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mirrorballtales · 8 months

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Dear Reader,

I want to tell you about something I seldom talk about. It entails Paris, The Devil Wears Prada, and a psychiatric ward. This sounds like the set-up of a joke. It’s not. Although many times it feels like that’s what my life is. A series of jokes I end up laughing about, alone.

There is something I like to do every October. It’s my little not-so-secret secret. I like to put out all my Halloween decorations that have grown from two bins to nearly twenty! I love Halloween. It’s the beginning of the holiday season, the start of autumn, and there’s just this change in the air. I bask in it. I also like to sit in on my couch, cuddling now with my pup, with all the decorations softly glowing, and watch The Devil Wears Prada. Although it’s not a Halloween movie, no matter how scary Miranda Priestly is portrayed (she’s actually my hero!) it’s a movie about Andy Sachs and her fashion journey, as well as her transformation from a meek, quiet, shy young woman, to this confident, flawed, strong young woman, who finds her footing and her place in this world.

At this point you must be asking, okay, how does this intertwine with Paris or a psychiatric ward? Well. The first time I watched this movie, I had just entered my first inpatient stay in one. I was only thirteen, one of the youngest girls in the wards, I actually went in on October 2nd. Didn’t get out until October 16th. It’s strange the dates we choose to remember but I do. Without a need to jot it down my mind immediately knows and it takes me back every October. I guess in some strange sense, I have this need to commemorate that date. Like celebrate it and reflect on it.

I’ll give you a quick rundown of what that day looked like. It’s not pretty and I’ll try to keep it as succinct as possible. *TW (self-harm is mentioned in case that is something you don’t need to read) I had an awful night. An awful flashback of that summer. The detective had just finished talking to me that day. My mom blamed me for everything they’d done that night, and I had a detective continuously bring up the age of consent. As if I had some sort of say that night. I guess I was naive and had no idea what a shit society I lived in. One where girls and victims are blamed and cornered, asked why they didn’t fight harder, berated for not screaming louder, shamed for having even been in the situation in the first place. It had only been a couple of months since it happened and the mere mention of their names would bring me back to that night. That October 1st, happened to be a night like that, where I could not rid myself of their scent, the feel of their hands, the scars from their slash barely healed, the pressure, there was this heavy weight on me, and I couldn’t even cry or scream, or run to anyone. I was alone. No one to listen to me. No one to hold me. At thirteen, you can imagine it was incredibly isolating and traumatizing. I would just lay in bed with a broken heart. That night, that experience was painful but in many ways, the aftermath was much worse. And so I did the only thing that made sense in my head. I reconcile these coping mechanisms as survival instincts. I think because I was the only one fighting hard for my life that I felt this was the only way to do it. It was like teetering between life and death. Like if I could somehow make myself feel alive by physically releasing this pent up hurt, then I could continue to live. That night, I went too far. I will spare you the details but there was no hiding it. I wasn’t thinking straight. The next morning at school a friend, a good friend, reported this. Of course, being the dramatic, uninformed people that they normally were, the PET Team was called. Joy. I had to wait all afternoon - close to four hours - for two people to come interview me and determine that I was a danger to myself and/or to others. I was told “you’ll be staying at a beautiful place, with a pool, and private beds. You’ll love it.” The most humiliating part - the ambulance ride. I was literally kicking and screaming, begging not to go on the gurney, to no avail. Feisty. I was shackled to that gurney. But there was a pool so how could I complain?

The thing with psychiatric wards, you have to be admitted sitting on a gurney which somehow converts into a wheelchair, never would have known that. So this tiny, 89 lbs girl, thirteen, enters this place. Not to mention of course - I am as shy as they come and the thought of having to share a room with a stranger was dreadful. After being admitted I immediately went into my dark bedroom, got into my bed, and sobbed in the fetal position. I cried for a whole hour until a man named Papa Bear came to get me. He had to get my picture so the nurses knew what meds to give me. Wonderful. It’s funny - even in times like these, the mere mention of a picture and all you can think of is how shitty you’re about to look. Papa Bear said something funny that made me smile and snapped the picture. The Polaroid prints and he looks at it and says, “You’re too pretty to be in here and crying.” It made me smile again. There was something so kind and gentle about that. Like he still saw a girl and saw some hope in me. I sure didn’t feel pretty, doubt I looked pretty, but it didn’t matter because this stranger didn’t care.

Like I always somehow do - I adapted. Quickly. And within two days was happy to be there. I moved rooms my first night when another girl was admitted for self-harm, also thirteen. We shared our room with a third roommate, she was sixteen, different story. Not mine to tell. We would laugh and talk about getting out, why we were in there, and what boys we thought were so cute. It’s funny in a situation like ours how quickly we revert to our teenage selves. Like at our core we were just girls who wanted to have crushes and laugh and live. Sadly so many of us had that ripped away for the same reason.

My first morning - when I was given a paper with rules and goals - I was asked who I blamed for me being there. Of course I took this question literal and not like some reflective thing and wrote down the teacher’s name. The girl behind me read it and soon we realized we went to the same school. She shared her story with me. I shared mine. Little did I know her story would become mine a year later.

It became routine. A system of points. Goals. The longer you stayed, the more points you gained, the more points you accrued the more “freedoms” you could have. As an A student it only made sense I reached my goals quicker than most. I got phone privileges within days, a longer night curfew, permission to go out and have my meals at the cafeteria, AT (activity therapy) and the coveted pool time. But the one I’d been wanting after being stripped of tv and internet was movie night.

At this time in my life I think I was so lost in my pain that I couldn’t even manage to escape in a book or a movie until one night. We’d all had a hard group therapy. I’d gone days without a single visit or call from my mom and although friends came every evening, in the quiet of the night everything would come rushing in. It was starting to catch up to all of us. For the most part we all began our inpatient programs around the same time so we delved deep into our trauma together. For some reason being raped doesn’t make it any easier to hear that someone else had also been raped, or had been abandoned, or was being abused by their brother, or grandfather, or whatever sick person decided to also hurt them. They could see it in our faces. Eight of us had a movie night privilege. We begged the night staff to allow the other girls to join us. After begging they finally broke and allowed it. One of the girls, a nine year old, had taken to me, and wanted to snuggle right with me, she’d also been abandoned by her mom, and was in a foster home. I shared my blanket. It was nice to feel needed. Now came the hard part. Picking the movie.

All of us hovered over this black binder filled with tons of DVDs. We were taking forever and after arguing I suggested a movie I’d never seen - The Devil Wears Prada. The scarlet stiletto on the disc called to me.

We all had our snacks and the movie began.

For the first time, in months, I felt a semblance of my old self. The girl next to me fell asleep. We were all quiet. The living room was dark, and we all were curled up in our blankets. I was enchanted. With Andrea (Andy). With Miranda and her infamous monologue on Cerulean sweaters. With Emily. With Nigel. The clothes. THE Chanel boots. The iconic montage of Andy’s outfits with Madonna’s “Vogue” playing in the background. My favorite scene, with my favorite outfit I’ve ever recreated, a tweed cabby hat, white dress shirt, black off the shoulder sweater, and Azure Ray’s “Sleep” playing while Andy contemplates taking Emily’s place for Paris. The score. The soundtrack. And then, like magic, after being in the dark, U2s “City of Blinding Lights” comes on and the Eiffel Tower shines in all its glory. Paris is bright, Andrea is captivated with the city. As am I. I’d known Paris. Always wondered about it. But that scene, the way Andy looks out the car window, I wanted nothing but to be her and be in Paris. I wanted to wear a pretty dress and drive by the Eiffel Tower while it glitters in the dark night. For the first time in a long time, I wanted back my future. And hope returned. With trepidation but it did. It felt like I was the only one awake and right there and then I decided I would try. I would try find myself again. Do everything to get to Paris. The first step was to get out. And step into the daylight.

After the movie ended, I went to bed dreaming of the city. So foreign to me and yet it felt like that’s where I belonged. Like I’d always known it. I could close my eyes and know where to go and how to get there.

That night ignited my everlasting love for Paris.

Life has not been so kind and life was not kind after my first stay. It only got darker and darker but my only hope, my reason for living was Paris.

I worked hard to one day have my Andy Sachs moment. Too many days and nights felt like I’d never get there. Like I was in this never ending dark night. I almost didn’t make it. Until I finally did. Every single night of hell, every single painful day, every night I spent crying or wanting to die, all evaporated when I landed in Paris.

I remember sitting on the vedette thinking about thirteen year old me. How alone and hurt I was the night I watched The Devil Wears Prada for the first time. And how I was now where I wanted to be that night and so many other nights. My own two eyes reflected the glow of that iron statue. It reflected my journey, sometimes dark, sometimes lonely, sometimes full, but for that night, filled with light.

I’d finally stepped into the daylight. And for a moment, let it all go. Right there and then I was being defined not by the things that were haunting me in the middle of the night but by the things I loved. I saw Paris and I saw that maybe I deserved to be here.

To honor that thirteen year old girl, and her dreams, every October I continue this tradition. I know to most it might seem silly and childish, so I’ve been told, but that dream kept me alive all those years. For that, I hold this film in my heart with a belief that I was meant to see it that night. To finally see daylight.

The vedette waiting for me. It was my first sunset in Paris.

The first time seeing the iron giant glow. This was my Andy Sachs moment.

At the top of Arc de Triomphe. Yes I walked all those steps. It was worth the climb.

My favorite. Paris. In the rain. *I bought a striped orange dress this particular rainy day. It is one of my favorite dresses. My feet were soaked at this point and I’d gotten lost. Ten of us were taking cover.

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