What Am I To You, The Apple Of My Eye?
This Blog Post is an educational post dedicated to those who are loving somebody through anorexia, asking those who are the apples of our eyes what measures they're willing to take to support us through it... What am I to you? Am I the apple of your eye? Will the lengths you go to be lengths that love me or destroy me?
What am I to you if I ask you not to talk about certain things? Am I the person who you'd do anything for or am I the person restricting your speech? What will be more important to you, shielding me from harm's way or announcing a remark? I hope you feel proud of me for asking because you understand it's a sign of my endeavouring to surround myself with a type of talk that will instil change, progression and harmony. Am I to you, courageous? Am I to you, inspiring? Am I to you, one in a million? Or am I to you, manipulative? Am I to you, controlling? Am I to you, disappointing? For if you are truly the apple of my eye, then I will remain the apple of yours. It is all about where your priorities lie, and I accept that sometimes with two individuals there must be room for a place in the middle. However, refusing to be willing to see things from the perspective of the person you call the apple of your eye is to take part in their suffering. I want to be safe with you but I can't be safe with you if I tell you what will keep me safe and you write the words down on pieces of paper and use them as a starter for the fire you make to keep yourself warm.
Am I, to you, worth giving parts of yourself away for? Or can you keep parts of yourself away to allow parts of me to flourish like a flower exposed to the beautiful sun and the glorious rain? If dieting will kill me, will you do it in private? You know if I give that part of myself away for you, I may never recover. But you know that if you give that part of yourself away for me, I will bloom and blossom. Am I truly the apple of your eye? For if it were me in your shoes, it would be as simple as slicing a perfect piece of sweet, cinnamon, apple pie for you are the apple of my eye.
What am I to you if I tell you I'm not ready to recover? Do you have conditions on your love me for me? Will you only love me when it's easier... When the direction I choose is less painful, less excruciating, less grappling for you? If it's not convenient for me, will you be okay with my inability to be inconvenient for you? Not being ready to recover hurts me the most. It's my life going down the drain. But I know and understand the suffering you experience as you watch someone you love go down the drain. So I beg to ask if you can endure the route in which you're forced to watch my white face become whiter and my big heart grow only thinner if it means we live our lives together. It will be painful and brute and inconvenient but is the love you have for me prepared to shine amidst, upon and through it?
This post involves a lot of questions, not to trip you up, not to make you feel on trial and not to make you feel less than. These questions are here to provoke the part of your mind that immediately feels shut down so that with enough questioning, perhaps become inclined to grow to understand that some questions have answers that aren't so simple, answers filled with the fruit of your vine, filled with the haven of unconditional love. These questions are not designed to make you understand the lack of simplicity involved in an eating disorder. Perhaps nobody is right and perhaps nobody is wrong. Perhaps you can see that love will always be this complex and it will always be this simple... not at all and all at once. Anorexia has boundaries but maybe, love does not. And for me to beat this, I need you to never think in the likes of just a 'yes' or just a 'no.'
Kisses,
COS x
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