the five minute rule

(continued from previous post... "the diagnosis")




So there I sat, again, same kitchen, same day, almost drunk in my anger and drowning in my anxiety, and before me was yet another meal I had to force down. Truth be told, I don't remember what food was placed before me that night, but I know if I look hard enough I still have my "food logs" stored away in a box somewhere where I keep everything. The food logs were a sort of journal I had to keep to write about every meal I ate and about every emotion involved in eating that meal. Some of my food logs were just nasty, not so much because of the food, but because of what I had to say about how I felt. They were full of anger, the sort of anger that had someone, rather divine or tangible, not intervened it could have easily been birthed into hatred. Some of them were depressing to read, even after having left treatment, so I don't know why I kept them, except for the fact I keep everything I write down (well, truthfully, I actually keep everything, finding it hard to throw anything away... a characteristic that many people have tried to free me from). But other than that I suppose that for as depressing and angry as they were, keeping them has served as a reminder of how far God has brought me. I will try to do some investigating to locate my food logs (a funny name when I think about it), so as to possibly share some of my early thoughts about meals in treatment, but that will come later.

Now, much like at lunch (as written about in "the beginning"), all the other girls were able to eat whatever they wanted, while I was limited to what was in the styrofoam box sitting in front of me. Along with my roommate, Ashley, the same girls from lunch were in the room for dinner; the quiet girl who whispered to herself and rocked back and forth (this went on again at dinner), the loud, epicene girl whose mom hated her because she loved women, the few other girls who would egg on rebellion in any form, and then myself. I was quiet, and sad, and smiled a few times so as not to draw attention to myself for not laughing at the girls who thought they were funny, but mostly I just wanted to cry.

As I was taking in all of the girls being loud around me, my attention once again fell on the girl who was whispering to herself. It was obvious she was trying hard to focus, and though I didn't know what she was trying to focus on, it was clear that it was difficult for her given the noise around us. A female BHA leaned over and hopefully whispered something encouraging because the girl then lifted her head, picked up her spoon and began to eat, smile, and look around as if there wasn't a care in the world. I barely overheard someone saying "she made it through her numbers," but I didn't really know what that meant, nor was I going to ask. Looking back on the situation, I don't think it was obvious, but it might have been, when I realized that I didn't care about what "her numbers" meant because I found myself staring point blank at her hands. As her spoon lifted from her plate to her mouth, I noticed her right hand for the first time and I couldn't take my eyes off of it. She had her left elbow on the table with her left hand tucked in between her plate and herself, and I was able to see enough of her left hand to make out that it looked just like her right.

Her hands... they were covered with cut marks. I mean, not just a few here and there, but patterns from below her wrists up to her fingers of small cuts. I remember feeling shocked and scared at the same time. It looked as if she had been keeping score of something on her hand and each cut was a tally mark of some sort, and she just kept cutting, or tallying, until she ran out of room. "Dear God," I thought, "is she OK?" I wasn't expecting an answer, nor did I get one, but I remember being so shaken in how I felt that the only thing I could think to say over and over again was "Dear God, O Dear God." I looked at the stark contrast between my hands and hers and it literally gave me the chills. I don't think it was so much out of ignorance as it was me just sincerely wanting to know, but I couldn't help but keep asking myself "what is wrong with her?"

I felt in that moment that I wanted to talk to her or be nice to her in some way, but I didn't know how. I was scared, and worried that I might say the wrong thing and offend her, which would then send her into a state of something other than reality. She was so young, at least in high school as she had on a letter jacket, and seemingly pleasant to be around when you weren't freaked out by her rocking and whispering. Mid-way through her meal, she stopped eating to rock and whisper again. A BHA took notice and addressed her, "Corrie, you need to finish your meal, we'll worry about your homework later, OK? It's OK." I was trying my best to keep up with what was going on, but I felt so confused about my own self and why I was there that it was hard to keep track of the others' "drama." Corrie whispered for a little bit longer, as if she didn't hear the BHA, then continued with her food.

"You see," someone yelled out, "if you just leave her alone she'll finish!" I looked up and it was the loud woman-loving, ring-leading girl from lunch standing by the kitchen counter. "Annie, sit down!" the BHA snapped back in a manner that was sort of serious and sort of joking. "What?" Annie laughed, then pulled up her baggy pants, twiddled her lip ring and stuck a spoon full of peanut butter in her mouth. In that moment Annie made it seem as if she cared about Corrie, but I couldn't help but wonder if it was more out of a desire to be the center of attention then it was out of concern. The BHA rolled her eyes and looked at Corrie and smiled. My attention left Corrie's hands and went right back to Annie, as I'm sure that's right where she wanted it. She was a beautiful girl but seemingly tried hard to make herself look like a boy. She wore baggy clothes and a beanie that hid her short hair underneath. She continued to talk loudly about her love for women, mind you she was 16, and would often refer to some of them as "bitches." I had wondered if it was as degrading for a gay woman to call a woman a bitch as it was for a man to call a woman a bitch, but I didn't ask. Ashley spoke up and said something about it, which made me feel proud, solely because she was my roommate and not afraid to speak her mind, but when questioned, Annie implied she meant "bitch" in a loving way. "Interesting," I thought to myself, "maybe men and women really have been misunderstanding each other all these years."

One other girl at the table, Carson, was Annie's accomplice, so to speak. I think Carson was confused about her own sexuality and found something comforting about Annie's confidence in her own. Though Carson would say she was her own person, she followed Annie around and encouraged her in all that she did. She sided with her against other girls or against staff, though that was going to be something I wouldn't find out until later. The main image I have of Carson in my mind is one of her hunched over her cereal bowl, laughing at everything Annie did. As far as I knew, Carson was just a side kick without much conviction of her own, but at the time I didn't realize how dangerous of a place that is for someone to be.

Between Annie and Corrie, the table would go from loud to silent to loud again. I remember just sitting there, trying so hard to take it all in but also feeling so much like I was in a dream, about to wake up at any second. Between my attention being distracted and my desire to not eat my food anyway, I took just as long as I did at lunch to finish my meal. Everyone was done and out of the kitchen while I was still working on a side dish of some sort. I was frustrated that even Corrie was done before me. Sure, I wanted to be nice to Corrie, but truth be told I also wanted to be less crazy than her, and the fact that I thought the food on my plate was pure evil wasn't going to help me plea my case for sanity.

I remember the BHA trying to ask me questions to possibly lift my spirits enough for me to lift my spoon to my mouth, but I was about as interested in her questions as I was in my dinner. I would answer with one word, if even, and kept my head down while I ate as slow as possible. I remember wanting to cry because my stomach physically hurt and I thought that there was no way eating more could possibly healthy. It had been so long since my body not only had that much food in it, but held it down, and so my stomach, along with my mind, was freaking out. The most talking I did at the dinner table was when everybody was gone and I tried to explain to the BHA the pain I was in. She said she understood, I doubted it, and that it would only be that uncomfortable in the beginning as my body just needed to adjust to the changes.

To make matters worse, I began to feel as if I was going to be physically sick. It wasn't nausea, but it was certainly the feeling that my food wasn't going to stay down. I remember wondering what would happen if it didn't. What would happen if I couldn't help myself and just threw up right there on the table, not even because I wanted to, but because I felt like I couldn't help it? This feeling continued after most meals for a while, and I later learned that just as my body was adjusting to the food I was giving it, it was also adjusting to to "keeping" the food. Though it was self induced, my body was so used to rejecting any large amount of food, especially certain types of food, that it almost seemed natural for it to continue in the state of rejection, even in treatment. It's not like I could tell my gag reflexes that I was in treatment now and things were going to be different.

After dinner I was drained of every emotion I could hope to express, even anger. I was just too tired to be angry, but dear God was I uncomfortable. I do remember just feeling gross, disgusted with myself even. I constantly felt my stomach, wondering if I was gaining weight that very moment. I was hoping that maybe by a sheer miracle there were some some laxatives still lingering about in my body, as I had taken them the whole weekend before entering treatment, but I was fairly certain that was wishful thinking.

After waiting around in the main lobby for a little while, once again just observing the interactions of the girls around me, Ashley and I were told we were going to be taken over to the adult lodge so we could unpack before coming back over to the youth lodge for snack and a nightly group. We were escorted outside and through the snow to the building next to the one we were in. I still couldn't believe all of the snow, especially at night. I remember loving the sound of snow crunching underneath my shoes and leaving foot prints the size of my feet. Before entering the lodge where I would be lodging, I felt for a moment that I was somewhere else, somewhere magical, where it snowed at night and the sound of snow could be heard under your shoe... somewhere much like the mid-west in winter, I suppose. I entered through both sets of locked doors that were disarmed by the BHA who was leading us and reality set back in... "I am not somewhere magical, I am in treatment."

Ashley and I were led to Lauren's room, which quickly became "our room." The rooms were quite large with 4 twin beds, but since there were only 3 of us we used one of the beds as a table to throw our stuff on. There were 4 tall dressers as well, one beside each bed with about 5 drawers a piece. I knew I wasn't allowed to keep enough stuff to fill all the drawers, but I still liked the idea of having all those drawers. I've always liked the idea of hiding things, including myself, which could be a good or a bad thing, depending on what or why I am trying to hide. Ashley and I started unpacking and Lauren came in shortly after us. We talked as we unpacked, but about what I don't specifically remember. I discovered two more drawers underneath my bed and those quickly became my favorite drawers where I hid my underwear and letters from loved ones. If I would have had anything else to hide I would have hidden it in those drawers, but the BHAs had already taken anything worth hiding away.

I placed a Boyd bear on my bed that my aunt and uncle had given me the day before leaving for the facility. It wasn't the most comfortable bear to sleep with, as I think it was made more for a shelf than a bed, but it was the only thing I knew I would have to keep me company at night. It had little wings and a halo, obviously resembling an angel, but instead of enjoying it's angelic features, I actually grew annoyed by them. It's wire wings would poke me in the neck or it's glittery pipe cleaner halo would stab me in the face. I should have put him (or her) on a shelf where he (or she) belonged, but despite my annoyances I couldn't let go of him (or her) at night. As silly as it sounds, having that bear, even at 23 years old, made me feel loved and not so alone.

As I finished unpacking I felt my stomach to check and see if I had gained any weight. There were no mirrors in the rooms, only in the bathrooms, but those remained locked at all times. I felt disgusting, but I tried not to let it show. I looked over Ashley's side of the room, then Lauren's. I tried not to compare, but I did. Ashley seemingly came from money, Lauren didn't. I figured I was somewhere in the middle, but told myself to shut up because it didn't matter anyway. I noticed that Lauren had a small CD player on her dresser which I thought was interesting because they had taken all my CDs away, and if one couldn't have CDs, why have a CD player? I asked her about it and she said it belonged to the facility and that one day she had asked if she could use it during the day, but whoever had given it to her forgot about it and so there it still sat in our room. I asked her if she had any CDs and she said she did because whoever had given her the CD player for the day had also given her her CDs and they forgot to take those back as well. Prior to that moment I never in my life would have thought that I would be so excited about the idea of smuggling CDs, but there I was, thrilled at the thought of having something deemed as "contraband" so close to my possession. She allowed me to thumb through her very small collection of CDs... a few burnt CDs of mixed music, followed by The Killers, Gorillaz, Jet, and a sermon by Desmond Tutu.

As I was examining Lauren's pittance of music, I was told by a BHA that I could put my toiletries and such in my locker where they were to be kept on lock down at all times. I could use my tooth brush and tooth paste and non-alcoholic shampoo, but I had to ask permission for said toiletries to be used, in which case a BHA would follow me to my locker, unlock it, and take note of what I took out. After making use of said toiletries, makeup and dental floss included, I had to inform the BHA that I was done so he or she could lock everything back up until I asked for permission again. So, the BHA walked me down the hall and showed me my locker that looked like a square of no bigger than 10 inches by 10 inches. I loaded my locker up with my hairdryer and hairbrush, and all of my other toiletries, and watched the BHA lock them up as I thought to myself how crazy it was that I couldn't even have my hairbrush out. Ashley, Lauren and I were then told we would be walked back over to the adolescent lodge for snack and our nightly check in group.

Before heading back out into the snow, I put on my layers of sweaters and covered them all with the bright orange Harley Davidson Jacket that my Chicago native uncle had loaned me since I had never owned, nor had I ever planned on owning, a winter jacket. Not having had time to go shopping for a winter jacket between landing in Chicago, watching the Bears loose the Superbowl at my aunt and uncle's house, and checking into treatment, I just had to take what I was given. Being that my uncle may still be one of Harley Davidson's biggest fans, there wasn't much he could have offered me that didn't have "Harley Davidson" plastered across it somewhere. I have since grown fond of Mr. Davidson, but never in a million years would I have planned on sporting such a winter jacket as that one. I guess it's funny because I had also never planned on having an eating disorder, let alone going to treatment for one, yet there I found myself... in a men's large, bright orange Harley Davidson jacket, flames and all, standing behind two sets of locked double doors, waiting to be escorted out. John Lennon so poetically sang once that "life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans," and that is exactly how I felt when I wore that jacket.

In addition to adjusting to treatment, as a born native to the coast of South Carolina, I was also still adjusting to the Chicago climate change. I had to figure out how to move about in a down jacket, especially one that made such a loud statement in contrast to the serene, white snow. When I walked outside it was as if my presence was screaming "HERE I AM, BITCHES!!" Why my presence had to include the word "bitches," I don't know, but I thought it was something that someone wearing a Harley jacket might be prone to say, which may sound like a stereotype, but I felt okay making that judgement since just earlier Annie had said that "bitches" could be used as a term of endearment.

And so, as if it wasn't enough of a shock for me that I was wearing a flaming orange Harley jacket in the freezing cold of a Narnian look-a-like town outside of Chicago, I could have never been prepared for the shock that was about to take place when we walked back through the doors of the adolescent lodge.

As the night was coming to an end we arrived back at the lodge where my morning started. The BHA who was with us couldn't even unlock the second set of double doors before a BHA from inside came running to the doors, out of breath, telling us not to come in yet. I heard yelling coming from inside and I didn't know what was going on, but I knew something wasn't right. As I stood in the middle of two sets of locked doors, loud yelling on one side and the quiet of the snow on the other, I clinched my fists in an effort to relieve the stress I felt.

"It's a five minute rule!" the BHA from inside snapped at us, as if I understood what that meant. Lauren with her "oh no!" and Ashley with her "oh shit!" seemed to know what "five minute rule" meant and judging by their reactions, it didn't sound good. The BHA who was with us said that the five minute rule meant everyone had to go to their rooms and shut the doors until told to come out. "But why?" I asked. "Because somethings going down!" Ashley blurted out. "Just for the safety of everyone," the BHA quickly chimed in. The BHA from inside said she needed all the staff help she could get, so for our BHA to walk us into the group room off to the side as quickly as possible, close us in there, then follow her. Ashley joked by saying she'd help "lay the smack down," but the BHA from inside cut her a look and said "seriously, go straight to the group room!" Everything was happening so fast and it was all so ambiguous that I started to get anxious.

We got through the second set of double doors and down one of the three hallways I heard someone yelling "FIVE MINUTE RULE! FIVE MINUTE RULE!" Our BHA rushed us to the group room, shut the door and left. The group room was quiet. I looked at Ashley and Lauren... Lauren looked concerned while Ashley just grinned. "Congratulations!" Ashley said to me as she laughed, "no one ever gets introduced to the five minute rule on their first day!" Her warm welcome was interupted by a girl yelling on the other side of the door... "I'LL GO TO MY FUCKING ROOM WHEN I FUCKING WANT TO!" I looked at the glass door that was covered by a curtain, which Lauren was peeking under, then I looked back at Ashley. "Welcome to fucking treatment," she said sarcastically, "you might as well sit down because this is going to take longer than five minutes." I clinched my fists again as the comotion outside of the door got louder and F-bombs where being launced through the whole facility like hand grenades. There was only one thing that came to my mind in that moment...

where the hell am I?




To be continued...