“I’m sorry. But can I make a reservation?”

I’m sitting on a train to Boston. The seats are wide and comfortable. For the most part, things are quiet, other than the occasional murmur of a conversation. 

A few stations ago, a group of young women got on the train. They were trying to sit near each other. I cleared the seat next to me for one of them, and went back to reading my book.

“I’m sorry to bother you but…”

It was her friend’s voice across the aisle that broke into my concentration. None of them were loud, but it was the “I’m sorry” that kept me re-reading the same paragraph.

In the space of a less than two minute conversation, the girl had said it SIX times. 

Last night I attended my first group therapy session. I’m on a waiting list to be matched with an affordable professional for my individual journey. Hopefully one versed in dealing with anxiety and eating disorders.

But in the meantime, it was suggested that I try out the motivation drop in group that meets online weekly. I was told it might help simply to feel supported, or to listen to what others are saying about challenges they are facing.

It was only recently that I began speaking out publicly about these issues that affect my daily life. In the past, I felt I had to put on a brave face, smile at the world, and never let on that inside was a constant battle. That a relentless conversation went on in my head about whether it was okay to eat, did I earn the right to eat, was I going to be worthy of eating, was it really necessary to eat.

And like the proverbial snake that swallows its own tail, my anxiety - an entity completely separate and stemming from traumatic experiences in my past - fed the eating disorder. While the eating disorder - an issue with roots in my childhood - increased my anxiety.

Last Sunday night I challenged myself to be BRAVE. Not the loud in your face kind of courage that the world seems to applaud when it goes viral on Instagram posts. 

But the quiet bravery. The one that requires a strength no one can visually see most days. But that must be felt in your core.

The task set at hand was a long time coming. I’d been holding on to something far longer than necessary. Twelve somethings it would turn out to be. And three hours of tearing and ripping and trying not to shake and cry and scream all at once.

Last Sunday I tore up my journals. Over 3000 pages documenting scary moments that I would never have imagined, yet actually lived through.

And in doing so, I hoped to free myself from the weight of carrying around visual reminders of a nightmare that I still re-live often in my sleeping hours. But maybe, just maybe, the process of destroying these journals would also sever the link that tethered me to my past.

Maybe I would finally be free to move forward.

But like many good stories, to understand how I got to this place where destruction allowed me to rebuild my life, we have to start in the past. 

It’s Friday, November 8, 2024. I’m sitting at a coffee shop. In a town I love. After stopping by to check on my wonderful hair stylist. A gay man who is scared about what the election results mean for him and his husband. 

Earlier today I texted some of my transgender friends. They had to pull their child out of school for a day because she was so scared. They are checking their passports to make sure they are in order. Not because they want to leave the country. But because they are afraid they won’t be able to get a passport in the future. Or at least one that correctly identifies them. 

My favorite librarian is worried about his disabled sister’s benefits as the day care center has already made her feel like her care is in jeopardy. He is working two jobs as it is, to make sure his family is cared for properly. 

It’s barely been 48 hours since the election results were announced and I know of no one in my close friend group who is NOT experiencing shock, horror, fear, anger, disappointment, sadness, or a myriad of other negative emotions.

I spent yesterday in tears. Sobbing, ugly, hiccuping tears. And when I finally pulled myself together enough to head to a coffee shop, I cried silently walking the streets to the cafe, as the raindrops fell. Later I cried again. And again. And again.

I woke this morning to a haunted look on my face. And the question in my heart: “With everything going so right in my life, what could possibly have me falling apart so greatly?”

The answer is not so simple. But it starts with something that sounds almost fantastical in its phrasing - INTERNET TROLLS.

When I was a little girl, I loved the stories that included mythological creatures. There was one in which a hero had to cross a bridge. But the bridge was guarded by trolls who lived under it. You wouldn’t even know they existed, until you tried to cross the bridge. And then they appeared to extract their price - in some rather gruesome versions of the story, it was a pound of flesh. 

Interestingly, the bridges in all these stories were actually public structures. The trolls had no more right to take a fee, than did anyone else. But they felt entitled or superior. Or perhaps they merely hated others who walked boldly in plain sight while they felt they had to hide. (Although I’ve never come across a version of the story in which anyone treated them badly until the trolls struck first.)