Clandestine Confessions

I was sixteen years old when the question was asked.

My sleeve rolled up ever so slightly while scooping out the mashed potatoes from the pot into a scalloped ceramic bowl, one suitable to sit at the dining room table with us – a table adorned with a fancy lace tablecloth and lit auburn candles and freshly prepared dishes that are synonymous with Thanksgiving.

The scars became visible.

“Haven’t you considered how that will look in a wedding dress?”

It was the first time they were ever seen by eyes outside of mine. One would hope the sight would evoke concern and empathy, especially coming from a family member. But instead, it induced shame.

I can assure you, in the moments when the incomprehensible emotion pain and utter desperation made harming myself feel like the only escape, that thought never crossed my mind.

Because that would mean I was envisioning a life beyond each present day I deemed myself lucky to survive through.

Whether it be my body or my mind, one of them was inevitably going to raise the white flag soon. I was eagerly awaiting that fate.

I verbally gave no reply. I simply dropped the spoon, adjusted the sweater back to full coverage of my body, and continued on with the task in front of me.

An act to acknowledge the comment was heard but offer the speaker of it no further attention.

•

It was not brought up by anyone again until a boyfriend twelve years later – March 18^th, 2019 if we want to be that exact.

We were sitting side by side in a booth at Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner.

To clarify, his dinner. I opted into the choice of catering to the disordered thoughts that evening. Four months into our relationship and the euphoria had well worn off that was keeping the coping mechanism at bay. Although, still in my line of sight; never given permission by me to stray far.

I was texting a friend (ironically about my mental distress). He was holding my right arm and caressing his hand underneath the red cable knit sweater sleeve. His fingers grazed over the healing wounds, not knowing they were there and me not remembering quickly enough to have distracted him before he reached them.

He turned my arm towards him.

“Babe…..,” he looked me right in the eyes. “What…are…these?”

I did not respond. I tried to pull my arm away, but with the slightest sensation of my resistance he gripped my wrist tightly. I understood what this meant; his emotions were matching that power. Both of those were a strength I was incapable of defeating.

And he knew that.

He asked again more insistently, reaching across my chest to grab my phone out of my hand and placing it next to him. I kept silent, head down with my eyes fixated on the saltshaker, praying this would have an instantaneous and peaceful end.

The question would hit my ears one more time with an intensity of fury I have heard and experienced before. All the alerts were going off in my mind I was not safe. Having already been entangled with the eating disorder, there was nothing left I could do in that moment to settle its anxiety. I was abandoned in unfamiliar territory to feel every single debilitating ounce of the heart-breaking fear and anguish.

I told him it was nothing.

“Nothing? Really? That is what we are going with? Do not dare lie to me.”

My dismissal was not out of desiring to be untruthful to him but out of not wanting him to cause a scene in the restaurant.

Which I knew was exactly where this was headed. This was not my first rodeo of his rage.

“Please, we can talk about it later. Not now. Not here.”

Waiting was not an option for him. Patience was never a virtue of his. If not “here” then he was going to take me elsewhere.

Immediately.

•

He hastily grabbed my jacket.

“Let’s go. Now.” 

Aggressively I was pulled out of the booth before I was given a second to do it myself.

His silence and the impending retribution made that walk to the car feel like a marathon. He did not acknowledge the people in the restaurant saying goodbye on the way out. He did not hold the door for me to avoid getting hit by its weight by how forcefully he opened it. He paid no attention to the car coming straight towards him in the parking lot.

His anger was on a mission to be expressed, and as soon as we got in his car, it was released.

 “F*#^,” he said continually. With each repetition of the word, he got progressively louder. The sound of him slamming the steering wheel would soon be added to the enraged melody echoing around me. My mind flinched with each beat.

“Babe, please do not be angry. It is okay. I am okay. It will not happen again.”

My plea was met with wrath. In his tone, in his eyes, in his body language.

“How could I not be angry over the thing I told you would hurt me the most if you did?”

•

That was all we spoke until we got back to my apartment where he would then ask all the questions. When? Why? How? What was I thinking when I did it? Did I think he would never find out?

I muttered what I could through my surmounting fear and guilt, offering answers in a futile attempt to appease him. They were not enough to satisfy his fury.

“I am going home,” he said with his gaze straight ahead. “See you when I do. Don’t do anything dumb tonight.” He turned up the music to signal this conversation was over.

And with that, the tears that had been clinging onto my eyelids for dear life streamed down my face. As I went to open the car door, he grabbed my arm and pulled me into his chest where he held me and told me how much he loves me.

“I am sorry. I am so sorry. So so sorry.” I tried to make my voice loud enough to overpower the sobbing. “It wasn’t intentionally to hurt you. It was never supposed to get to this point again. Please know that. I am so sorry.”

The words felt so hollow despite the depth I meant them. But maybe it was just my own emptiness I was picking up on…

He lifted up my chin and wiped my tears. He kissed each eye.

“Promise me you will never do that again. Because your hurt is my hurt. It’s not just about you anymore. I have sacrificed so much to make this relationship work, and then you act like I mean nothing to you. Your words of loving me mean nothing when you act so selfishly. Do you understand that? Do you see what a bad place this puts me in? The stress it adds to my life? I am at a loss.”  

In the moment, this felt like love.

In hindsight, this felt like manipulation.

And I ache for the Jenna who did not know the difference then.

Because no one had ever shown up for her in her pain in any way, any act of presence felt like support. She mistook his aggression for affection.

•

“Go grab your stuff because there is no way I am leaving you alone tonight. I will drop you off at work in the morning.”

Despite how much my mind ached to be alone, I knew this was not a decision of his I could refute. I was officially a slave to his requests indefinitely.

He spent the drive trying to get me to smile and express his adoration for me. My heart was motion sick from the rapid back and forth of emotions. I lost all semblance of what was real and who was real.

“Babe, it isn’t worth it,” he said as we pulled into his driveway. “Whatever you think it will do or give you or save you from, it isn’t worth it. You have to stop punishing yourself.”

And while that is truth, it loses its value when it is spoken from the source of its existence. The intensity of reliance on the self-destructive behaviors only increased as the relationship continued to progress; predominantly the tried-and-true disorder, the most dependable of them all.

Until a year and a half later – June 1^st, 2020 (again, if we want to be that exact).

•

There was a mark on my body that brought him suspicion the self-harm had returned. I watched as his eyes spotted it when I was saying good night to him in his office. His body language intensified, but I pretended to not notice.

I went into the bedroom where he would storm into shortly after, finding me sitting on the bed texting a friend.

“Roll up your sleeve. Now. F*c!. If I see what I think I will…”

I hesitated.

“NOW!”

He did it for me. Again, patient was never an adjective used to describe him.

The dozen wounds on my right arm were now exposed.

He walked out of the bedroom slamming the door. The bed shook, the walls rattled, as did my nerves.

I sat there trembling, holding my breath. Wondering if he is coming back. Fearing he will. Waiting for what that will mean for my body and heart.

A minute later the door reopened. He headed straight into the bathroom and returned to me holding a bottle of lotion.

One containing lactic acid.

•

My arm, still bare as I was too paralyzed with panic to make any movements in his short absence, now gripped by his hand. The lotion hostilely was rubbed deep into the open cuts.

Within seconds the burning sensation took over my body. I could feel it coursing through my veins.

The shame invaded my mind. I could feel it rewiring my pathways.

The defeat infected my heart. I could feel it redefining my perception of love.

But I made no sound. I expressed no pain. I concealed the sorrow of knowing the Jenna who once lived would be no longer soon. I was witnessing the conclusion to her long, drawn-out death. Every word spoken was another shot to end her existence.

“How dare you do this to me.”

“You so clearly have zero love for me.”

“You are the most selfish human being.”

“I give you everything, and this is how you repay me.”

“Do you really think THAT little of me?”

“You are like a child with how you behave.”

“I cannot even trust you to even take care of yourself.”

“You are a disappointment.”

“And you think you can one day be a wife?!”

And there it was: the kill shot. Finishing off what was started well over a decade ago in that kitchen.

•

I had still not considered after all those years how the scars would look in a wedding dress for I had yet to accept I was worthy to be chosen by another forever, still struggled to trust that anyone in this universe would deem me deserving to love unconditionally.

And could anyone really blame me? I was living amidst the evidence to support that unbelief.

He released his grasp on my body while the one on my mind tightened.

“Anything you want to say to me?” he asked. It would unknowingly become the last words he would speak to me for the next four days.

“I…am sorry,” I whispered.

And with that, he left the room, shutting the door behind him. But not without turning off the light first.

Removing the last bit of hope I had left.