Addictions vs. Anorexia (thoughts while watching Euphoria Season II)
I am a little late to the party, but the Crave TV show Euphoria has become one of my recent obsessions. I love it for its rawness, how it doesn’t shy away from any topic, its artful and creative way of portraying every thought and feeling in every aspect-- from the camera angle to the music selection.
And above all, as unrealistic as this show may be in compared to the average kid’s high school experience, I love how realistic it is in its depiction of a lot of the issues the kids find themselves in-- especially in season II.
Without any intention of giving anything away, I will give a spoiler alert here in case you haven’t jumped onto the Euphoria train yet. Early in season II, there is the episode where Rue finds herself in an intervention. She’s been flying under the radar, using for months without anyone the wiser, until one of her fellow users lets her momma in on the secret.
When Rue walks into the door and is confronted about using again, her instinctive reaction is anger and denial: She shouts at her mother, accuses her of making false assumptions, dares her to drug test her, and spews hurtful, hateful things.
In that moment, had you never met or seen Rue as the genuinely good human she is, you would probably assume her to be a selfish, manipulative monster, and undeserving of any help anyone was trying to give.
But Rue is anything but a monster, as you know if you have watched any of the other episodes in this series, where her strength and silliness and heart of compassion and fire emanate.
What she is, is an addict. Its drugs that have hijacked her compassion, and her ability to think and act rationally, just as its Anorexia that commandeers a person’s brain and body..
And an addict, as it turns out, behaves an awful lot like someone with anorexia when they are cornered and cut off from their drug of choice-- whether that be opiates, cocaine, or an eating disorder. The horrible things Rue was screaming at her family were not far off from some of the things I shouted in the moments that I was confronted by my parents at the height of my ED.
As trivial as it sounds, when my brain was not so much my own but hijacked by rigid thoughts and restrictions, the simple act of being offered a bagel triggered a huge fear response, that sent me into a raging fury.
Like Rue, my anger and hatred was not really at my mother or anyone at all. It wasn’t even really anger, but a secondary emotion to the intense paralyzing fear that was taking over at the thought of being forced away from the one lifeline you had to see you through the drudgery that was everyday. It’s not only the drug that is addictive -- its the habit and rituals around it.
From the transaction or purchase, to the act of grinding or rolling or lighting or any other means of preparation, to the room, or place, or any other accompanying ritual. It starts you feeling high before the actual high even hits.
Its the same with an eating disorder.
When I was deep in anorexia, every skipped meal I got away with, or calories negated, or kilometres run was a hit. Even planning it out in my head, the euphoric lightness would begin to manifest. And in the beginning, it was a high that I could ride for hours at a time. I was so hooked on this feeling of euphoric emptiness and accomplishment, that I began to schedule my life in accordance with how to get that feeling more often.
Which often meant isolating myself by skipping events where there would be a big meal served, or turning down trips or party invites or even spontaneous hangouts if it would interfere with a run or workout I usually did at that time.
The thing is, just like anyone who has done drugs will understand, the euphoria of the first high changes. It starts taking more and more hits, and it still doesn’t last as long. Its like you started chasing the high to feel good-- but when you’re in deep, you’re chasing it just to avoid feeling awful.
Rue’s overdose, and subsequent close calls in Season 2, show exactly that. By the time the intervention occurs, she appears to function more normally while on cocktails of drugs and powders than when she is reduced to a trembling, sweating and stuttering mess after what seems to be less than a day of being clean.
I experienced a similar shift after the first few months of my anorexia. After that brief honeymoon period, when restricting came easily, not eating started to become more difficult, in every sense: physically, socially, and mentally. I didn’t like the rituals and rules that controlled my life.
I hated that I felt so terrified and powerless around food.
I hated that others could eat whatever and whenever they wanted and I was pervasively anxious about the timing and calories and macronutrients of any morsel I put in my body.
I absolutely hated waking up knowing the first thing I had to do was put my body through an intense exercise session for the 7th morning that week.
But the only worse feeling than doing these things was not doing them.
And that was the truth that hit so close to home watching the scene with Rue in the car with her mother and sister. She had just surrendered, just barely, during the intervention at Lexi’s house, and relented to being driven to the ER. Already, withdrawal was beginning to set in, and the physical symptoms she knew needed to be treated.
However, in a moment of terrifying realization, it hit her that she was about to have to endure an extremely painful, almost unbearable period of recovery where her body and mind would be in withdrawal, and she would be no drug (literally) to numb the pain.
In that moment she hurls herself out of the car and sprints across the six lane highway, because that feels more doable than learning to exist without her lifeline.
While the physical pain of recovering from an eating disorder isn’t the same as that of a drug or alcohol addiction (although it does have its own set of physical discomforts ie. refeeding syndrome, gastro issues, night sweats, swelling, etc) the notion of jumping into recovery and surrendering from your eating disorder completely feels similarly impossible.
Because on the verge of taking that (forced) leap into what feels like a foreboding abyss, it feels as if letting go if that lifeline could very well kill you.
And any rational thought you had ever had about maybe fixing yourself up and taking your life back completely vanishes and is replaced only with the guttural instinct to survive the only way you feel you can— by the drug or habit that has kept you feeling safe and afloat until now.
Even if that means running out in the middle of rush hour traffic to do so.
If you haven’t watched Euphoria, this probably doesn’t make any sense to you (and hopefully I haven’t spoiled it too much if you pan to!) But if you have, I am curious to know how you perceived Rue in these moments. Did you consider her outburst of anger and hysterics reasonable? Or did they seem overacted or melodramatic? Have you ever felt similarly, or acted similarly, in a moment where fear has gotten the best of your own rational mind?
Having lived with an anorexic brain for many years, all the thoughts and emotions and actions someone has before and during recovery make sense to me. I understand EDs even when they are not my own.
However, watching Rue battle her addiction, while also harbouring it like her secret lover, gave me new insight into how addictions have so many parallels to eating disorders. If they weren’t so horrible, it would be almost funny how we can be so attached to the very thing that wants to kill us.
Watch euphoria (if you are over 18). You won’t regret it.
-J