MINTZ: Thanksgiving for Beginners

Thanksgiving in my house has always been political.

Not political in the sense that we argue about the government over turkey and stuffing (although I was sitting at the kid’s table for the 19th year in a row, so I guess I wouldn’t really know). Despite how my ultra-conservative cousin got on my back just four days prior to Thanksgiving about how I’m attending a “super liberal” university, my actual Thursday evening dinner this year was fairly devoid of political debates.

Thanksgiving is political because, for 18 years, Thanksgiving in my house was a fight between my eating disorder, everyone else and me.

Thanksgiving 2004. I am 9 years old, and I haven’t taken one bite of food all day because I’m so nervous for the feast to come later. We will go to my great-grandmother’s country club, and the meal will probably be delicious, but I will fake a stomachache and not eat a thing. I drink water to feign the feeling of fullness and get nauseous as the scent of sweet potatoes fills my senses. I tell everyone that I hate sweet potatoes, when really I’ve just never tried them. But I know that they’re made with a lot of butter, and so I hate them by default.

I pointed out to my mother on Wednesday as we were designating which side dishes go on which plates that Thanksgiving is actually a pretty racist holiday, but it’s so steeped in tradition that at this point, we can’t not celebrate it. She kind of rolled her eyes and asked me, “Remember when you didn’t eat anything?” I kind of laughed and replied, “Which plates do you want the pot-stickers on?” Because I don’t know what to say.

The holidays are always hard for people with eating disorders, even me, whose eating disorder has been in remission for two years now. And she knows that. It takes patience to deal with someone with an eating disorder around the holidays, because you just want to shake them and tell them to enjoy themselves. Believe me, they want to enjoy themselves. But it’s just not that easy.

Thanksgiving, 2012. I am 17 years old, and I weigh far less than I probably should. I cry when I wake up because it hits me – really hits me – that it’s Thanksgiving, and I will be expected to eat. I almost faint when I try to get up out of bed, but that feeling of gravity loss still does not persuade me to eat. I watch the food being prepared, and I am ever so eager to help out, but I do not dare take a bite or pretend like I am hungry. Around 2:30 p.m., my mother begs me to eat something before the rest of our family starts to come over. First I cry, but then I give in. I eat a 90-calorie yogurt, savoring every last bite because that’s the sort of screwed-up thing you do when you have an eating disorder. You are at once repulsed and fascinated by food. At the actual dinner itself, I pick at turkey and Brussels sprouts and eat the smallest oatmeal raisin cookie I can find for dessert.

Thanksgiving of 2012 was probably the worst Thanksgiving I’ve ever had, but I remember every single detail about it because I vowed myself to never let it happen again. I went Black Friday shopping with some of my best friends after the meal was over, sustaining myself for countless hours on only turkey and that stupid cookie. I probably had coffee somewhere in there too, to make me feel like a normal person – well, as normal as one can be on a diet of practically nothing. Thinking about it now makes me sick to my stomach, thinking about how I could have been so low as to be perfectly fine with everyone’s disdainful glares, with everyone asking me, “Casey, why don’t you eat more?” or “Casey, aren’t you hungry?”

I never told anyone this, but I fainted in the bathroom of the mall at 8 a.m. on Black Friday of 2012. I definitely deserved the bump and nasty headache that came with it.

The decision to finally recover from my eating disorder was not a simple one, and it was met with many setbacks. I’ve written before that we live in a culture that practically perpetuates eating disorders, and I was never more cognizant of that than when I was recovering from a life-threatening one. I stumbled a few times, but eventually, I found my stride. The very same family that made Thanksgivings torturous made sure that I finally enjoyed myself on the holiday. My sister finally convinced me to try sweet potatoes, and now they reign as my favorite Thanksgiving side dish. My mother eased my troubles and made sure that the holidays weren’t too overwhelming on my First Good Thanksgiving, as I called it in 2013.

I quite literally had to learn how to eat again when I recovered, and no time was this harder than the holiday season. But eventually I learned how, and I am much better for it.

Thanksgiving, 2014. I am 19 years old, and I eat like a normal person. I have chips with spinach and artichoke dip, pot-stickers and celery with blue cheese dressing as appetizers. I eat turkey, corn bread, mashed potatoes and a hefty helping of sweet potatoes. I take a slice of pumpkin pie for dessert. I enjoy every bite, and it is a wonderful reminder that I am finally free.