soccer practice, let alone get out of bed in the morning. She was exhausted and freezing because of having no body fat. She was afraid people would start to notice so she did everything she could to make sure they didn't. She spent lunch hour in the library, changed for soccer in the bathroom instead of the locker room, wore extra layer under her school clothes and baggy clothes at home. Not that her doing this stopped her dad from noticing. They fought a lot and she almost always ended up balling. They fought mostly about news headlines like abortion and capital punishment. She realized that she was arguing to have control over her body, and by extension, her mind. She wanted to be free of the miserable house and the deadly gloom that had descended on it and her own depression. As she withered away her father began to beg her to eat. She finally felt she had the power she wanted over him and her body. She stopped caring what he though and focused instead on meeting her own standards of starvation.
By November she couldn't cover anything up. Her feet were so thin that her soccer cleats started cutting holes into her skin and around her ankles. It was so bad that she was hobbling. One day she could barely walk. Her coach called her over and said, "You look terrible out there- like a drunk with two broken feet," forcing a laugh, "What's going on?" When Marie got home there was a message for her father from her coach. She listened to it and deleted it right away. She collapsed the next morning when she tried to get up from her desk in spanish. Her father took her to a pediatrician who said she was so bony that she pinched a nerve by crossing her right leg over her left. He told them her left leg was paralyzed from the knee down but she could regain feeling if she gained some weight. On the way home her father cried in front of her for the first time since her mothers funeral. He told her a story from when he was little about his brothers death and how much it effected his family. He told her he wouldn't be able to live with it if he lost her too. Marie felt bad but she was also annoyed. She felt that he said it in a way that made it sound like her father suffering was significant because it made his life miserable not because of the pain she was in.
Her father took her to see Joseph Silverman, a New York City eating disorder specialist. "You're in terrible shape," he said, "I've seen a lot of bad patients but never anyone who's leg has gone out like yours." This made her happy. To her being the worst patient meant she was the best at losing and it meant she was tough and in control. "I'm sure you're happy to hear you're one of the worst cases. But keep it up and more important parts of your body will give out. Your kidneys. Your heart. And I don't have to tell you what happens to people who's hearts stop. This was the first time Marie had actually thought about death and the fact that what she is doing to herself could actually kill her. He asked her, "Do you want to get better?" She said, "I used to like what was happening to me, but now I'm scared I'll never be able to stop until... I do want to get better."
Marie was discharged after 4 months at the children's ward of Columbia Presbyterian. She weighed 100 pounds and her leg was a lot better. It was another 10 years before full feeling returned to her foot. She is still waiting for her emotional numbness to go away. She now realizes that her losing so much weight was a way to try to starve feelings. Feelings of depression, abandonment, and worthlessness. It was a way to train herself not to care about anyone else, so she could focus on the one and only thing she could control, the size of her body.
Now no close relationships are easy. It will be a long time before she feels "normal" again. Marie always worries that she is not attractive enough, smart enough or successful enough for someone to love her. But she finally feels thin enough.
By October she was eating only 250 calories a day. She was amazed she had the energy to keep up with varsity soccer practice, let alone get out of bed in the morning. She was exhausted and freezing because of having no body fat. She was afraid people would start to notice so she did everything she could to make sure they didn't. She spent lunch hour in the library, changed for soccer in the bathroom instead of the locker room, wore extra layer under her school clothes and baggy clothes at home. Not that her doing this stopped her dad from noticing. They fought a lot and she almost always ended up balling. They fought mostly about news headlines like abortion and capital punishment. She realized that she was arguing to have control over her body, and by extension, her mind. She wanted to be free of the miserable house and the deadly gloom that had descended on it and her own depression. As she withered away her father began to beg her to eat. She finally felt she had the power she wanted over him and her body. She stopped caring what he though and focused instead on meeting her own standards of starvation.
By November she couldn't cover anything up. Her feet were so thin that her soccer cleats started cutting holes into her skin and around her ankles. It was so bad that she was hobbling. One day she could barely walk. Her coach called her over and said, "You look terrible out there- like a drunk with two broken feet," forcing a laugh, "What's going on?" When Marie got home there was a message for her father from her coach. She listened to it and deleted it right away. She collapsed the next morning when she tried to get up from her desk in spanish. Her father took her to a pediatrician who said she was so bony that she pinched a nerve by crossing her right leg over her left. He told them her left leg was paralyzed from the knee down but she could regain feeling if she gained some weight. On the way home her father cried in front of her for the first time since her mothers funeral. He told her a story from when he was little about his brothers death and how much it effected his family. He told her he wouldn't be able to live with it if he lost her too. Marie felt bad but she was also annoyed. She felt that he said it in a way that made it sound like her father suffering was significant because it made his life miserable not because of the pain she was in.
Her father took her to see Joseph Silverman, a New York City eating disorder specialist. "You're in terrible shape," he said, "I've seen a lot of bad patients but never anyone who's leg has gone out like yours." This made her happy. To her being the worst patient meant she was the best at losing and it meant she was tough and in control. "I'm sure you're happy to hear you're one of the worst cases. But keep it up and more important parts of your body will give out. Your kidneys. Your heart. And I don't have to tell you what happens to people who's hearts stop. This was the first time Marie had actually thought about death and the fact that what she is doing to herself could actually kill her. He asked her, "Do you want to get better?" She said, "I used to like what was happening to me, but now I'm scared I'll never be able to stop until... I do want to get better."
Marie was discharged after 4 months at the children's ward of Columbia Presbyterian. She weighed 100 pounds and her leg was a lot better. It was another 10 years before full feeling returned to her foot. She is still waiting for her emotional numbness to go away. She now realizes that her losing so much weight was a way to try to starve feelings. Feelings of depression, abandonment, and worthlessness. It was a way to train herself not to care about anyone else, so she could focus on the one and only thing she could control, the size of her body.
Now no close relationships are easy. It will be a long time before she feels "normal" again. Marie always worries that she is not attractive enough, smart enough or successful enough for someone to love her. But she finally feels thin enough.