It’s Friday. The day I said I would step on the scale to check my progress. And I’m terrified and don’t want to do it. I’m like a grad student going into finals week. Can I get a few more hours to study? Can I just delay the test til after lunch? Is there anything I haven’t reviewed yet that I can cram?
But since this isn’t grad school and I've no textbooks or notecards, my thoughts go to one more run, one less bite, one more weight session, one more day to get it just right to try and put myself in the ‘win’ column. If all I know is that I never lose weight when I try to lose it, then of course, that’s the voice running through my head. And, since we’ve already decided it’s the voice and the story that have got to go, then I guess I’m stepping on the scale and celebrating any loss AND celebrating any maintaining AND celebrating a gain as well. Why? Oh, I don’t know. Love, maybe? Having the crazy ass notion that love isn’t earned through smallness and weight loss. Love just is. I get to have it even if I’ve gained five pounds at the end of this or lost them. My brain doesn’t like that. My brain is fighting for the old pattern, the old program, the old version it knows so well. Not today, Satan. Let’s step on the scale and kick the devil in the diamonds.
If you read yesterday, thank you. If you read yesterday, well you probably got more than what is acceptable in polite company and way bizarre content for a diet journal entry. If you read it and knew me when I was a kid, or you knew my parents, you might want to disprove the hidden stuff and fight for the good evidence. I wouldn’t blame you. In this life we could tell one thousand different stories about the same singular human life if we wanted. I could tell about church and church choir, mommy and me fashion shows, afternoon coffee (both awesome and guilt-inducing), annual kickass summer vacations that, turns out, were pretty special and of the kind that most of my friends never got, piano lessons, youth group, family gatherings, a new Barbie doll every Christmas eve, swim team, travel, field trips and fun. I could tell you so much that probably eclipses the harder stuff, but it’s the secret stuff that keeps holding me back and messing me up even now at 44. It’s not the fun stuff. It’s the hidden story that needs told in all the imperfection and inaccuracy that comes along with adolescent eyes and an adolescent heart who never got to have the floor for one blessed moment to safely say things she wanted to say.
Life was sadder in the suburbs than anyone wanted to admit. Friends had alcoholic moms and dads who liked to yell so we’d hide up in the bedroom hoping he wouldn’t know we were there. There was mental illness born alone behind closed doors and had the cops showing up at 10pm. Secrets and half-truths and whispering that modeled appearance over pain. Perception over everything pretty much. Looking back, there were clues I can see now that point to unspoken mysteries, and things that just weren’t right. The stuff I know was sad. The stuff I still don’t know was sadder probably.
And there I was. Kinda lost and floundering and without the words and skills needed to find clarity. By 14, looking back now, I think I was squarely in the category of “at risk” which I might expand on to say I was “looking at risk as a way to alleviate the lost-ness.” I did not fit the profile of ‘at risk.’ Two parents, nice home, good community, plenty to eat (and feel shame and guilt for doing so), church family, neighborhood friends, all the things. But also, an older brother with severe undiagnosed mental illness, two very busy parents pulled in all directions, guests who needed hosting, a brain and intellect that didn’t fit into school very well (talked too much, couldn’t stay organized, made teachers mad, under-performed, did not like it at all), a need for attention and care and no idea how to get it in a good way.
At risk. Risk more to alleviate lost-ness. I know. Go to South America and try out risk in another country. I know. Come home and feel even more other and defected than before. I know see if boys will like you for other reasons than being pretty. I know, get in with a crowd that might not mind skipping school, getting high, driving to Mexico, drinking beers, proving the thing we already knew to be true: we’re not in. We’re out. I know, accept the ride to school you never should’ve accepted that lead you down a path you never should’ve gone down, that put you in a room you never should’ve been in, that kept you keeping secrets from everyone forever. Do that.
Was there any avoiding it? Probably not. Like I said, I remember and held on to things that could’ve easily been forgotten and I could’ve hung on to different truths instead. I could’ve chosen an identity that wasn’t so banged up and broken, but that pesky Enneagram 4 weakness about believing in my brokenness? Man, the evidence just kept piling up. The comparison cryptonite? Man, it was everywhere. Beloved shiny very smart younger brother, popular fun, record-setting older brother, beautiful gorgeous powerhouse of a mother, local celebrity respected coach of a father and me trying to find a way to get my oldest brother to laugh instead of scream at my mom.
What does this have to do with stepping on a scale and skipping the ice cream? I used to say it had nothing to do with it. Now I’m not so sure. Now I think the through line starts way before I prefer to acknowledge. It includes the lost girl trying to survive high school and doing a terrible job of it. I think it has something to do with taking care of myself and her from the beginning to send her off in peace so I can take it from here and not drag it all around with me forever in a garbage bag marked “broken.” High five.