Wow. Long time, no update! I'm sorry for the (very long) wait. I'm sure this story has been forgotten by many of its followers – including me, but I felt obliged to continue!
From where I last left off, Sandy, JJ's mother, came to visit her daughter and quickly realised that JJ had relapsed. Emily overheard the entire conversation. This chapter is still based in JJ's apartment in order to slow the story down slightly, as I felt it was a bit rushed after I read through it again.
Prepare for an emotional rollercoaster! I tried my absolute best to try and convey that eating disorders are not a choice, and I was very careful with my choice of words.
Again, this story is based entirely on my own experience. Eating disorders will not manifest the same way in everyone. The same trigger warnings still apply.
JJ felt lost. Her head immediately started to spin...around...and around. Images from her childhood and adolescence in the confines of the white walls of the eating disorder clinic resurfaced in her mind – the feeding tube, the screaming, the movement restriction, not being allowed to leave her bed, the endless hours of group therapy, discharge, relapse, repeat.
Tears left her tired, blue eyes and strolled down her cheeks. She tried with all her might to stop the sobs, for fear that Emily would hear, but she failed nonetheless. You idiot. Now everyone's going to know how worthless you really are.
Her mother's comforting embrace did little to sooth her. Though the blonde's relationship with her mother drastically improved once she was discharged from the clinic for the final time at the age of seventeen, JJ had learned to fend for herself. Talking to people about her problems still terrified her, and she guessed it was because of her sister, Rosaline. Each and every time Ros tried to open up to her father, whom she was closest with, she was inevitably shut down.
"You don't know what love is!"
The memory of the argument between JJ's father and her sister appeared in her mind.
As she held her sister's necklace close to her heart, she observed the interaction. Through the small gap in the door, JJ could see her father yelling at Rosaline in the doorway of the older girl's bedroom. Rosaline didn't look well, from what JJ could remember. She had lost weight, her blue eyes were encompassed by dark purple rings, and she was just...angry...at her family, and at the world.
Rosaline's appearance made JJ wonder if her sister had shared the same problems with self-image, control and food that she herself experienced from the age of twelve – just shortly after her lifeline had disappeared from the world.
"It's going to be okay, Jennifer."
JJ was pulled back to the present by a soft voice. She took a step back to look into her Mom's eyes. The older woman looked nothing but worried. Her green eyes, different from those of her daughter's, showed understanding and concern. But, JJ could also see a slight hint of anger and disappointment. The younger blonde couldn't help but feel like she had failed her parents, and her team, who she also considered family.
"To hell is it going to be okay!" The shout escaped her lips before she could stop herself.
"Do you know what those shrinks called me?"
A look of confusion crossed Sandy's face and she shook her head slightly. It had been a few years since she had had to think about her daughter's struggle with the disorder. It was a time of pain and grief, and she had shoved it to the very back of her mind, in hopes that she would never have to think about it again.
"UPMC's Most Difficult Patient! Jailbird Jareau!" JJ continued. Her voice raised an octave higher than usual. The blonde chuckled angrily and her fists clenched by her side.
"I –I used to wear it as a badge of honour, but now -" JJ shook her head, her thin, dull blonde hair falling in front of her face.
"-I'm disgusted at myself. I think about it and I want to scream, cry – or both! Those doctors didn't care about me! Nobody did." She started to become hysterical.
Sandy quickly reached out her hands and unclenched her youngest daughter's fists.
"You and I both know Jennifer that that isn't true," Sandy's voice remained soft, yet firm. She knew that yelling back would only push her daughter further away, and she wasn't going to let that happen again.
JJ moved to sit on her couch. A wave of dizziness made it difficult to stand.
"Then how come you locked me away?"
Her voice was so quiet and child-like that Sandy barely heard her. The words made the mother of three's heart shatter into a million pieces.
"Oh Jen," JJ's mother knelt in front of the younger woman. She reached out with her hand and tipped up her chin so that they were once again looking into each other's eyes.
"We were trying to save you, Honey. We wanted to give you the best possible chance. Believe me when I say that it was so, so hard for us to practically sign you away into the hands of the inpatient clinic doctors. It's not often that you hear of a twelve year old girl nearly dying of a heart attack because of an eating disorder."
"But, I could've gone through outpatient services! I could have gone to a normal school, had normal friends, played soccer in high school like a normal teenager! But you and Dad took all of that away from me!"
Sandy knew that JJ wasn't being rational, yet the words struck a chord with her. Of course she felt extremely guilty that she had not noticed just how unwell her little twelve-year-old girl was. She was still grieving the loss of another child and had forgotten to check in with how her youngest girl was doing. While Sandy had lost one daughter to depression, she failed to acknowledge at the time that JJ had just lost a sister – her best friend...her lifeline. Sandy sighed.
"You know deep down JJ that outpatient wouldn't have worked. You needed to be monitored constantly because of your heart...and God Jennifer, we didn't take your teenage years away from you, this disease...this bitch did," Sandy took deep breaths and closed her eyes, trying to regain composure.
"Anorexia took away my little girl," Sandy's voice suddenly became very quiet. "I only got to see you on weekends for years. Every time your father and I would sit by your bed and try to talk to you, you would just stare at the wall in front of your bed, staring at the clock, counting down the hours until we had to leave," a tear fell down her face.
"Then you were finally discharged when you were nearly fourteen, oh we were so happy. Everything was going to return to normal and we could move on," a sad smile graced Sandy's lips, but it was quickly replaced with a look of pure regret.
"But then, you began hiding food again. You shoved it in your pockets at the kitchen table, you threw your school lunches in the rubbish bins even though teachers were told to keep an eye on you. You- you even started making yourself sick! I'll never forget that day I found you passed out on the bathroom floor beside the toilet!" Sandy wiped the tears that had begun to fall and laughed bitterly at no one in particular.
"Then you were admitted again," her eyes stared intently at her daughter's face. JJ's eyes were bloodshot from all of the crying, but her mind was clearly focused on her mother's every word. She had never heard this story from her Mom's point-of-view.
"You were so determined not to have a feeding tube that you accidentally kicked a poor student nurse in the face!" Sandy smiled as she heard JJ genuinely laugh.
"I remember that! I broke her nose and there was blood everywhere," the younger woman laughed as she recalled the experience. "Ciara never came near me after that unless she was accompanied by a senior resident!"
Sandy chuckled and patted her daughter's knee.
"You were always stubborn, just like your sister," Sandy's eyes glazed over as she reminisced about her middle child. Her gorgeous, gorgeous girl.
"Do you know why we fought so hard to keep you in inpatient? Even when doctors told us that they were losing hope? That they doubted you'd be admitted again after your second relapse? You had just turned sixteen."
JJ shook her head. It honestly puzzled her why her mother would willingly keep her daughter away from her, in a place that she openly despised. Of course, she knew that she'd probably be dead otherwise, but it surely went against all of the maternal instincts in her Mom's body.
"Because of Rosaline."
JJ froze, "What?" she asked in disbelief.
"I knew Rosaline would be looking down on us from above. And I most certainly knew she would hate me if I let you slip through my fingers, just like I had let her."
Sandy shook her head in dismay, "I know that she'd be so proud of you, Honey." Sandy's hand raised and caressed her daughter's gaunt cheek.
"You beat his bitch once. You powered through despite all of the ups and downs – and injuries you caused those poor, unsuspecting nurses," JJ smiled weakly at her mother's attempt to humour her.
"You won the fight – and, well, Ros didn't."
JJ's smile quickly disappeared. She blinked rapidly and suddenly everything clicked into place in her mind.
"I was right," JJ murmured beneath her breath.
Sandy paused, unsure whether or not she had heard her daughter correctly.
"I was right," JJ repeated slightly louder. She tried to stop the anger that began to pulsate through her petite body.
"W-Why d-didn't you tell me?!"
"JJ- Honey, you were so young! How do you explain to an eleven-year-old that her sister killed herself because of an evil voice in her head telling her to stop eating, among other things?"
A strangled sob escaped JJ's mouth and her head lowered towards her knees. She didn't know how to feel – angry? Sad? Relieved?
"I blamed myself."
The words that left her daughter's mouth hit Sandy like a train.
"N-No Jen -"
"I blamed myself for her death, I thought it was my fault. Had I just gone into the bathroom ten minutes earlier, maybe she'd still be here? Had I known that she was sick – that she was hurting – maybe I'd still have my sister!" JJ clenched her teeth. She was done holding back what she had to say.
"Maybe I would have been normal. I thought I was strange! I asked myself every. Single. Day. Why I was the one to be 'blessed' with this disorder. But no. It turns out it runs in the family! Maybe my future children are destined to be screw-ups just like their mother!"
"Jennifer, listen to me very carefully."
JJ looked at her mother. The younger woman's eyes were filled with a strange emotion – almost a mixture of relief and anger.
"What happened to your sister was a tragedy, JJ. Nobody saw it coming – and it couldn't have been prevented. She had a lot of problems, Honey, not just Anorexia. The eating disorder may have been what pushed her over the edge, but it was not the only thing that killed her."
She pulled her daughter into another hug and started to whisper into her ear.
"You cannot blame yourself for any of this. None of this is your fault. We are going to get through this again, just like we did before – just like you did before. I know I wasn't there for you as much as I should have been, and I'm sorry. I really am. I'm going to be there every step of the way this time, I promise."
Sandy was caught off guard by JJ, who pulled away from the embrace and held up one of her pinky finger. The older mother smiled at her daughter. JJ had always loved pinky-promises as a child. Although now in her mid-twenties, Sandy still saw the scared twelve-year-old girl who was carried, kicking and screaming in through the doors of the psychiatric unit for under eighteens.
Sandy wrapped her pinky finger around JJ's and smiled lovingly at her daughter.
"I promise you with all of my heart that you'll be okay, I'll make sure of it."
"I'll be okay," JJ echoed her mother's words.
Just then, a flash of brunette hair caught the corner of JJ's eye. Suddenly, the events of the night before came rushing back and JJ spun around around to see her best friend standing at the end of the hallway, tears streaming down her face. The blonde agent's bloodshot eyes widened in realisation that her best friend had heard every single word.
"Emily."
Please favourite, follow and review! It means so much to me. If you want to read more of my writing, I've recently started a new Criminal Minds story called "Altschmerz", which deals with similar themes. Apologies also for the cliffhanger in this chapter :P.