Wednesday, June 11, 2003
FIRST SEX Sunday, May 25, 2003
At 14 I'd won the battle of control with my parents. I'd exhausted them. School had been my sanctuary, so while my parents bemoaned my behavior, they had no quarrel with my academic achievements.
I'd been on those hormone pills to bring my period back just a few months when my personal research revealed that these were actually birth control pills. EUREKA! No one told me that, not the pediatrician who prescribed them and certainly not my mother. I'm not sure if she even knew then-it was 1959, and there was a lot they didn't know about hormones. I also discovered that I could just keep getting the prescription renewed. No one paid attention. That seems pretty incredible now in looking back, but that's what happened.
Boys were starting to sniff around. I felt powerful with my new found attractiveness and budding sexuality. Then came Eddie. A 21 year old paratrooper from Fort Bragg NC. We met at a party when he was home to visit his family in New Jersey. He started to pursue me. Telephone calls, movie dates, he wanted to meet my mother. I brought him home. My mother loved him. Thought he was sooooooooooooo handsome. He had huge shoulders and liked to pick me up and carry me around. It was time. I was dying to find out what "having sex" was all about. My mother had informed me about "becoming a woman" and getting my period but she never used the word "sex". She lived in that foggy place where image was everything and reality didn't exist. (She still lives there).
It did not happen in the throws of the usual teenage emotional swamp. I plotted and planned the scene. I bought my first sexy black underwear. I wore it the day Eddie invited me over to his house when he was on leave and we knew his mother would not be home. I was not exactly sure how this would play out but I let him know that I was ready for anything and figured he'd know what to do. He picked me up and placed me in the middle of his mother's bed. It was all white eyelet ruffles. He undressed me and I remember being excited about what he would think when he saw my black underwear. My breasts were small and I pushed back my shoulders to make the most of them. (I still do that) He seemed O.K with what he saw. He left and came back with a towel which he laid out under me. (I didn't know about the blood thing when your hymen is broken for the first time) He laid me back and took off his clothes and things started happening real fast. He was on top of me and I had a slight feeling of panic, but not enough to stop. I was emotionless, l was outside myself looking down on the scene, trying to figure-out what was happening while it was happening. Then it was over. Now what. There was a little blood on me and on the towel. Eddie said I could take a bath if I wanted. Somehow this seemed more intimate than the sex. He gave me some of his mother's bubble bath. I was sitting in the tub in a sea of bubbles when one of Eddie's friends stopped by. For the first time I was scared. Would Eddie betray me, ridicule me, take advantage of my vulnerability? The bathroom door was slightly ajar. I heard them talking. Eddie told his friend we were going to get married. Over my dead body I thought.
EATING DISORDERS
Anorexia and bulimia were not in the popular lexicon in 1958. It was the year I turned 13. After a turbulent childhood the struggles with my mother escalated. Being a housewife, a stay at home mom, the kitchen was her seat of operations and food was used as a vehicle to control behavior. Meals where prepared on-time and we had to come together as a family and sit and eat what was on our plates. Sometimes dinner would be ready, but my father did not come home on time. Great tension built-up as we waited and waited. Sometimes the food would get cold, or turn into a soggy over-cooked mess, but we waited. No eating beforehand was allowed. At last Dad would come home, often it was clear he had been drinking. We would sit at the table. I wanted to escape. I felt trapped. Huge piles of unwanted food (we were never allowed to help ourselves, our plates were always arranged by my mother)sat in front of me. It had been this way as long as I could remember. I'd been a slightly chubby kid, not obese, but "chubby" they called it then. My mom used to take me shopping for my school clothes, often frilly dresses with tight little cap sleeves. My mother would come in the dressing room with me and berate me for having to go to the "chubette" department to find something that fit. It embarrassed her she said. I was devastated. I hated the clothes. Back at home, at the dinner table, the piles of food kept coming. I was not allowed to leave the table till I cleaned my plate. One evening, in front of a mound of cold mashed potatos and peas, I snapped. I though that's it. I can't take it any more. I'm taking control over what goes in my mouth. I refused to eat. Several hours they made me sit there and finally they gave up. One terrifying evening at the dinner table, out of frustration with me, my mother goaded my father into forcing me to eat. He came over to me, put his knee on my lap to hold me down while he tried to force a tomato in my mouth. I kept my teeth gritted against this onslaught. I thought I'd rather die than give in. Needless to say I started loosing weight. I started to develop other strategies to appease them. I learned I could eat whatever my mother gave me, then later sneak into the bathroom and throw-up. This started to get out of hand, as I began to gorge when no one was home. My mother never allowed me to have ice cream or cookies between meals, or only after I'd finished all the other stuff first. So I started eating gallons of ice cream when she was not at home, then making myself throw up. She would question me about it, I'd lie, and she wondered what was going on as I continued to loose weight. Finally my period stopped. She took me to a pediatrician to find out what was wrong. The pediatrician prescribed hormones, little pills in a plastic wheel that I had to take every day for 28 days and then my period would come back. And so it did, with the little magic pills. My weight continued to drop. I was so pleased with my new look, I could wear tight pants and throw away the girdle my mother used to make me wear. I felt liberated. I started going out a lot more. I hit a low weight of 87 pounds. I was 5"4" tall. But it was love and sexual discovery that saved me.
At 14 I'd won the battle of control with my parents. I'd exhausted them. School had been my sanctuary, so while my parents bemoaned my behavior, they had no quarrel with my academic achievements.
I'd been on those hormone pills to bring my period back just a few months when my personal research revealed that these were actually birth control pills. EUREKA! No one told me that, not the pediatrician who prescribed them and certainly not my mother. I'm not sure if she even knew then-it was 1959, and there was a lot they didn't know about hormones. I also discovered that I could just keep getting the prescription renewed. No one paid attention. That seems pretty incredible now in looking back, but that's what happened.
Boys were starting to sniff around. I felt powerful with my new found attractiveness and budding sexuality. Then came Eddie. A 21 year old paratrooper from Fort Bragg NC. We met at a party when he was home to visit his family in New Jersey. He started to pursue me. Telephone calls, movie dates, he wanted to meet my mother. I brought him home. My mother loved him. Thought he was sooooooooooooo handsome. He had huge shoulders and liked to pick me up and carry me around. It was time. I was dying to find out what "having sex" was all about. My mother had informed me about "becoming a woman" and getting my period but she never used the word "sex". She lived in that foggy place where image was everything and reality didn't exist. (She still lives there).
It did not happen in the throws of the usual teenage emotional swamp. I plotted and planned the scene. I bought my first sexy black underwear. I wore it the day Eddie invited me over to his house when he was on leave and we knew his mother would not be home. I was not exactly sure how this would play out but I let him know that I was ready for anything and figured he'd know what to do. He picked me up and placed me in the middle of his mother's bed. It was all white eyelet ruffles. He undressed me and I remember being excited about what he would think when he saw my black underwear. My breasts were small and I pushed back my shoulders to make the most of them. (I still do that) He seemed O.K with what he saw. He left and came back with a towel which he laid out under me. (I didn't know about the blood thing when your hymen is broken for the first time) He laid me back and took off his clothes and things started happening real fast. He was on top of me and I had a slight feeling of panic, but not enough to stop. I was emotionless, l was outside myself looking down on the scene, trying to figure-out what was happening while it was happening. Then it was over. Now what. There was a little blood on me and on the towel. Eddie said I could take a bath if I wanted. Somehow this seemed more intimate than the sex. He gave me some of his mother's bubble bath. I was sitting in the tub in a sea of bubbles when one of Eddie's friends stopped by. For the first time I was scared. Would Eddie betray me, ridicule me, take advantage of my vulnerability? The bathroom door was slightly ajar. I heard them talking. Eddie told his friend we were going to get married. Over my dead body I thought.
EATING DISORDERS
Anorexia and bulimia were not in the popular lexicon in 1958. It was the year I turned 13. After a turbulent childhood the struggles with my mother escalated. Being a housewife, a stay at home mom, the kitchen was her seat of operations and food was used as a vehicle to control behavior. Meals where prepared on-time and we had to come together as a family and sit and eat what was on our plates. Sometimes dinner would be ready, but my father did not come home on time. Great tension built-up as we waited and waited. Sometimes the food would get cold, or turn into a soggy over-cooked mess, but we waited. No eating beforehand was allowed. At last Dad would come home, often it was clear he had been drinking. We would sit at the table. I wanted to escape. I felt trapped. Huge piles of unwanted food (we were never allowed to help ourselves, our plates were always arranged by my mother)sat in front of me. It had been this way as long as I could remember. I'd been a slightly chubby kid, not obese, but "chubby" they called it then. My mom used to take me shopping for my school clothes, often frilly dresses with tight little cap sleeves. My mother would come in the dressing room with me and berate me for having to go to the "chubette" department to find something that fit. It embarrassed her she said. I was devastated. I hated the clothes. Back at home, at the dinner table, the piles of food kept coming. I was not allowed to leave the table till I cleaned my plate. One evening, in front of a mound of cold mashed potatos and peas, I snapped. I though that's it. I can't take it any more. I'm taking control over what goes in my mouth. I refused to eat. Several hours they made me sit there and finally they gave up. One terrifying evening at the dinner table, out of frustration with me, my mother goaded my father into forcing me to eat. He came over to me, put his knee on my lap to hold me down while he tried to force a tomato in my mouth. I kept my teeth gritted against this onslaught. I thought I'd rather die than give in. Needless to say I started loosing weight. I started to develop other strategies to appease them. I learned I could eat whatever my mother gave me, then later sneak into the bathroom and throw-up. This started to get out of hand, as I began to gorge when no one was home. My mother never allowed me to have ice cream or cookies between meals, or only after I'd finished all the other stuff first. So I started eating gallons of ice cream when she was not at home, then making myself throw up. She would question me about it, I'd lie, and she wondered what was going on as I continued to loose weight. Finally my period stopped. She took me to a pediatrician to find out what was wrong. The pediatrician prescribed hormones, little pills in a plastic wheel that I had to take every day for 28 days and then my period would come back. And so it did, with the little magic pills. My weight continued to drop. I was so pleased with my new look, I could wear tight pants and throw away the girdle my mother used to make me wear. I felt liberated. I started going out a lot more. I hit a low weight of 87 pounds. I was 5"4" tall. But it was love and sexual discovery that saved me.
