Don’t look back in anger
Earlier this month I was exhibiting at a local art fair when my ears pricked up as some live music unexpectantly came on. The music was emanating from a woman with a beautiful voice and I was met with a sudden wave of emotions. The first was panic, because although her voice was lovely, singing is one of the most effective ways to transmit Covid, so initially I was desperately wishing that this woman wasn’t infected with the virus and thus infecting us all.
Secondly, and I must confess to a touch of envy here (an emotion that stirs up all too frequently inside me, one of many things that I dislike in myself). I wished for the millionth time in my life that I was blessed with the ability to sing. (Interestingly I always dismiss compliments about my ‘talent’ to paint, claiming that it’s actually the result of a lot of hard work, not some natural, magical gift, yet I can so readily accept this premise when it comes to other people’s ‘talents’, including singing. What’s with that?)
Thirdly, the music itself stirred up inside me, as music has a tendency to do, a wealth of memories and emotions. Initially I didn’t recognise the song even though it sounded strangely familiar. I expect this was due to my being used to hearing it sung by Seal and not a female singer. The song was ‘Kiss From A Rose’ and for me it’s one of those songs that has the power to instantly transport me back in time, in this case to 1997.
I’m in the back seat of a car and we are driving down to Cornwall for our annual family holiday. I’m 13 and although looking forward to our beloved holiday where we ventured to the same place year on year, this year something is different. I feel strange. Gran offers us all a Werther’s Original, which was very much a part of our holiday tradition. I can’t recall if I chose to accept or to decline her offer. A Werther’s after all isn’t technically food, right? Does it count? There was no such thing as Google to consult, and I doubt we could have afforded the tech even if it had been.
I don’t know what day it was, but I was probably at least 20 days into my fast, for during this period in my life I chose to stop eating for good. I lasted 26 days. This might sound quite dramatic, but to me it was not. I had spent the previous two years building up to it. During Year 7 at school I started skipping breakfast, then lunch as well and by the end of Year 8 I was only eating at the weekends. (This was because I could not get away with not eating then as I was often at my mum’s house and it’s much more difficult to not eat when you have tv dinners on your lap, sitting on a sofa next to other people.)
I can’t recall what prompted me to eventually ‘give in’ and decide to eat again. But I did. Annoyingly I didn’t even loose that much weight, which had been the ultimate goal. As I said, I had nowhere to turn for more sensible approaches to weight loss. I dropped from 9 stone to 8 stone, but I desperately wanted to go lower. To be thin. To see bones. Even more to my annoyance was a comment made by my father after I had eventually plucked up the courage to ask if I could see a counsellor, he said, ‘there’s nothing wrong with you now - you’re eating again.’ As if that was actually the real problem. I instantly regretted starting to eat again, but the damage was done. I had fucked it all up and was disgusted with myself for giving in. For not committing to my initial resolve to stop eating. It was around this time that my periods stopped for 9 months, which wasn’t to be the first time this happened. During this time I was also pulling out my hair and self-harming.
Over the years leading up to this I had developed a visceral hatred for myself and my body. My body disgusted and repulsed me. I would look so enviously at the bodies of other girls who were thinner than me. Who had nicer skin, nicer hair and far less body fat. Girls who appeared to be so comfortable in their own skin, so at ease, so confident, so unashamed. What must that feel like? I can recall that time in my life when it felt unbearable to have another human being (who wasn’t an immediate family member) even so much as look at me. It would make my skin burn with shame.
Sometimes I look back and mourn for the life that I have wasted by, as my therapist puts it, being at ‘war’ with my body. Sometimes I wonder what I could have achieved if I had spent a lot less of my time and energy on starving and hating myself, and more time focusing on my art and actually enjoying life, more time actually living.
Sometimes I wonder if this pattern of eating and not eating hadn’t messed up and confused my metabolism so much that my weight loss had been more noticeable and dramatic (as it was in later years) would someone have noticed? Would someone have cared?
My therapist has told me twice now (and it didn’t go down any better on the second hearing) that if I was a teenager now and presented as I did back then, it would be taken ‘extremely seriously’. I was not, and am not, entirely sure what to do with that information. What the hell am I supposed to do with that? I can’t begin to explain just how angry that remark made me feel. It reminds me of the doctor who told me ‘you actually have to be ill to see a nutritionist’. Of the psychiatrist who glibly asked me if this was ‘just another storm in a teacup?’ Both comments came at the beginning of my five year stint of only eating fruit, when my periods stopped for five years. I have often asked myself ‘just how fucking bad does it have to be before someone actually takes me seriously, until someone actually gives a fuck?!’
Still, it is fruitless to lament of things that happened in the past, of things that didn’t happen and of things that I have no power to change. All I can control is how I choose to live my life now, in this moment and how I want to live. For now I want to channel all of this - this shit into my paintings. To get it out of my system and onto canvas. Bring it on.
