THE SPLIT (Part 2)

I’m sure there were thousands of moments prior that ripened me for it, but splitting my favorite jeans minutes before being out-the-door to a party dunked my confidence to a newfound low. To cope, I got really drunk and threw up in my dorm room garbage bin moments after peeing in the stairwell of my building just for the hell of it. My first year of college was ending and I was starting to dick off. I moved back home with my mom and brother for the summer and got a job as a camp counselor in the town that the Real Housewives of New Jersey were from. My summer ambitions were to feel skinnier and meet Albie. To establish the former, I started buying clothes that were several sizes larger than my usual because the drapey fabric made me feel anonymous. I was a tiny girl craving to be a tiny girl for no particular reason other than everything girls are taught their entire lives. I never met Albie. Thank God.

I spent the summer chasing spoiled children and smoking pot with my friends. I barely ran or exercised and was more interested in acting my age and “losing weight” or whatever that meant for me. I grew up in the era of cutting carbs and Master Cleanses so I decided to do that…to stop eating bread, crackers, or anything worth living for. My daily meal was one lone can of tuna fish and that would basically be it save for five or six Wheat Thins when I felt like I was going to pass out. My jeans started to fit baggier around my waist and so would sit lower on my hips a la Nicole Richie or one of the Olsen twins. I lost weight fast and inherited a slump to my posture that concaved my shoulders and depressed my broadness. I felt petite and people noticed. Looks like you avoided the Freshman 15!

Can you imagine anyone coming up to you when you were, say, a little bloated or, yeah, heavier than you’re usual and saying Oh my god, you've really chunked up! Why the hell on earth do people insist on commenting about thinness, about weight, about bodies in general? It’s universal fact, at least amongst women, that everyone suffers or has suffered some type of body dysmorphia and so if that’s the case, why isn’t it inherently understood that the person you’re you’re-so-skinny’ing is likely deriving a sick pleasure from your assessment that then fuels their disordered relationship? Well, getting a lot of those remarks that summer validated my decision to deprive myself. It’s funny how low points disguise themselves as high points based on how we think others think about us when in reality everyone is just thinking about themselves.

Summer summered. It started and ended within what felt like a breath yet the long, blazing days had me believing that it just might last forever. I went back to campus a little earlier because athletes had to start pre-season training. I was leaner than when I left and slower. I didn’t have much stamina or power and the demands of team sportsmanship were at odds with my newfound desire to think solely of myself. I wanted to go out, I wanted to take creative arts classes, I wanted to try acting, I wanted new friends…ones that felt different than the people I grew up with in the suburbs.

A stroke of luck via clerical error allowed me to bypass the prerequisite restrictions of an Advanced Creative Writing class and got in as a first semester Sophomore in a room of Infinite Jest-loving Juniors and Seniors. The class had 10 students in it, which was intimidating because I definitely couldn’t disappear and had I even tried, my basic-ness stuck out. I was wearing t-shirts from Urban Outfitters that said stuff like “Idaho? No! Youdaho!” (IYKYK) and taking an extreme amount of time to flat iron my hair and wearing thong sandals and a messenger bag and just overall had no sense of personal style, taking all my fashion cues from the status quo. I felt completely uninteresting and desperate to amend that. I was used to standing out on the track team and couldn’t tolerate being no more than a skin tag in this classroom.

Thank god for my professor who was a young, short, sweet-voiced man named Mickey. He had a tendency to answer everyone with a “cool cool” or “yeah totally!” even when they were obviously missing the point, which I did a lot of, so appreciated his encouragement. We were graded on the completion of our assignments, readings, and class participation. We had to read our essays aloud to the class, which was something I immediately loved doing. Uninterested in the nuances of grammar and prone to making up my own words for sentiments I lacked the appropriate vocabulary for, I have always tended to write how I speak so being able to read my pieces intentionally gave me creative prowess. It was vulnerable, but liked it. I enjoyed narrating my inner life to strangers and grew comfortable sharing my writing and receiving feedback and talking about my feelings and associations. Something opened up inside of me and I immediately felt addicted to voicing frustrations and aches, dreams and dreads. My creative mind was starting to receive validation. And like most college artsy-fartsies, I was earning angst points that were being met by other peoples’ woes and slowly starting to find my way to storytelling. I felt for the first time probably ever that maybe, just maybe, I was smart.

I was eating normally in the cafeteria again and still running track, but not excelling the way I was year one and got bumped off the starting 4x4 team. I dove into new friendships and ostracize myself from my teammates. My roommate Kelley kind of couldn’t tolerate me and I felt the same toward her. She was always with her boyfriend and I was always hanging out with people she didn’t know. I knew I wanted to quit running, but I didn’t know how to put words to what I was feeling and what I was going through. I felt nervous to lose my scholarship, but even more nervous to face my coaches and the athletic department, so I became unreliable. I missed meetings, was late to practices, and ignored the nutrition and weight lifting protocols. Acting out my anxiety only made things worse because my delinquencies manifested the disappointment, confusion, and resentment I was afraid everyone would feel by quitting. I was called in for a meeting with my coaches and it ended in my resignation by way of we don’t think you’re committed anymore and me saying you’re right, I’m not. I told my new friends and acted like it was a celebratory event, but actually felt heavy with shame. I hated how I handled myself those months and felt sad and self-conscious the way most things feel when we act out of integrity. All of a sudden, I had a hand full of haunts on campus; hallways I needed to divert, run-ins I’d dodge, eyes I would refuse to meet. I didn’t know there was another way to behave and couldn’t possibly imagine a world where my coaches and teammates would have understood my decision to quit and wanted what was best for me.

I dove into my new identity and immersed myself in writing, reading, and literature courses. I even took a class on The Beatles. I attended open mic nights at the school cafe and bar, I dabbled in a theater classes and started shopping at thrift stores. I discovered alt rock and indie bands like Animal Collective, Eels, Rilo Kiley, and Regina Spektor. I discovered hair mousse and that I could crunch my hair into a natural wave rather than ironing it straight. I was also eating and drinking a lot because I couldn’t find a way to participate without indulging and rapidly gained all my weight back, and then some.

Nothing really fit me and my body was reorganizing itself after such a short window of extremities. I mean…I went from being a muscular athlete, to a stick with an eating disorder, to a college girl eating buffalo chicken wraps at 2am and drinking beer almost every night of the week…my body was in need of love, nurturing and nourishment, but I was too dissociated to hear a peep. Instead, I avoided the full length mirror in my room. I didn’t feel good, but this type of not good was new—full on crap food, alcohol, lack of sleep, and lack of physical movement—so I accepted it as a newfound baseline. My hormones were confused, my cycle very irregular (which was not my typical) and I developed a suburb of acne on my chin. Feeling unattractive and not myself made me angry more than anything else and all that anger and rage turned inwards at myself—you’re disgusting, you’re hideous, and so on. That inner voice got very loud so my outward voice got louder to drown it out by oppressing my introverted nature and forcing myself to be extroverted. I was at complete odds with my body while making acquaintance with my new college life and community. I chose to mainly focus there and ignore my pain and anguish for as long as I could.

What was working was that I had started doing well in school (was for the first time in my life an A student) because I loved the classes I was taking, which inspired a confidence in me that enhanced my intellectual appetite. I wanted more out of my experience than Rider had to offer. I needed to transfer schools. I wanted to be in New York City.