Page 108 of You Spin Me

I make myself meet her gaze. She’s not judging me. She’s just worried. “I’m an actress. I can’t get fat.”

“You’re not—”

I raise my hand to stop her. “I know I’m not fat. I understand that I pushed myself too hard and that I got too thin.” I have to swallow around the lump of fear in my throat to keep going. “I do think… I think I may have a problem knowing how to judge, or… seeing myself clearly.”

Esther narrows her eyes and turns away, like she’s scanning through something in her head. “Dysmorphia,” she finally whispers.

“What?”

“Maybe it’s body dysmorphia.” She starts to pace. “Maybe you were never anorexic, or maybe it’s a combination.”

“What are you talking about?”

“There is a condition, one psychologists are only beginning to understand, where the patient has difficulty seeing their body as it truly is. Or something like that. It’s not always about weight; it can be one area of the body.” Talking to herself, she heads for the door. “You might have to talk to someone from psych before they’ll let you go, so I want to look into this to make sure they consider it as a possibility.”

This actually makes sense to me. “Okay.”

She’s out the door before I can take another breath, but I need to know, so I shout, “Where’s Cal?”

Her mouth is tight when she pops back in. “He left.”

“What do you mean?”

She shrugs. “He left after he dropped you off.”

I shake my head. “He was here.” Hoping I wasn’t hallucinating, I press on. “In the doorway. I saw him.”

“He was. He said he was”—she makes air quotes—“‘sorry he couldn’t save you,’ and he left.”

When I open my mouth, she holds up a hand. “Jess, you can’t be in a relationship when you literally”—her hand gestures at the hospital bed—“can’t stand on your own two feet. It’s not healthy—for either of you.”

I want to protest, I want to argue, but I’m suddenly so tired.

And I know she’s right. I can’t burden Cal with my crap. He’s got enough of his own to deal with. So I nod.

“I’ll be back,” she says.

And I’m alone again.

When I walkinto my chilly, dank apartment after almost a week away, I have to admit it was nice to hole up at my parents’ and let my mom take care of me after I got out of the hospital. I’m so grateful that I have my family’s support. Like me, my parents were wary at first about this new diagnosis because of the blame foisted on them by doctors when I was a teenager, but body dysmorphia, as bizarre as it sounds, makes more sense to all of us.

I don’t quite understand it yet, but it seems that being bullied because of my reading struggles were a contributing factor. The crisis point most likely hit when I lost my ballet body. Feelings of failure sent me into a tailspin, resulting in misapprehensions and obsessions around the size of my breasts. Even though it’s all pretty new, the psychologist I talked to at the body dysmorphia disorder clinic at Brown University convinced me that it’s worth taking some time to work with them intensively. She’s pretty confident that once they get me on the road to recovery, I can work with a therapist locally to continue the process.

Running my hand along the smooth surface of my ballet barre, I can’t help checking out my silhouette in the mirror. Obsessively checking one’s appearance is apparently part of the disorder. I never really thought about how much time I spend looking in mirrors. I mean, when you take ballet seriously, you’re surrounded by them. Monitoring your form in the mirror is part of the process.

My parents’ house doesn’t have any full-length mirrors—I don’t know how my mom gets dressed without one—and the bathroom mirror at the hospital was one of those tilted, blurry things where you can barely see well enough to brush your teeth. It’s been a weird mix of relief and anxiety to be away frommymirrors. A slightly different mix of relief and anxiety to look at my reflection now. My breasts look the same—ugly. Leaning in, I’m not sure if the wrinkle situation is the same or not. I’m actually not sure if I can believe anything I see. I know I don’t have a ballet body, but I’m not sure of anything else.

I guess that’s why I am turning my life upside down to go to Rhode Island. Closing my eyes, I remind myself of the list of tasks I need to accomplish so I can leave town. When I open them, I avoid my reflection as I draw the curtain to hide it.

The shudder that goes through me once I can no longer see myself is a familiar one. I never thought about the ritual I go through every day when I open and close that curtain. Yet another thing to delve into, I guess.

Before I can do that, though, I need to sit down and listen to the answering machine messages that have built up over the week. The little red light is practically strobing, it’s blinking so fast. Thinking about what might be waiting for me on that tiny little cassette has the spot behind my solar plexus clenching, so instead of pushing the button, I bustle around packing clothes and cleaning out my fridge until there’s only a half hour left before I have to leave for Providence. If I’m going to make it in time for check-in, it’s now or never.

Part of me wants to erase it all, but my curiosity must be stronger than my fear of the unknown because my finger pushes play.

BEEP. Jessica, darling, it’s Mira. I hope you’re feeling better. Bella let us know you were in the hospital. I want you to know that we are happy to consider you for both shows without a callback and will get back to you with casting as soon as we can. Take care of yourself.

The next couple messages are about auditions that I missed this week. I already called the casting directors in town to let them know that I won’t be available for the rest of March, so I don’t need to deal with them. I got my dance classes covered while I was at my parents’ house too.

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