Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body

Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body by Roxanne Gay             Audiobook:  6 hours    Hardback book:  320 pages                          

Excellent book.   The deep emotional scars that Roxanne Gay opens and horrific moments in her life brought on by others inflicting pain and later by Roxanne’s own self-loathing and self-punishment.   Roxanne is of Haitian parentage and ancestry.   She grew up in America born of wealthy Haitian parents who are academics.  She never wanted for anything while home with her parents, the neighbors were all wealthy professionals whose children were thought to be good.   At 12 years of age, Roxanne fell in love with one of the “good boys” whose parents were considered society elite.   This good boy who stole Roxanne’s heart turned out to be cruel and sadistic and through her complete trust and devotion he coerced her into going with him to a private place in the woods where they could be alone, however, when they arrived at the place a bunch of his friends were waiting for them.   To her terror she found out her boyfriend set this all up with the other boys and in cahoots they held her down and gang-raped her.    This horror has affected her ever since though she has tried to come to terms with it and get past it.    In trying to deal with the memories she began to feel she had somehow brought it on and continued to have a relationship with the boy.   Though all of the boys told others at school what they had done everyone looked down on Roxanne calling her slut and worse.    She had no friends when she tried to reach out to other girls they would call her names and humiliate her.  She finally begged her father to send her to Exeter a prestigious private boarding school (and the most expensive private boarding school in the U.S.) so that she could start over where no  one knew her.   Life was tolerable for a while but she could not rid herself of the shame and began to eat to self-medicate to try to make the bad feelings and memories go away.    She gained 30 lbs. the first year there.   When she went home during the holidays her family freaked.   They tried to help her but also they criticized her and made fun of her for being what they considered so fat.   Their jibes did not stop her food bingeing.     Relationships came and went both male and female and her weight rose with every new criticism by friend, foe and family.    The more they made her feel bad about her weight the more she ate to make herself feel calmer.   She began to avoid going home and finally stopped going home all together though her parents continued to support her in school and for a time on her own until she disappeared because she could not take their criticisms anymore.    She dove into a pit of perversions with strangers, and taking chances with her life with sordid characters she met over the internet or on the street.   She would do anything to try to make the awful pain go away but it never did and she began to feel so low she let others degrade her because she thought it might purge her of her awfulness.    And her weight continued to rise.    Her story is such a brutal one but such an intense look into the psyche of a highly functioning yet broken human being.       Excellent portrait of bulimia and its underlying causes and how body image can blind the public to the person.   This is the most honest life story I have ever read.     Excellent book.