Duck

I have a sweet friend on my mind tonight. I'll call her Duck. Duck has always been so good to me. I haven't seen her in 12 years, but we have been able to stay touch. In 1997 I was anorexic. I made a trek across the US to Chicago to see her, with another friend. It was the best trip of my life. Looking back I wonder how I was keeping alive. I was emaciated. I maybe ate 500 calories a day, and drank a lot of diet soda to keep my gut feeling full. Sometimes I'd drink a case of it a day. Yep - 12 diet whatever - diet coke, sprite, rootbeer, cream soda...... I can't imagine what that did to my insides.
When Duck came to pick us up at the bus station she didn't even recognize me. I had told her I had lost some weight, but wanted to surprise her with how good I looked. Instead, I scared the ever loving shit out of her. I walked in a daze during that trip, sort of stoned from the euphoria starvation can bring upon you. I was so anxious to weigh myself that she let me weigh myself on her mailing scale at her work. Her kind boss took us to dinner one night, and even expressed his concern.

Many anorexics talk about "the voice" inside your head. When people comment on you "wow you're so tiny" it feeds the addiction. You like those compliments, so you work hard to stay tiny, so you continue to be complimented.

While on this trip Duck sat me down and showed me an article about a ballerina who had died of heart failure, brought on by anorexia. Her name was Heidi, and I believe she was about 22. I was 20. Duck tearfully told me "I don't want this to be you." After adamant denying that I had a problem, I finally caved. When I got home I was to tell my parents that I needed help. She would be calling my parents in a week to make sure that I had done it. And she did call. And I had told my parents.

I kept in touch with her through my recovery.

When I became a parent she gave me the tools that I needed to break some generational cycles. She introduced me to attachment parenting - a style of parenting that has really worked for us. I already see some of that fruit in my oldest son Bear.

Thinking of Duck reminds me of her testimony. There was a girl that she went to highschool with. I'll call her Molly. She would tease Molly, bully Molly. Duck says that she was really mean to her. Then one day Duck heard Molly talk about going to church. Duck said "You go to church?" And Molly said "Yeah, I go to church, I'm a Christian. Duck asked "Could I go too?" And Molly invited her to come. This is a perfect example of turning the other cheek. I was bullied mercilessly in highschool. The thought of having two certain girls accompany me to church would have been a nightmare. I would have probably told them to fuck off, or something else that would have made Jesus super proud of me, had they asked if they could come to church with me.

We live in a world full of good people and bad people. Some are saints, and some are assholes. The point is, as Christians we are supposed to love as Jesus loved. We're supposed to get our hands dirty. We're supposed to go amongst our society's outcasts - the prostitutes, and addicts and other people our society wants to sweep under the rug. We are called to bring in EVERYBODY, not just the people who seem approachable. I feel really sad that I see more hate and intolerance preached on TV, than the real message that Christ has for us. It makes me sick when certain tel-evangelists call homosexuality an abomination - MURDER, RAPE, CHILD PORNOGRAPHY, the fact that hitting a child in our country is legal and the powers that be want to keep it that way. Those are abominations.

I'm just thinking that if there was more love and more tolerance and more compassion and less greed in this world, that it would be a better place. Sadly, I don't think that will happen.