spoons full of peanut butter

It wasn't what I was looking for. And I should know by now the risk I am taking when I open the lid to that particular black box. If I was smart I would label it "school" or "college". Then I would at least have some warning.

The last time I opened it searching for a stray car title I came up with my sisters autopsy results. It is that kind of box. 

But there is a lot of good stuff in there too, like the whole linage of early man meticulously mapped out, physics notes dotted with poetry, an inch thick packet of morphology sketches, and half a dozen articles in support of the theory that man evolved to run & ran to evolve. 

Then there are the surprises. Like this time. Pulling out an old note from a friend commenting on the results of a series of lab tests of mine. Not just any lab tests, the ones that would eventually lead to my diagnosis as a diabetic.

The blood draw done at student health after I passed out in class in front of 200+ of my peers while Dr. Linton, my physiology professor glared.

Everyone was so sure they knew what was wrong. Judges stacked the jury. They all pointed the finger straight at me: I was starving myself. 

And although that might have been partially true, it wasn't the cause: it was one of the symptoms. When I ate I couldn't concentrate. 

I was on campus 16+ hours a day balancing kids, school, a research grant, rotations, and nursing a baby. So I pushed back a few meals to buy myself the time I needed to think clearly. 

Then the hours between became days and I started dropping weight.

My Attendings in the hospital began to collective grumble about it. 

Individually, my professors on lower campus began pulling me aside to let me know if I ever needed anything their door was always open.

Except for Linton, who stepped right in, flat out accused me of being anorexic. And before I knew it I was on the ground at his feet.

I remember being really angry that no one would listen to me. I remember being slightly offended that it could be so easily believed I would be susceptible to such a shallow, feminine weakness. 

But I also remember wondering if I was flat out crazy. If I had made it all up & perhaps what was being said about me was true. 

What I don't ever remember was being hungry. 

In the letter he was mostly agreeing with everyone else. Telling me it was my fault. Atoms of his flash temper bleeding through in heavy sarcasm and doctor speak. Telling me that I was the only person with the power to fix this for all of us. And that I was not being fair to the people who care about me. 

Within a month, after half a dozen doctor visits my true diagnosis filtered its way out. The term "anorexia" dissolved from my doctors' notes replaced by words like hypokalemia and glucose. 

What never left was my angry. 

At the first moment I had seen what I might truly be capable of I was given an anchor to carry with me. An anchor whose line was just short enough to hold me away from what it was I truly wanted to do. 

I recall the look on my Attending's face when she told me I should seek a "calmer field of medicine" than the one I was chasing.  She explained that legally & ethically, on paper it was not a deal breaker but it was something 'very much not' in my favor.

Following her advice I turned up in ped's clinic. But only long enough to have my temper break through and get me kicked out. 

Instead of finding something else, something within range I simply gave up. Treading water until I finally found a good enough reason to let it pull me under. 

When I get stir crazy I tend to lean against the line to see how much slack I have. Of course, it is always the same.  I can't do what I want.  I can't live off of a spoonful of peanut butter and a pot coffee while running twice a day and writing all night.  I am certainly too old, or at least I should be, to want any of that anyway.                

When I read his letter now, I can see from the very beginning he was actually right about me, "...you are the only person here questioning whether or not you deserve this chance, the only person doubting who you are and where you belong... you are burning down your own house."

That was a life time ago and I think it is time to throw it all away.

              

"She may know but that doesn’t mean she is foolish enough to believe." 

~Pillars of Gomorrah, mlb