6/3/05
Dear Body,
I know I’ve put you through some shit. I’ll never minimize that. I’ve risked your health; put you close to death. I’ve exhausted you during exercise. I’ve tortured you with laxatives. I’ve left you hungry, thirsty, cold. I’ve numbed you with excess food, stretched your stomach, made you uncomfortable. I’ve neglected you beyond belief. Not fed you or provided adequate rest. I’ve forced you to vomit repeatedly. Made your eyes red, your throat sore, your face swollen, your system dehydrated and unbalanced.
I’ve subjected you to painful, compromising sexual acts. I’ve flaunted you. It must have felt like mockery.
I’ve hated you. Every solitary part. Your breasts never grew. You store all fat at your stomach – that really pisses me off. You catch diseases easily. Your thighs have stretch marks. Your butt has cellulite. You have ugly moles and skin conditions. Your vision is failing.
You’re broken and defective. I fail to see why I should be the sucker, the one out of a hundred to get diabetes. Why me. I have enough complications. I’m too infuriated and resentful over the diagnosis to even grieve.
You never give me a break! You’re always hungry, always tired, always needing something related to diabetes - a doctor’s visit, glucose test, shot, or food. Do you honestly fucking expect me to spend my life managing this disease? To make up for your shortcomings?
Why are you so fucking helpless? Not only do you expect me to spend my entire life meeting your obscene diabetes-related needs, but you have a damn ED, too!
I’ve worked so hard to manipulate you. Spent countless hours and effort. And still you fail to cooperate. You stay fat despite my labor. Is this some fucked up power struggle?
I miss health.
I grieve life before diabetes and the subsequent ED.
I feel I’ve paid my dues. Like a virus, this disease should be over. It’s cost me so much. Time, peace of mind, my ability to have healthy kids.
What better way to pay you back for your deficiencies than through an ED. I was able to deny you, diabetes, make you powerless by pretending you did not exist.
And still you won. Please. Just disappear. Stop grabbing and screaming and demanding. You drive me to the brink of insanity. Hold me hostage in this body. I hate your defects and flaws. Your needs and urges disgust me. Your cries and cravings are pathetic. If you expect me to be fat to satisfy you, give up. Because you’re not just asking me to be fat. You’re asking me to bow down to you. To cater to your interminable diabetic needs.
You’re an awful entrapment of disease. You’ve robbed me of freedom. All freedom.
I detest you, diabetes.
You are a leech. Criminal. Scum.
6/6/05
Dear Rachel,
This is your body. I got your letter. You started off reasonably enough, but then it all went downhill when you revealed my “shortcomings.”
Do you honestly think I chose your DNA? Do you seriously think that I wanted you to be diabetic? It takes a ridiculous toll on me!
Rachel, you almost killed me. You totally ignored what I needed to survive: I cannot function without insulin. You put me in a position where all my organs were threatened and could have been permanently destroyed.
Of course, I screamed for help. I was horrified! You didn’t care one iota about me. You stuffed me, purged me, starved me, exposed me to drugs, sex, booze. Punished me for being broken.
We’re supposed to be a team; not waged in a war where no one wins. I need you to respect me, so I can continue to do all the things you love: see, write, run, sunbathe at the beach, make love to your husband, have children one day.
I’m sorry, trust me, very sorry that the pancreas doesn’t work. I’d love to manufacture insulin, like I used to. We were so much healthier and peaceful then. But I’m not liable for genetics, Rachel. That’s ultimately God’s call.
You must pick up the slack for this. Eat as best as you can – I need carbohydrates so that I can minimize your urges to binge. I need you to deliver me insulin. Our eyes are damaged. Please. Let that be the extent of it. Please stop trying to silence my cries with food, liquor, drugs. Please treat me well. Your body is sacred. I cannot be a peaceful refuge if I’m under attack by you and the ED. I beg you to keep it at bay. I know you can’t do it alone, so call on the Lord. Forget your useless pride – this is life and death, Rachel. I want to take you through the blessed life your Father has planned for you in optimal health. But we have to work together, find out what is effective and stick with it.
I miss health more than you do - you took it for granted. I don’t want life to revolve around diabetes or an ED, either. I still love and serve you, Rachel. I just need you to take care of this one thing [insulin] so that all my other parts can function. We both benefit from health.
I grieve freedom, too. But I register what you’ve apparently overlooked: the “freedom,” as you so foolishly put it, is temporal at best – better described as an illusion. I scream for your attention because if you do not stop your behaviors now, you’ll be debilitated or die.
I am not, nor will I be, content to die young and destroyed.
Sincerely,
Your Body