Dear Daniel

Dear Daniel,

If there was an immediate escape hatch to this house I would access it and use it at this very instant. I know my ship will come in, but waiting for it is painful, hurtful, and sometimes I feel like I’m drowning in the sea of my mother’s judgment, her need to control, and her shocking lack of empathy at times.

No, Amy, you’re eating well, you exercised? Well, you didn’t do it right. Can you afford those calories? Did you walk far enough? Is your corner clean enough? No, Amy, no gratitude for you eating your own dinner and cleaning up after yourself.

I know I’m an adult and reinforcement for this shit isn’t really needed but complaining about your life to me when you’ve kind of made that bed for yourself does little to make me feel bad for you.

Yes, I know your sister came closer to death than any of us are comfortable with. It shook me to the core too. Only I got the message. The road you’re on leads to the same place as Debbie’s. Heart attack, diabetes, insulin, poor kidney function, flirtation with death. I don’t want that. I’ve started on the path back several times since our initial heart to heart over this, Daniel. Yet I’ve never been more determined to stay the course.

I don’t want the health complications before 40. As for that I already suffer from acid reflux. I’m 38, I weigh 299lbs. I may not have the health problems but I’m certainly at risk for stuff that will kill me sooner rather than later.

As for my mother, she’s at risk too. Maybe more so now than at any other time in her life, but as much as she wants to lecture me and Debbie she is in as much denial telling me why she can’t do anything about her weight just yet. And why she’s not as bad off as me or her sister.

You can’t make people stop doing something they are getting a payoff from. It took my aunt almost dying to get the message, you’re on a dangerous path. Your dreams you so aspire to? If you don’t change your ways that television you want so much to create and write for? Will never happen. Those trophies you covet so much from the Emmys, the Golden Globes, and the Oscars? You will never have a chance to dress for them, get an invitation from them, be nominated by them.

And lastly, those heroes you want to thank in person, you’ll be six feet under and they’ll never know just how much of an impact they made on your life.

So here I am, at day four, hoping my family does not sabotage me in my attempts to take control of the one part of my life that seems to have eluded me. My food addiction. Because when I do finally take that stage I want to be Cinderella at the ball with her significant other on her arm and writing partner at her side, triumphing over every bad thing that has ever happened to me in my life and be able to smile and feel joy instead of the pain that sometimes suffocates me in my present day life.

Sincerely,

Amy McCorkle