Role Models

I have been reading Crystal Renn's book, Hungry and I am in love with it.  Aside from my unhealthy penchant for books about eating disorders, I'm beginning to enjoy the end of the book in which she gets better.  I haven't finished it yet, but Renn makes a multitude of excellent points about the stigma surrounding the modelling industry, the facts and myths of eating disorders, and ties it all together with her clever sense of humor and heart wrenching stories of her personal experiences with the disease.

I have also read Unbearable Lightness by Portia De Rossi and Wasted by Marya Hornbacher.  Reading Unbearable Lightness made me feel level with Portia.  Her descriptions of the painfully embarrassing moments that take place in everyday life make her seem friendly and real, and I felt a connection with her because of her open & honest writing about her eating disorder. 

Marya's book is terrifying, yet fascinating.  The thrilling plot aside, she is a brilliant writer!  You can tell by her style of writing and beautiful language that she is wildly intelligent, but she also uses a fluid, tumbling stream of manic thoughts going through her head during her narrative. 
I love books, don't you? :)

Next on the reading list... Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson, The Best Little Girl in the World by Steven Levenkron, Wasted by Marya Hornbacher, and Unbearable Lightness by Portia de Rossi. I've read them all before, but they're so good!  I'm on an anorexia kick, I guess.

My Favorite Quotes:

"Dead girl walking,” the boys say in the halls.
“Tell us your secrets,” the girls whisper, one toilet to another.
I am that girl.
I am the space between my thighs, daylight shining through.
I am the bones they want, wired on a porcelain frame.
-Wintergirls, Laurie Halse Anderson

“I wanted to kill the me underneath. That fact haunted my days and nights. When you realize you hate yourself so much, when you realize that you cannot stand who you are, and this deep spite has been the motivation behind your behavior for many years, your brain can’t quite deal with it. It will try very hard to avoid that realization; it will try, in a last-ditch effort to keep your remaining parts alive, to remake the rest of you. This is, I believe, different from the suicidal wish of those who are in so much pain that death feels like relief, different from the suicide I would later attempt, trying to escape that pain. This is a wish to murder yourself; the connotation of kill is too mild. This is a belief that you deserve slow torture, violent death.”
-Wasted, Marya Hornbacher

Lora and I started fighting over nothing.  Well, not really over nothing.  I was taking my shirt off, my back to her. 
“Max, let me see your back.”  Her voice was sharp.  I had stopped changing in front of her.  I had slipped.  “What?  No.”  I pulled my pajama tops on and went into the bathroom, locking the door. 
“Max!”  She banged on the door.  “What the fuck is up with your back?” 
“What are you talking about?” My hands ran their panicked course over the bones of my back, my collarbones, my wrists, my knees.
“Max, you aren’t eating!  Come out here!”  I came out and stood in front of the mirror, brushing my hair.  It fell to the floor in thin dark clouds.  She stood at her desk, banging things. 
“You know, Max, this is, like, bullshit.”  I didn’t say anything.  I looked at myself sideways in the mirror.  I was thinner, but not thin enough yet. 
“I mean, like, you could talk to someone about this, or something.”  I got into bed and vigorously cracked open a book. 
“MAX,” she screamed.  I looked up, waiting. 
“Fuck you,” she said.  “I mean, about this.  Just fuck you.”  She slammed out of the room. 

-Wasted, Marya Hornbacher

"Fat and Skinny had a race
All around the pillow-case
Fat fell down and broke her face
Skinny said, ha-ha, I won the race!"
-The Best Little Girl in the World, Steven Levenkron

"It's 4:15am.  It's time for my morning workout.  I have exactly one hour to run and do sit-ups and leg lifts before I get in the car to drive forty-five minutes to the set for my 6:00am makeup call...As I slip out of bed and do deep lunges across the floor to the bathroom, I promise myself to cut my calorie intake in half to 150 for the day and take twenty laxatives...But i's not the weight gain from the six ounces of yogurt that worries me.  It'sthe loss of self-control."

-Unbearable Lightness, Portia de Rossi

I NEED BRITNEY BACK, DAMMIT!

Sapphire - Therapist = very bad

Peaceful moments

The front doors are bathed in sunlight if the weather allows.  Between the pillars that support the awning are wooden benches.  Walk inside… to your left is Fellowship Hall where church meals, meetings, and events take place.  To the right is the sanctuary.  The sanctuary is big and blue.  The carpeting is blue and the wall behind the altar is blue.  The side walls are white and set with colorful stained glass windows.  The light-colored wooden pews have maroon cushions on them.  The vaulted ceiling is made of the same light wood.  On the altar is a projection screen where they show the lyrics to our songs, our prayers, and announcements for the congregation.  Dead center on the wall behind the altar is a depiction of God wrought in brass.  God has his/her/its hands outstretched and a halo around his/her/its head.  There are no facial features, or clues to any gender or race.  In front of that is a podium where from which our two pastors preach (though they rarely remain stationary behind the podium) and a table from which communion is served.  On the right side of the altar, set back from the rest of the main floor is a raised floor where the choir sits between songs.  In front of this space are the mics, the drums, the piano, and the organ for making music during worship.  I like the sanctuary best after service when the lights are off and sunlight streams down through the windows.  I have many fond memories of sitting alone in the sanctuary or sitting there with just one person for company – usually my youth pastor.  I became a member of Peace in the sanctuary, my youth pastor blessed my prayer shawl in the sanctuary, and I have spent a lot of time in the sanctuary crying, praying, and meditating. 
 

My youth pastor blessed my prayer shawl for me.  We went into the Sanctuary.  It was just the two of us and we sat in a back corner that was full of sunlight streaming down through the tall, stained-glass windows.  She and I sat cross-legged with the shawl between us.  She arranged the shawl in a circle with a plastic, batter-powered tea light in the middle.  We both put our hands on it and I sank my fingers into the soft, purple yarn.  I could feel the sunlight on my shoulders.  She said the prayer:

May god's grace be upon this shawl...

warming, comforting, enfolding and embracing.

May this mantle be a safe haven...

a sacred place of security and well being...

sustaining and embracing in good times,

as well as difficult ones.

May the one who recieves this shawl be cradled in hope, kept in joy,

graced with peace,

and wrapped in love.  Amen. 

I thanked her; she gave me the prayer sheet and asked me to blow out the candle.  I chuckled nad pushed the button on the bottom of the plastic candle. 
 

She gave me a big hug.  It all felt very special and holy in the quiet, beautiful, sun-filled sanctuary.  I want to remember it. 
 

There was another moment I want to remember from Peace church.  It was on Good Friday, during the end of lent.  After the service was over, I stayed in the sanctuary to meditate, pray, and find some comfort and rest.  Both pastors were praying with those who stayed in the Sanctuary.  It was peaceful in the dark but I also had veelings of fear of the future and sadness about Jesus' death threatening to overwhelm me. My youth pastor came to sit by me.  We leaned together and she wrapped her arms around me.  I closed my eyes and tried to let all my worries melt away for a little while.  squeezed my shoulder and said, "God, be with sapphire always."
 

I felt so loved and treasured in that moment.
 

"Always."
 

God is and will be with me always.  My youth pastor helped me to realize and believe this.
 

That prayer was one of the few, breif, and far between moments in which I felt happiness, beauty, and comfort.  I need to hold on to these precious memories and reflect on them during hard times. 

The sanctuary is my favorite part of the church.  On the floors above and below the main sanctuary are classrooms and rooms for meetings.  I am more familiar with the lower floor.  There is the Iglesias sanctuary on the left for the Spanish services that take place on Sunday afternoons; to the right are Pastor Paul and Pastor Kayla’s offices.  Down from that are high school, middle school, and preschool classrooms, as well as bathrooms, and a small theater.  I go to faith formation in the high school room.  When you first walk into the high school room, there is a ping pong table that is occasionally cluttered with art supplies, bibles, and other things.  There is also a foosball table.  Five couches are arranged in a circle.  There is an area carpet in the middle with dark, muted squares of color.  A table stands on the carpet with candles on it, a box of markers, pens, and pencils, and a stack of paper.  There is a large television that looks as though it’s been around since the invention of the flat screen TV.  Back to Fellowship hall – carpet of questionable color (it’s got a little bit of everything in it) tan walls, high ceiling.  There are a few long rectangular tables on one side, and lots of round tables surrounded by folding chairs.  There is a podium that I have never seen being used that has a sound board on it.  The kitchen is right next to the main room and has a large window/counter for serving food.  The church is fairly large.  There is one main level with the sanctuary, church office, Fellowship hall, and Peace room.  The other side of the church is split into three levels with classrooms, meeting rooms, and a couple more offices.  Peace is the one place where I am able to let go of everything troubling me and just be happy.  It is the one place in my life where I am fully accepted for exactly who I am and loved without reservation.  This church saved me from a lot of grief I’d been getting from the Catholic church I attended my whole life up until a year ago.  Peace UCC teaches me about a God that loves everyone, not just a select few people; a God who is more like a parent than anything.  I love the people who go to my church with me. 

*Flips the bird*

Although this is probably not the case, it begins to feel a bit more personal when she says she doesn't have time for one-on-one, and yet there is T.  Just her and T. Havin' a little one-on-one time. Yesterday she said she would come get me in half an hour so we could talk, but she never showed up, and then made out like I should have known all along she wouldn't come.  Well actually, miss, I usually expect people to show up when they say they will unless they tell me ahead of time that they are unable to come. 

I'm sitting around crying all day because I'm facing more anxiety, depression, anger, and hopelessness than I can deal with alone, but se tells me she has no time for me.  Why not? She clearly has time for the others.  That's what makes it feel like she's avoiding me or personally attacking me, because she's with other people in her office all the time but she dissmisses me.

So I'll just continue to sit here and continue to cry.  Their plans for college are more important than my plans for . . . I shouldn't finish that sentence in case someone sticks me in the loony bit again.  Use your imagination.

I am completely irrational.  I'm a stupid fucking loser.

If you don't want to listen to me bitching about how much my life sucks then don't look at my blog and go print some coloring pages or something. I don't have anything nice to say.

I can't do a single goddamn thing right. My hands are shaking so my hand writing is terrible.  My sweater is linty and I'm too fat for these pants.  I need to buy a lot of new pants in size fat.  I didn't put on any makeup this morning so I look like hell. 

Today is solo / ensemble contest for band and choir.  I just want to look nice, but that is clearly impossible for me.  I don't have anything nice to wear except for these black dress pants and the same fucking sweater that I wear to every band event.  Everyone else will look better than me.  I don't even want to go to contest!  I have put in three years of solos and duets, isn't that enough?  I'm only going because our band director is making me.  I have to be part of a clarinet choir and play a stupid Pavanne that no one in the ensemble likes.   

The school counselor is supposed to meet me in the library.  She was supposed to meet me here 10 minutes ago.  I don't like being stuck in my own head.  It's a shitty place to be. 

This week is the last time I will see my current therapist.  She's quitting her job.  It's bullshit & it's not fair.  I really, really like her.  I don't want to see anybody else.  I'm sorry that I'm such a selfish brat but I wish she weren't quitting her job.  I need someone I like and trust, and I've never had that before.  This therapist is the first good therapist I've ever had. 

Today is not a good day.  I will not be eating anything today.  I'm a disappointment.

End the Silence

The sea is a good place to think of the future.

 

I grabbed hold of her wrist and my hand closed from tip to tip
I said “you’ve taken the diet too far, you have got to let it slip”
But she’s not eating again, she’s not eating again, she’s not eating again, she’s not eating again.
I ask her to speak French and then I need her to translate, I get the feeling she makes the meaning more significant.
She was always far too pretty for me to believe in a single word she said, believe a word she said.
At fourteen her mother died in a routine operation, from allergic reaction to a general anesthetic. She spent the rest of her teens experimenting with prescriptions, in a futile attempt to know more than the doctors.
She said one day to leave her, sand up to her shoulders waiting for the tide
to drag her to the ocean, to another sea’s shore.
This thing hurts like hell,
but what did you expect?

And all you can hear is the sound of your own heart
And all you can feel is your lungs flood and the blood course
But oh I can see five hundred years dead set ahead of me
Five hundred behind,
A thousand years in perfect symmetry

Best known left wrist right finger, through all the Southern States, on every video games machine they call her triple A.
There were racists on the radio trying to give up smoking, the chat show host, he joked “you have to wait for the government program”.
You talk about your politics, and I wonder if you could be one of them, but you could never kiss a Tory boy without wanting to cut off your tongue again.
A good place to look to the future is when you are sat at the sea, with the salt up to your ankles and a view of the end of the pier, you may look down at your model’s feet and wish that you’d just float away, and the weather here is overcast and the sea is the same shade of grey, so the landscape before you looks just like the edge of the world, but to the left side and the right side, either way is a crazy golf course.
The sea is a good place to think of the future.

And all you can hear is the sound of your own heart
And all you can feel is your lungs flood and the blood course
But oh I can see five hundred years dead set ahead of me
Five hundred behind,
A thousand years in perfect symmetry
A thousand years no getting rid of me
A thousand years in perfect symmetry.

-Los Campesinos

Will someone please come rescue me?

I'm so tired... It's so dark and I can't find

 the way out.  I'm seriously going to fall asleep in a minute here.  It won't be the first time I've cried myself to sleep, or the first time I've slept in school, but it will be the first time I've cried myself to sleep in school.

That's almost humorous... maybe there's hope for me yet.

Probably not.
 

I honest-to-God want to eat, but something's got a hodl of my mind and is making it very difficult.  My whole body aches from not being fed.
 

That's pathetic though -- I'm not even good at being anorexic.  I think I'm something special because Ive cut my intake down to one meal and one snack everyday.  The girls who are really sick are much better at this than I am.

I'm so fucking miserable. 

and i miss jessa. but don't tell.  i'm supposed to be strong.

Nothing I do works.

I'm getting absolutely nothing done in my classes.  I'm just there because I have to be.  I'm spending my time looking at magazines, drawing and reading.  It's unfortunate because I'm reading about girls with anorexia.  The magazines I'm looking at make me cry - they're dance magazines and I want to be a ballet dancer so bad, but that's just another lost dream.  I'm trying to draw passionate images of dancers, but I can't draw right today.  I'm too upset to function, really.  I really shouldn't even be in school, probably, but I will not wimp out again.  I stayed home from school for a couple days last month because I was having a melt down, but this time I will tough it out.  I need to at least try to work.  When I'm in college, I won't be allowed to take mental health days.  When I'm in college I'm going to have to actually work, and work really hard.  I have goals.  If I can't reach them, then what's the point of living? 

If someone else had to feel the way I do right now for just a minute or two, they would probably hit the floor.  I've built up a lot of mental muscle and scar tissue, I reckon, so I can at least fake my way through the day.  I would love for someone to know what exactly is happening inside me right now, and say wow, that's awful... Just to have someone understand would make me feel a tiny bit better. 
I am SO PISSED OFF that none of my drawings are turning out well.  Drawing is a great release for me when I'm this upset, but only if I draw well. The only trouble is that I never draw well when I'm upset.  This causes me to get progressively angrier and more frustrated as well as the original underlying depression and insecurities. 

I need someone to yell at.  I'm going to turn into a bitch if I don't get help soon. 

Today is a terrible day.

I'm supposed to be taking notes right now, but I just don't feel like it.  I don't care about much of anything at present.  I would give anything to be in the sanctuary at Peace church right now.  I'm tired and sad and run-down.

I miss my girlfriend.  Oh sorry, I mean ex-girlfriend.

I feel empty, void.  There's a blackness in my chest that won't go away. My insatiable need for affection is eating away at me.  Having such a tremendous need makes me feel pathetic and very irritated with myself.  I'm so frustrated with this neediness, wanting, and sickness. 

I hate myself, I hate myself, I hate myself! I don't want to, but that's how I feel right now.  I have lots of good reasons for this, too, so it's hard to convince myself that it's alright, I'm alright.  I am behind in three of my six classes, and owe make-up work in two more classes.  I'm trying to ask my supports for help, but I'm talkng in circles.  It's damn near impossible for anyone to help me in the state I'm in. 

I'm really hungry.  I've been indulging in "target behaviors," whatever the hell that means...  I've been reading memoirs about anoretics, and all I've eaten today is 4 oz of fat-free yogurt.  I only ate that to appease someone who's concerned about me.  I feel really bad for making people worry about me.  I'm such a stupid, worthless piece of sh*t. 

I wish Sarah would stop staring at me.  To the students sitting around me while I'm blogging in class: Yeah, I get it. We have a ten page paper to work on, and I'm already behind schedule.  I honestly don't care, though, so leave me alone and quit looking at me like I'm a hopeless bum.  I am a hopeless bum, but it's really none of your business.

The school counselor is unavailable for the next two weeks, and I only get to go to therapy once a week.  I'm screwed. I need someone to talk to.  I need someone to help me eat.  I need a hug. 

I wonder if we have play practice tonight. I can't remember. Rachel...?

I need some serious inspiration and motivation here.  I'm going nowhere fast. 

Faith Ponderings (United Church of Christ)

"Around 7 p.m. on February 26, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin walked out of the gated community near Orlando where he was visiting his father to go get some Skittles and a can of iced tea at a neighborhood convenience store. On his way home, George Zimmerman (28) was in his car when he saw Martin walking on the street.   He called the police and said, “There’s a real suspicious guy. This guy looks like he’s up to no good, on drugs or something. It’s raining and he’s just walking around looking about.”  The police dispatcher asked, “Are you following him?”  Zimmerman replied, “Yeah.”  The dispatcher responded, “OK, we don’t need you to do that.”

Martin was talking on the phone with a teenage girl and told her that he was being hounded by a strange man on a cell phone who was running after him.  Zimmerman, carrying 9 millimeter handgun, shot and killed the 17 year old African American boy.  There are many disputes about what really happened during this altercation, but the end result was that a 17 year old un-armed boy was killed, and thus far Zimmerman has not been charged with any crime, claiming his actions were in self-defense. 

Martin’s English teacher described him as “as an A and B student who majored in cheerfulness.”   Martin had no criminal record, yet Zimmerman was charged in July 2005 with resisting arrest with violence and battery on an officer.  Zimmerman called the police 46 times since Jan. 1, 2011, and according to neighbors, Zimmerman was “fixated on crime and focused on young, black males.”

Why does this story matter?  It matters to me, and should matter to us because unfortunately this event represents the continued racism that plagues our country and the lives of our brothers and sisters.  With the upcoming election in November, I recently saw a bumper sticker that said, “Don’t Re-Nig in 2012: Stop repeat offenders.  Don’t reelect Obama.”   This blatant hatred is unacceptable, and as a community of faith is it our business to be involved in places of in-justice in our world.  Micah 6:8 says, “What does the Lord require of you but to seek justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.”  Sometimes it’s easier to walk humbly and love kindness than to seek justice.  Justice is not just the work of courts, government, and legislators. 

Educating yourself about white privilege is a step towards seeking justice.  (I recommend http://www.timwise.org/category/essays/)  Supporting anti-prejudice and anti-racist organizations is a step towards seeking justice.  Making an effort to get to know people different than you or learning about cultures other than you own is a step towards seeking justice. 

Creating the Beloved Community here on earth is what Jesus taught us to do.  This is the work we have been given and entrusted with.  Will you join us?" 

 -Pastor Kayla