Interlude, or, Thoughts from Code Name: Prison

I stand in a bathroom next to an open window. I am not allowed to flush the toilet. Someone waits for me outside the door. I expect if I turned on the water in the sink with the door still closed, there would be questions asked. The absurdity of it all hits me, so that I almost smile in spite of myself.

I take a breath and open the door. A young woman whisks in, glances at the toilet, and says, “OK.” That is my cue that I can finish now. I flush the toilet and wash my hands. The door opens onto the kitchen, and I see two or three other women congregated at one end of the kitchen island, waiting for their turn in the bathroom.

I can’t take time now to fuss with my hair, even though I’ve wanted a chance to freshen up. I will have to make due with the little mirror in the hallway, which leaves everything below the chin to the imagination.

This is Prison. At least, that’s my code name for it. It has a real name, and a website about eating disorder treatment, and there is a long waiting list to come here. I sign myself in on a Monday in April, exactly one week after running the Boston Marathon.

I want to sign myself right back out. Actually, to be fair, I cope pretty well for the first day and a half. Tuesday begins with a brain-scrambling caffeine withdrawal headache, since Prison does not permit refreshment in the form of diet Dr. Pepper. But I know I am stronger than the headache—the suffering is temporary. I have managed to unpack and organize my clothes, take a shower, and generally fall in line with the routine. It seems like I could make it here, only I can’t remember why I should try.

Sometime before the end of Tuesday, I center all my hopes on release. The Prison staff won’t have it. My opposition to treatment clashes with their good intentions. I think of the Borg from “Star Trek”: “resistance is futile.”

I distract myself by following baseball and choosing marathon pictures.

My existence in Prison evolves into a mix of real fear and ironic humor (my favorite kind). I am scared by the level of control I have relinquished to these well-meaning people, because I am convinced their very goodness will misguide them. I am scared because I don’t know when I can reestablish a sense of normalcy, or whether I can even find that again once I go home. I am scared because my running shoes are locked away in my car and my car keys are locked away “upstairs.” I’m afraid because it seems that control—however illusory—is all I have, all I can hope for or aspire to. And maybe that’s true, in Prison or out: choices may be limited, but agency can never really be taken away.

Sometimes the fear rises in my chest and my throat, and I have to tamp it down. I try to make myself laugh. Yeah, you are really being tortured here, I joke to myself. How awful, they are going to make you do yoga, and the very kind yoga teacher will expect you to lie down on a mat covered by a blanket that smells … unpleasant. This, you can’t handle?! Come on!

The humor helps. Still, it is hard to be here, and everyone else here knows it. I don’t argue with the staff when they imply that I must have been pretty desperate to come. I have no Italian villa to retire to, and even if I did, I’d go there and there I’d be—I couldn’t escape from the person I need a rest from, myself. So I didn’t retire to Italy. I drove two days to St. Louis to stay in an inconspicuous house where no one will let me run and where they talk to me about nutrition. Human beings need food, the dietitian claims. Humans need to eat whether they run or not. Well, I don’t, I think, but I learn to keep some thoughts to myself.

We have good times in captivity. I care about the people around me. I know I will think of them long after I leave. In Prison I am free to say things I wouldn’t usually say. I tell about feeling judged by the grocery store cashier who wants to chat about my purchases, while I sense the pulsing of the neon sign across my forehead blinking, “This woman does evil things with food.”

For the first time since 2009, I go days and days without running. I hear kids shooting hoops in the backyard next door and I think it sounds fun. I walk around the neighborhood with my fellow captives, noticing the interesting architecture of old houses. I sit on the porch in the sunshine and color. I dance. I start to dream about running again. I wonder wistfully about my shoes, whether they will be safe in my car. I used them for a run the morning I checked into Prison.

Two weeks and more pass. When my chance for release arrives at last, I know it will be hard to leave, just as it would be hard to stay. I try to focus on the moment. My first run is intense and sweet. My first sip of diet Dr. Pepper tastes like manna, or so I imagine. I promise myself to stay grateful for the privilege of being outside on my own.

At home, I walk down the aisles of the grocery store contemplating physical laws. In the treatment center, Code Name: Prison, some rules seemed suspended. I believe if I ate the way I ate in Prison for even a single day, I would gain weight. In Prison, I felt embarrassed to be hungry. Outside Prison, hunger comes as a sign of safety. If I am suffering, I must be doing what I’m supposed to. Outside Prison, I am preoccupied with numbers. I know the nutrition information for everything I eat. I also know that no matter how much I run, it will not be enough. I take that for granted by now.

I run anyway. Two weeks out of Prison, my speed improves, as if my body is revving up. I look forward to my next marathon, in Luxembourg on June 8. I try to appreciate moving outside in sunshine, shopping by myself, going to the bathroom without a monitor.

Life in Prison was hard, but the greater challenge is to escape the prison of my own making. For now, I try to keep the walls from closing in.