Meet me again - (Sarah Paulson)

FRUSTRATION

TW - Eating-Disorder

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We waited a bit with Ms Paulson and an intern came to us. "Hi, I'm Dr Wilson, I'll bring you at the weighting." She filled some papers and I was still very weak. I was surprised they hadn't gave me food, but thankful for it as well.

"So your name is Gabrielle, and you're 17, right ?" Dr Wilson asked. I nodded, she smiled. "Well, we are ready for the weighting!" She pushed the gurney along the corridors, making conversations with Ms Paulson. "So you're a teacher ! In what subject ?"

"I'm an English teacher" Ms Paulson answered smiling.

"I hope you're nice, I've always had mean teachers who were punishing me for nothing..." Dr Wilson said, laughing at herself. "Here we are. So I'm going to help you standing and you will step on the scale."

I waited for so long to check my weigh, it was finally the time I was able to see my efforts. So I was quite happy. Dr Wilson and Ms Paulson helped me stood up and I stepped on the scale, waiting for the numbers to appear. But nothing happened.

"It's good, we're finish!" Dr Wilson said, helping me to lay on the gurney again.

"What ? But I didn't see my weigh! The scale is broken!" I said quite angry.

"No honey, the scale is made so that patients can't see their weight. It's about recovery, especially in eating disorders." Dr Wilson said, trying to reassure me.

"But that's not right! That's my body, I have the right to know my weigh! And I don't have eating disorder so what's the matter ??" I started to get upset. Ms Paulson, still holding my hand squeeze it to calm me down. "Hey hey, it's okay Gabrielle, it's nothing."

"Nothing ?!" I said as I got up from the gurney. "It's not nothing! It's very important you don't understand!". Ms Paulson tried to lay me down again on the gurney but I was moving too much so Dr Wilson helped her.

"Gabrielle you have to calm down right now." The stern tone of Ms Paulson made me stop fussing. I looked at her in the eyes, with so much rage in mine.

"Stay still honey, and let's talk with the doctors about what we are doing now." She was still so serious, so I stopped fighting and I stayed still until we reached the room. Dr Robbins was already here and Dr Wilson gave her the results of my weighting and the exams from the paramedics. I wasn't feeling very great when I saw the look of both doctors. Ms Paulson saw it too because she squeeze my hand, like it was bad.

"So Gabrielle, it's clear that you suffer from eating disorder. More precisely anorexia." Dr Robbins started. "So we're going to look for the better way to help you through it, but for now, you are very underweight, underfeed and clearly starving." Ms Paulson was very shocked at this statement. She wiped a single tear and kept listening Dr Robbins. "We have two possibilities to feed you right now." I shivered at this sentence. The idea of eating scared me so much.

"The first possibility is to give you a meal tray, that you will eat in front of us, to make sure you eat everything. And the bathroom will be closed after to make sure you keep the food inside." I swallowed the lump on my throat and I shook my head to make them understand that I refused this possibility. "Otherwise, we will put a naso-gastric tube down to your stomach, from your nose, to give your body the food that it need." This possibility scared me even more. I didn't realize I was shaking until Ms Paulson stroke my head and squeezed my hand. "It's okay honey, you can choose. What do you prefer ?" she asked.

I suddenly imagine how it must felt to have a tube in your nose, that you can't put out, and which feed you by force. I shivered at this idea, so I came to terms with it.

"I don't want the tube, it seems too horrible." I said, still shaking.

"Okay so you choose the meal tray ?" Dr Robbins asked, knowing the answer. I nodded out of spite.