The room started to spin. I felt anxious like I might never get through the pre-calculus test in front of me. Everyone else in the class had started to finish but I was only halfway done. I felt totally faint and then the Ms. Kenney’s class in the annex building at my old middle school went black. The next thing I remember is waking up to an empty classroom with only the teacher still present.
This is what I recall from that day, but friends recount something different. I was taking the test and I was the last to finish, but I did turn the test in completed. I didn’t look well though. I was pale and sweaty. When I sat back down after handing the paper in I laid my head down and went to sleep. On the outside it just appeared that I was not feeling well. No one realized the torment raging inside.
There was still another period left before classes ended for the day and basketball practice followed the school day. I would not be attending either of these things that day. I didn’t have the strength. I could barely walk to the car when my mom arrived at school early to pick me up after being informed that I was ‘sick’. They had no idea how sick I truly was.
I made a miraculous ‘recovery’ that evening though after eating a snack at home and then a small dinner I felt completely normal again. Who knew that food was all it would take to give a 14 year old, 5’2’’, 100 lb girl all her strength back? Everyone would have known if only someone knew my secret. I had not eaten a single bite of food in a good 2 days. I had lost 40 pounds and grown 4 inches since my disease began 8 months before, but no one connected the dots. This made part of me artificially glad that I could go on living to die. It made a bigger part of me sad. I felt more alone than ever that no one cared enough to see what was right there, all the evidence of my sickness displayed so clearly. In retrospect I realize I wanted someone to find out my secret, but when no one did I instead had an excuse to continue.
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