run

Week Four, Day 2

Thursday, August 3rd, 2023

Content warning: discussion of eating disorders.

POST-RUN MORTUM

Running Time: 30:31 minutes

Distance Achieved: 2.27 miles 

Tunage: Mylo Xyloto again because it soothes me 

No fucking part of me wanted to do that run. Not a single atom in the deepest reaches of my anatomy wanted to do what I just did, and I am feeling that resistance even now as I sit down to write this thing. This will not be a long post, I can promise you that. 

I guess you could say I’m chuffed that I made it to 2.27 miles. That’s the farthest I’ve run, and I think it happened out of pure spite and sheer willpower and annoyance and anxiety manifesting itself in my legs, though where it came from, I can’t tell you because I am depleted right now. There was a moment when I did a power 20, and I promise at some point I will explain the whole power thing of it all. Please don’t ask me to do it today. 

So far, today has been brought to us by the letter C for FUCKING CHAOS. I had to move the car but now, because of very unclear signage, I’m left to wonder if Gladyss – our car – will, in fact, be towed tomorrow night, which would suck, but again neither Colby nor I can tell what’s going on, and there is something going on with Pete, and we are freaked out about taking him to the vet later today, and it’s 1:37 in the afternoon, and I haven’t eaten anything so I am currently running, literally, on negative calories. 

I want to brush this off and be like it’s a bad day, but it didn’t start out as a bad day. It was actually a good day. I went grocery shopping, got Gladyss washed, which means she’ll shine the brightest in whatever lot they tow her to, but then I went to a doctor’s appointment, and that’s where I felt this darkness settle over me. I have the bladder of an 87-year-old war vet, and as such, I get treatments every five to six weeks. I’ve been doing this for the better part of 13 years, so I’m used to it. Ten years ago, I started working with this nurse practitioner, I’m going to call her Mari for our purposes here, who is my favorite medical professional I’ve ever worked with. I think when catheters and numbing syringes are in play, you bond quickly, and the trust has to be there from both sides. And I love this woman, I really do. But sometimes, she can be so blunt. 

Today was one of those blunt moments. And it smacked into me. 

Mari looked at me and said, “Why are you gaining weight?” And just, like, ouch. And at the end of the day, she is my urologist, not my PCP, not a nutritionist. And yeah, all parts of the body are connected, but I would love to just stick to one fucked up area of my body at a time when going in for these treatments. 

I felt my mind go into hyperproductive mode. It was working at warp speed to try and figure a way out of this conversation. But something to know about Mari, humor doesn’t land on her. She is Russian, and irony, or at least my style of irony, is lost behind the iron curtain of our communication. Normally, I get a kick out of it because I actually find the explaining of jokes to be really funny, something I’ve done a lot during our time together, but I didn’t want to make a joke. I looked at her, and I said, “Ok, so we’ve never talked about this, but I have an eating disorder, and I’m in a bad ebb of it right now, and I’m fluctuating in ways I don’t understand and can’t control, and I’m doing the best I can.” 

It was the first time I had just outright said it. Without a joke or a quip or an apology. I just fucking said it. There was relief, but then I just felt tired. Tired because I have to explain this to people sometimes, tired because I was having a good day, tired because I saw her five weeks ago, and had I really fucking gained weight since then??? Like, noticeably??? Even with the running?  Fuck, y’all, I don’t know, but I deflated a little. And then her tone changed, and her posture shifted, and she went into caretaking mode, which is also exhausting. I don’t ever want you to feel like you have to take care of me. I know it’s likely coming from a good place, but I don’t want to be your burden, and it makes me uncomfortable when I notice someone realize that I maybe need to be helped. I know. It’s not great. Again, I’m working on it. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” She asks. 

“Because it’s hard.” 

“Absolutely.” 

There was silence. 

“I’m training to run a 5k, though…” I offered as if to be like, yeah, I know I’m fat, but I’m working on it? Jesus Christ. Another wave of exhaustion. 

Her face lit up, “Good for you, girl.” 

And I wanted to die. 

And then she asked if I’d seen BRAM. 

And then I dissociated from my body. 

I don’t know. 

And I’m hungry. I feel hungry now, and how could I not feel hungry? I’ve had a full morning and literally ran over two miles. But I don’t want to admit that I’m hungry because then I have to do something about it, but I should do something about it because I cannot be walking around with negative calories, but I doubt that I will, at least not right now because my doctor whom I love thinks I’ve gained weight in the last five weeks. Enough to comment on. Or maybe she’s noticed for a while and then just chose today to say it? I don’t know. I don’t fucking know anything. 

I can feel your frustration rippling through the space time continuum of the internet. “Doesn’t she know she needs to eat?” “Did the hospital story have no effect on her?” “Will she ever learn?” 

I feel your frustration because I know it intimately. But I also know that cautionary tales exist because we, as humans, have a propensity to repeat history—especially our own. 

I know that I would be running with more energy if I had more food inside of me. I know I would be healthier if I took in more calories. I know what a balanced meal looks like. I know all of these things. 

And yet. 

This is the cycle. This is the brain of someone with an eating disorder, or rather, this is my brain, and this is how it spins and spins because of my eating disorder. The fighting of the most basic instinct and feeling of hunger. It’s exhausting. And I’m scared to be sharing this with you all because I like to think I have a reputation as someone with her shit together for the most part. I’m dependable, on top of my tasks; I am not this person. And I am also this person. And holding those two truths is heavy, hah, pun not intended, and I worry what you will think of me. I worry that you’ll start to look at me and be like, “Oh, god, is today the day she keels over?” And I don’t want that. I don’t want you to worry about me. Like I said earlier, I don’t want to be your burden to bear. But I also told you that I would be honest about where I’m at. 

This is where I am today. 

And maybe, I don’t know, maybe you know what it feels like to have a face that you show and an inner demon that is trying to kill you. I’m feeling mine a lot today. And I didn’t want to fucking run. 

But I did. And that has to count for something. I broke 2.2 miles, almost got to 2.3, and you know, if I were in a better mood, I would set a goal for either my next run or for a run next week to try and break 2.5, but I think by now y’all know me well enough to know I’m not, in this moment, in this mental state, going to make a goal. 

Not today, satan. There’s enough to worry about without setting a fucking goal.