How are your eyes?
That’s all anyone ever wants to know these days: How my eyes are doing after my collision with Lasik almost three years ago. Are they still dry? Do they still hurt when exposed to sunlight? Is my vision still blurred? And what about glasses — am I still wearing them?
The answer: Yes, yes, yes and yes. Emphatically, resoundingly, blindingly yes. My eyes sting. They burn. I look at neon signs and the colors bleed into a fluorescent Rorschach test. I have difficulty deciphering black lettering on white boards; I have personally helped elevate the stock of Allergan, which manufactures Refresh Plus, the drops that allegedly help dry eye.
Clearly, this is all very annoying, but at this point, I’m used to it. It’s just one of the things I live with, like PMS and hangnails. And in the grand scheme of things, it’s not so bad. According to Market Scope, LLC, an ophthalmic industry research firm, nearly 15 million procedures have been performed in the U.S. over the last decade, with a 95.4 percent patient satisfaction rate. Lasik is also a $1.6 billion industry — which, as Michael Lewis points out in “The Big Short,” was initially created to replace the revenue stream lost to declining cataract surgery reimbursement rates.
Ninety-five percent satisfaction is not awful (although of course it depends on what your definition of “is” is). It’s the other 5 percent that worries me. I’ve interviewed people who’ve had corneal transplants because of botched Lasik, who’ve lost their jobs because they can’t see — like Los Angeles Dodger Jay Gibbons, who reportedly stopped playing winter ball in Venezuela because of blurred vision he acquired after Lasik surgery earlier in the season, the L.A. Times reported.
So all in all, I’m pretty lucky. But I think it’s fair to say that I’m angry. Not just about my situation, but because this is an industry where it’s almost impossible to find a reputable refractive surgeon to speak out on behalf of patients. If you’ve got a problem, it’s your fault. I went to a dry eye specialist in New York City, a guy who wrote a book on the subject. He acknowledged that Lasik causes dry eye and that it’s a major surgical side effect.
“Would you ever say that on the record?” I asked.
He shook his head somewhat sheepishly. “We do Lasik here,” he explained. Aha! Talk about a smart businessman. He’s got the problem and the solution under one roof.
Attorneys also have trouble finding doctors to testify for patients. On June 2, 2009, Todd Krouner, a lawyer in Chappaqua, N.Y., who has won millions of dollars for injured Lasik patients, cross-examined a Dr. Wing Chu in a case involving a patient with post-Lasik ectasia, a bulging of the cornea. Dr. Chu is medical director of the Eye-Bank for Sight Restoration, and an associate clinical professor of ophthalmology at Columbia University, among other appointments. He was hired by the defense to conduct an independent medical examination of the patient. Here’s how that conversation went:
Krouner: “Is your version of the Hippocratic oath “first do no harm” translated “first do no harm to any ophthalmologist,” is that your interpretation of the Hippocratic oath?”
Chu: “That’s a part of it.”
Oh. Good to know.
The hero here is a man named Morris Waxler, whom I wrote about last year for Salon. Waxler is a Ph.D. and a former branch chief of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health from 1995 to 1999. He was, in effect, the man responsible for approving Lasik vision enhancement lasers in 1997. Since that time, he has become rabidly anti-Lasik, publicly admitting that the FDA “screwed up” when it approved it.
Now he’s taken his activism a step further. Last month, he filed a petition calling for the FDA to withdraw approval “for all Lasik devices and issue a Public Health Advisory with a voluntary recall of Lasik devices in an effort to stop the epidemic of permanent eye injury caused by lasers and microkeratomes used for Lasik eye surgery.”
In his petition, Waxler maintains that the initial approval was based on data that was “dominated by Lasik surgeons working hand-in-glove with Lasik manufacturers. Data recently brought to light exposes this partnership for what it was: a classic example of the fox guarding the henhouse, wherein the primary arbiters of safety and effectiveness of Lasik devices were the device manufacturers and its collaborators.” Consequently, he says, the FDA was deprived of knowledge of the full extent of Lasik injuries prior to and during FDA reviews of documents submitted in support of the safety and effectiveness of Lasik devices.
He adds that — contrary to the FDA’s own device-approval standard, which limits adverse events to 1 percent — published scientific data shows that Lasik devices induce an average adverse event rate of about 22 percent “that persists beyond six months to five or more years.”
Lastly, he says, the published data shows that Lasik devices transform healthy corneas into sick corneas that never completely heal; are permanently weakened, vulnerable to trauma and inflammation; cause neuropathic dry eyes; have pathology that progresses annually; are vulnerable to blinding corneal bulging (keratectasia); compromise night vision; have unstable vision corrections that regress; and require eye care that otherwise wouldn’t be needed.
This is potent stuff. And it doesn’t seem to be the rantings of a bored retiree. “The idea that I had such a hand in getting a product on the market that was messing people’s eyes up is disgusting,” he says. “My wife said, ‘Why are you getting back into that mess? Leave it to other people.’ But I couldn’t leave it alone. The more I discovered about it, the worse it got. Rereading the applications to the FDA that I once read and reviewed and reviewing the published literature since then — it’s not a pretty picture.”
It’s not a pretty picture, but it seems to be pervasive among the FDA. According to a recent report in the Archives of Internal Medicine, of the 113 devices that the FDA recalled between 2005 and 2009 for posing serious health risks or even death, more than 70 percent had been approved because they were considered similar to other products on the market. “Our findings reveal critical flaws in the current FDA device review system and its implementation that will require either congressional action or major changes in regulatory policy,” the authors wrote.
While Waxler stops a centimeter short of using the C word (that would be, “conspiracy”), he does wonder why doctors failed to report adverse, or negative, reactions after five or six months. “They didn’t report the data,” he says. “They said patients wouldn’t come back because as far as they could tell patients were doing very well. It’s like asking Iran how many nuclear sites they have and them saying, ‘We don’t have any.’ And saying, ‘OK, that’s fine. We trust you.’”
The refractive surgery community, not surprisingly, is less than pleased with Waxler. The American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery stated that while they laud his commitment to Lasik safety (which they share), they “disagree with his science and conclusions.”
“The vast preponderance of clinical evidence shows that Lasik is safe and effective — a conclusion that the FDA has repeatedly re-affirmed in its multiple reviews of up-to-date information,” they wrote. “By failing to follow standard scientific protocol, Dr. Waxler does a disservice to all LASIK patients — including those few who have had serious problems and who deserve to have them clearly understood.”
After talking with Waxler, I called, and e-mailed, and called, and e-mailed again, the FDA to no response. Finally, Karen Riley, an FDA spokesperson, shot me an e-mail: “FDA continues to monitor the safety and effectiveness of all devices, including the lasers approved for Lasik,” she wrote. “In October of last year we provided a brief update on our role in a three-part study of Lasik that is still in the beginning phases. It is a project that we hope will yield additional insights about this procedure.”
It was a nice pat response, but had nothing to do with Waxler’s petition. That response came from David S. Buckles, Ph.D., the ombudsman for the CDRH, and was forwarded to me by a Lasik activist:
“I personally appreciate the effort by Dr. Waxler and colleagues to use this approach to raise these issues with the Commissioner’s Office because this is an appropriate venue within which to propose changes to the means by which Lasik devices are regulated,” Buckles wrote. “While we in CDRH do not have close contact with proceedings in the Commissioner’s Office on this particular matter, my understanding is that the petition is under review at the Commissioner’s level to determine whether to accept the petition for consideration. If the petition is accepted for consideration, and subsequently members of CDRH are tasked to participate in the review, then we will have some visibility into the process. However, until that happens, the status of the petition is not within our cognizance.”
In other words: Let’s wait and see. And wait some more.
Realistically, of course, it’s unlikely that Lasik will be banned. Plenty of people have had tremendously wonderful experiences. Even Todd Krouner, the lawyer, says that he “knows and respects too many honest, intelligent, competent Lasik surgeons, who ‘eat their own cooking’ and have had Lasik themselves,” he says. “Still, I believe that the public deserves an honest study, free from the bias and influence of the Lasik industry. There are bright doctors and trustworthy public health officials who have no financial interest in Lasik, who are certainly qualified to perform a credible study. Without that, I doubt that the public will be able to assess the true risks, benefits and alternatives to Lasik surgery. If doctors cannot agree among themselves about the true incidence of ectasia, or much more common dry eye syndrome, how is a patient ever supposed to make a truly informed decision?”
How indeed? It’s a good question, and one I’d like to explore further. But not right now. My eyes hurt.
The other day I got a prescription for eyeglasses. This is not newsworthy in itself except for one thing: More than two and a half years ago I had Lasik (laser-assisted in situ keratomileusis), specifically so I could toss away the spectacles I wore for near-sightedness. I knew that eventually I would need reading glasses, but I would, I was assured, be able to see long-distance for a long time.
Problem is, I can’t.
Not only is my vision blurred, but as I wrote in a 2008 article for the New York Times, I still see halos, and not the kinds with angels attached. It takes a good 10 minutes for my eyes to adjust to dimly lit rooms. My eyes are scratchy and as dry as the desert. Yes, before I got the surgery I signed an “informed consent” saying I understood all the possible side effects, but I certainly never knew that they might last indefinitely, and that they would be more than “annoying,” as my doctor promised. But nearly three years later, they are still here. And while I could get an “enhancement” — that’s industry parlance for another surgery to correct errors — frankly, the only thing I want near my eyes is mascara.
According to the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, most of the 13.6 million people in the United States who have had Lasik surgery since the first lasers were approved by the FDA in 1998 are pleased with the results. But others have experienced similar, if not worse, problems than I have.
Indeed, the estimated $2.5 billion industry has recently come under fire for its failure to acknowledge potential risks. Last spring, the FDA inspected about 50 Lasik facilities and found that many had no system in place for collecting and transmitting data to the FDA on patients’ reports of post-surgical “adverse events.”
And in August, Consumer Reports Health released the results of a survey, which found that 55 percent of Americans who’ve had laser vision correction surgeries are still wearing glasses or contacts some of the time. Fifty-three percent experienced at least one side effect within the first four weeks of the surgery; 22 percent of patients experienced them six months after surgery, especially dry eyes, halos, glare and starbursts around lights.
Still, the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery emphasizes that Lasik surgery, which can cost up to $5,000, has a 95.4 percent patient satisfaction rate, based on an analysis of research worldwide from 1996 to 2008, said John Ciccone, a spokesman for the organization. The researchers evaluated 19 studies involving 2,022 patients that specifically addressed patient satisfaction.
“Based on everything we know from the literature, and everything I know from any other elective procedure, Lasik eye surgery is the most successful elective procedure performed,” said Dr. Kerry Solomon, a cataract and refractive surgeon in Charleston, S.C., and a co-researcher on the study.
The experience of patients like Jeremy Fox, 26, a college student in Rockford, Ill., who got Lasik about four years ago, seem to support this assessment. Getting the procedure, he said, was one of the best decisions he has ever made. While he does experience some starbursts, he said “it’s not bothersome at all.”
But the FDA and others are taking note of what they call “quality of life” issues. In October, the FDA, the Defense Department and the National Eye Institute announced in October a three-year effort to assess adverse effects of Lasik. The effort will involve gauging how many active-duty military patients at the Navy Refractive Surgery Center in San Diego suffered post-surgical eye problems, and a series of national, multi-center clinical trials that will study the impact on quality of life following Lasik surgery in the general population. In addition, the FDA has reopened a public docket to receive comments through Nov. 15.
“We noted that there was little consistent evaluation of the issues,” said Mary Long, an FDA spokeswoman, about the reasons for why the study was initiated.
Erik J. Rupard, a doctor and clinical researcher with the U.S. Army, is among those who think such scrutiny is necessary. “Lasik is the Tiger Woods of medical procedures: deeply and demonstrably flawed, but so many people love it that those few of us who speak ill of it are dismissed as cranks and/or loonies,” he wrote in an e-mail message. “I saw lots of dry-eye complications in soldiers in Iraq who had undergone the procedure ostensibly because contacts are too unsafe in that dusty environment, and yet the Department of Defense has done no controlled studies to look at the cost — human and otherwise — of these post-refractive issues. I am a clinical researcher, and I know that Lasik, a cosmetic procedure, has never been subjected to the pre- or post-marketing scrutiny that we put even lifesaving drugs through.”
Surf the Web and you can find dozens of stories from people who have had post-Lasik difficulties: dry-eye, halos, glare. Some complications have resulted in corneal transplants. Over the last few years patient activists have bombarded the FDA with anti-Lasik e-mails, complaints and petitions.
Among them is John Hoge, 39, a businessman in Port Jefferson, N.Y., who suffered from night glare and halos and regrets not choosing the “zero risk option” of corrective lenses. A few years ago he got some experimental contact lenses that have largely taken care of the glare issue. They are expensive, he added, and are not covered by insurance.
While the FDA’s recent efforts have given some patient activists a modicum of peace, many do not feel it is enough. “By not inspecting every Lasik facility in this nation, how is the FDA to know if Lasik doctors are compliant?” said Dean Andrew Kantis, 40, a jet salesman in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., who has experienced double vision, starbursts, halos and dry eyes since getting Lasik in 1999, and operates the Web site LifeafterLasik.com.
Some experts believe the FDA should have taken more care when the first lasers were approved in 1998. “We screwed up,” said Morris Waxler, a former branch chief of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health Office of Science and Technology from 1995 to 1999. “You know how some drugs have a black box warning – it’s dangerous because of this, this and this — we could have done something comparable to that. We should have looked at the worst-case impact on patients, rather than just the very good outcomes we saw in the clinical trials.”
Larry Pilot, a former associate director for compliance in the FDA’s bureau of medical devices, and currently a lawyer practicing food and drug law in Arlington, Va., agreed. “It appears that information to provide adequate informed consent was not sufficient for all prospective patients about occasions where a bad outcome could result,” he said. “The present dissatisfaction rate of 5 percent is very high. Personally and professionally, I am very disappointed in the FDA.”
Spokeswoman Long refutes the notion that the FDA was errant. “The FDA has reviewed safety and effectiveness information included in the manufacturer’s applications for approval,” she wrote in an e-mail message. “We found them to be safe and effective when used as indicated and will continue to monitor their safety and effectiveness, in addition to taking necessary and appropriate steps to protect the public health.”
Timothy A. Ulatowski, director of the FDA’s Office of Compliance at the Center for Devices and Radiological Health, sent out letters to Lasik ambulatory facilities last May reminding them that all risks must be mentioned in every Lasik advertisement online, in print, radio or TV.
“As part of our ongoing review of Lasik and its impact on public health, we continue to look at various aspects of Lasik advertising and how we can better improve public health,” said Long.
Still, an informal online search showed dozens of doctors’ Web sites that do not mention risks or side effects.
As for the new study, Larry Pilot is not impressed. “The FDA is beginning to do what should have been done 10 years ago,” he said. “The bottom line here is that upwards of scores of thousands of human eyes have been irreversibly damaged unnecessarily.”
Dr. Solomon disagreed, maintaining that the FDA clinical trials on Lasik lasers were “rigorous” and “well-performed.” “I think the FDA did an outstanding job at evaluating the technology,” he said. “And the technology and procedure since approval have only gotten better.”
As for me, if I had to do it all over again I wouldn’t. But hindsight, alas, is 20-20.
Abby Ellin is the author of “ Teenage Waistland: A Former Fat Kid Weighs in on Living Large, Losing Weight and How Parents Can (and Can’t) Help .” She lives, works, and tries to see in New York City.
A few weeks ago I did something I haven’t done in years: I went out with a Jewish guy.
This was a big deal, as my last intratribal relationship was in 1994, and that was a disaster. He was, in no particular order, whiny, angst-ridden, afraid of his stove, and hairy in all the wrong places. He found me, in turn, charming, adorable and nuts. We were a terrible match, but we stayed together for a while because it seemed like we should. We were both writers, we were both Jewish; clearly, we were supposed to be miserable.
Since then, I’ve avoided Jewish men like locusts, frogs and boils. The last place you’ll find me, for example, is on online Jewish singles sites like JDate or JCupid. My worst relationships have been with Jewish men; they’re too familiar — and not in a good way. They’re argumentative and contentious, which I tend to be. The writer and I picked at each other mercilessly: He didn’t like the sound my clogs made in his apartment. I didn’t like that he checked the stove five times to make sure it was really off. He wanted me to kick in for the heating bill, even though we weren’t living together. I thought he should try to be less, er, frugal. Our disagreements may have had nothing to do with our backgrounds, but he pushed a lot of buttons that only someone with a similar upbringing could touch.
I grew up in a family that was not afraid to voice its opinions. When we had a complaint, we let it out. Loudly. My parents adored their three kids and consequently critiqued just about everything but our bowel movements. Do I want my husband doing that? No. And while I get terribly frustrated by people who can’t talk about their emotions, sometimes you don’t want to analyze and dissect ad nauseam. Sometimes you just have to shut up.
Of course, I am stereotyping; not all Jews are critical and mouthy. In fact, some of my best friends are Jewish. I just don’t want to marry them. I know plenty of people who feel completely different than I do: They believe it’s easier to have a relationship with someone who shares a similar background, who knows, say, what kind of fish is a gefilte. To them I say, “L’Chaim!” But frankly, I’ve never wanted to make my world that small. Yes, it would be nice to have someone to eat Chinese food with on Christmas Eve, but the potential for antagonism isn’t worth the moo shoo pork.
Which is precisely why I’m a firm proponent of interfaith marriage — or, at least, not at all against it. And apparently I am not alone. A recent report, the National Jewish Population Survey, found that from 1980 to 1984, 38 percent of all Jews in the United States married outside the faith. The number increased to 43 percent from 1985 to 1990. By 2001, it was at 47 percent.
This study caused all sorts of discord in the Jewish community: The numbers were too low, too high, too inclusive, too exclusive. But what some Jews see as a crisis, I see as a blessing. We’ve wised up, we Jews. We’ve finally realized that too much Jewish angst in one household is not good. (Neither, for that matter, is too much WASPY stoicism or Catholic repression.)
Clearly, it’s not just Jews who feel this way; if we’re marrying outside our faith, other people are marrying outside theirs. We’re all mixing things up, and it’s only for the better. Think about it: Baptists like to suffer; Jews have suffered enough. For the kids’ sake, wouldn’t it be better to have at least one parent who isn’t interested in unnecessary pain? Who doesn’t think the Messiah has come and gone and that we are all doomed to hell — or, conversely, that he is right around the corner?
“You’re a self-loathing Jew!” my mother cried when I explained to her that I would never attend the Matzoh Ball, or any other Jewish singles event for that matter.
“No, I’m not,” I told her. “I’m quite happy with myself; other Jews are the problem.” I know what I’m talking about: I spent the first seven years of my life at a yeshiva. I didn’t like the exclusivity, the sense of superiority, the arrogance born of being “chosen.” I didn’t like the constant haranguing about marrying within the faith that began in grade school: “Stay away from the goyim!” What if the person I fell in love with wasn’t Jewish? Should I dump him in favor of a guy whose last name is Rabinowitz, even if I couldn’t stand him?
“Look at all those Kennedy women,” my mother pointed out. “They all want Jewish men!”
“Of course they do! They’re not Jewish!”
The Kennedys aren’t the only ones who have intermarried with abandon. From Woody Allen and Mia Farrow to Charlotte and Harry from “Sex and the City,” men and women of different religious backgrounds — whether famous, fictional or real — have always fallen in love. Again, I think it’s because familiarity often breeds contempt — or at the very least, exasperation. Besides, coupling with someone who is different is more exciting, exotic even. Jewish women and non-Jewish men work because non-Jewish men know how to humor Jewish women. They are amused by our outspokenness and assertiveness; they like that we aren’t shy. Jewish men want shiksas because they don’t remind them of their overbearing mothers. They get worshipped but not smothered.
My friend Chandra, 29, a magazine editor in New York who was raised in Jeffersonville, Ind., is as Wonder Bread as they come. She was born Catholic, raised Lutheran and had never known (that is, biblically) a Jew until she moved to Manhattan. Tired of Match.com, she posted an ad on JDate, figuring she’d give the Hebrews a whirl. She announced right off the bat that she wasn’t Jewish, but did anyone mind? Au contraire. The first week she was on she was bombarded with messages — about 100 in three days. “If I log on at night and stay logged on while I’m out, I’ll come back to find 30 messages and/or missed IMs waiting for me in the morning,” she says. “Most of them say things like, ‘I never really date Jewish girls anyway.’”
This does not remotely surprise Craig Zavielsky, 41, an I.T. expert from Long Island, N.Y. “Non-Jewish women appreciate me more for just being nice, in the same way non-Jewish men probably excite Jewish women more because they’re more classically male and maybe not as nice,” he says. “Jew-on-Jew romance is a bit incestuous, almost like you set up the relationship you had with your mother.”
Those persistent stereotypes — Jewish women who are bossy and opinionated and Jewish men who can’t use a power drill to save their lives — can actually be quite endearing to non-Jewish members of the opposite sex.
“When we got locked out of our apartment Jon wanted to call the locksmith,” laughs Rebecca Bradshaw, 37, a non-Jewish marketing consultant from Minneapolis who married a Jewish man a few weeks ago. “I had him lift me up through the window. He’s not interested in the car, including washing it. I come from a family of people who can fix things.”
That said, she’s not at all bothered that he doesn’t own a tool belt. “I love the intellectual side of him and that we can talk about all kinds of things,” says Bradshaw, who’s actually converting to Judaism. “I like the fact that he doesn’t go ice fishing and hunt deer; I can talk to him about clothes and politics and we will have an energetic conversation.”
After my friend Cindy, 32, a graphic artist in New York, returned from a weekend away with her new Jewish beau, it occurred to her that she’d done all the cooking and cleaning. But she didn’t mind. For her, the benefits of being with a menschy man outweighed her domestic efforts.
“Jewish men are less emotionally repressed,” she says. “The ones I have dated come from these huggy, kissy Jewish families where love is expressed freely. Really, it comes down to the fact that I already have one emotionally repressed family; I don’t need someone else’s.”
Of course, there are thorny issues associated with intermarriage. I know scores of interfaith couples who aren’t sure how they want to raise their kids, whether they ought to join a church or a synagogue, or if Jesus should be a regular part of their lives or just an exclamation.
I’m certainly not advocating abandoning Judaism; I’m hoping the tribe expands and explodes and lives forever. I’m a big fan of conversion — assuming you’re doing it for the right reason and not to please someone’s mother-in-law. If I marry a non-Jew, I want my kids to have some kind of Jewish identity, just as I would want them to have some kind of American identity if I raised them in Europe. I’d like to have a house filled with a smorgasbord of festivities: Let’s play dreidel by the warm glow of the Christmas lights, with Buddha sprawled on the mantel and the Tao of Pooh on the bookshelf. “With intermarriage the kids will grow up in a household where it’s accepted that neither religion is true,” says Douglas Rushkoff, 42, the author of “Nothing Sacred,” which examines how Judaism has been misconstrued over the last century. “And that’s the most important thing.”
And even though I don’t want my kids kneeling at the cross (or growing earlocks), what’s wrong with embracing a calmer, less neurotic attitude? Getting some height in the mix? Why not have a first name that’s a last name instead of a last name that’s a first name? And most essential, why thrive on exclusivity?
“It used to be seen that difference was harder to transmit to our children; part of what people used to do was create sameness because that was seen as easier,” says Debby Hirshman, until recently the executive director of the Jewish Community Center in New York, which has an array of interfaith programs for its members. “The healthiest society [is one where] people realize that differences can coexist and become a strengthening force within each of us.”
I agree. And as my recent Jewish date will attest, it doesn’t look like I’ll be frolicking under a chuppah any time soon, anyway. He and I went out, we made small talk, we split the bill, I was unimpressed, and that was that. But the final nail in the mezuzah? I discovered that our parents live in the same condo complex in Florida. And the only thing worse than two Jews in a relationship is six.
- – - – - – - – - – - -
We want to make you a part of this series. What is the state of your union? Did you find the one and never look back, or has finding lasting love been a marathon of trial and error? Did you have a fairy-tale wedding only to watch things crumble once the reception was over, or have you glided along in marital bliss since Day One? We want to hear your stories of joy, romance, heartbreak and pain. After all, partnership, as we all know, is a complex concoction of all of those things. (Please remember: Any writing submitted becomes the property of Salon if we publish it. We reserve the right to edit submissions, and cannot reply to every writer. Interested contributors should send their stories to marriage@salon.com.)
When I was a little girl I used to fantasize about the kind of guy I wanted to marry: a musician, filmmaker, writer or painter. I didn’t really care which one I ended up with — I only knew that I wanted to be with someone who could immortalize me in celluloid, in stereo, in print. I wanted to be his muse, his inspiration, Zelda to a (preferably non-alcoholic) F. Scott Fitzgerald. I wanted to move someone to such great depths that a Mona Lisa would spring from his paintbrush.
When I was 24, I met Sam, a tormented, bespectacled writer who was, I believed, nothing short of brilliant. Sam published in well-respected literary journals, was a veritable encyclopedia of information, could talk film noir with the best of them. And yes, OK, he was Jewish. A literate Semite who liked movies. What more could a girl ask for?
So Sam and I entered that precarious territory known as a relationship. We did all those nauseating couple things: walks in the zoo, autumnal strolls through Harvard Square, weekends wearing nothing but grins. He was a little more neurotic than I’d bargained for — he suffered from occasional bouts of agoraphobia and separation anxiety — a little competitive when it came to our respective writing careers, but soon our lives were entwined. We both taught at the same college and we hung out with the same circle of friends.
I even felt close enough to him to talk about my food problem. Like so many women, I was obsessed with food and weight; as I liked to describe it, I was a failed bulimic, a failed anorexic. I’d mastered the binge but I couldn’t perfect the purge. Like so many men, Sam just didn’t get it, and he questioned me endlessly: “How old were you the first time you weighed yourself?” and “What’s your favorite food?” Sam seemed genuinely fascinated by this, and upset by the obvious pain it caused me. He seemed to really want to help me shake “the food thing,” and I appreciated that.
And so I’d answer as honestly as I could, grateful that someone finally cared enough to ask. I’d never spoken about it with anyone before; it was my own private hell. It took a lot for me to talk so openly with Sam, but I trusted him.
With time, though, Sam grew progressively more irritable when it came to the food thing. “Why can’t you eat like a normal person?” he’d say, his brown eyes blazing behind his round John Lennon-style glasses. And then, more specifically, “Why can’t you eat with me?” To him, food was something intimate, special, something to share with the people he loved. My relationship with it, of course, was a lot more complicated, and try as I might, I couldn’t just change 16 years of conditioning.
Sam and I had been dating for about a year when he handed me the manila envelope.
“My story,” he said, grinning broadly. “It’s done.”
“Great!” I said. He’d been struggling with this piece for months, and I knew he was proud of it. “Should I read it now?”
He nodded. “Sure. I’d like to know what you think.” Off he went to take a shower; I sat down to read.
It began simply enough: a poignant little tale about a husband and wife in the throes of marital angst. They loved each other, but she had these weird problems with food that, he believed, were the source of the couple’s misery. I read on, and slowly my blood began to boil. There, in print, were conversations I’d had with Sam, confessions I’d made about my own dietary struggles. I felt like smashing his computer through the window. No, the character wasn’t me, exactly — she was a tall blond lawyer, which, as of this writing, I am not — but she possessed enough of my idiosyncrasies, my neuroses, to be a damn good replica. This wasn’t fiction; this was my life.
I felt violated, betrayed, voiceless — like Emily in “Our Town,” who saw things clearly a little too late. Sam had taken aspects of my life — personal, painful aspects — and condensed them, trivialized them, into 18 pages of prose. I finally understood why members of certain cultures refuse to be photographed: They feel their soul will be stripped from them. That’s how I felt when Sam wrote about me: like my soul, the core of my being, had been mercilessly snatched from me.
I probably should have known better. On our first date, Sam had told me about his previous girlfriend. They didn’t have much in common, he said, but she was very knowledgeable about all things feminine: menstruation, the female orgasm, how it felt to be a 16-year-old girl. Their relationship didn’t last, but her insights mysteriously worked their way into a short story of his, a story written from the perspective of — surprise! — a menstruating, 16-year-old girl in search of the female orgasm.
Yes, I probably should have known better, but I honestly never thought he’d use my life as fodder. When I’d imagined being someone’s muse I thought he’d wax poetic about my shoulders, my sense of humor, my patience during the long nights he’d spent “creating.” Instead, Sam had appropriated my most painful and private struggles for his own uses. Part of being in a relationship means opening yourself up, making yourself vulnerable. I thought Sam and I were becoming allies.
“I can’t believe you did this,” I said when Sam came out of the shower. I was so mad my teeth were chattering. “Why did you have to write about me?”
“It’s not you,” he said. “Maybe she’s got similar traits, but it’s fiction. Don’t you think I have any imagination?”
“Oh, yeah? What about the scene with the Diet Coke? What about her thing with the salad dressing?”
And then I started crying, violently, terribly.
“I can’t believe you’re reacting like this,” he said. “You laugh about your food problem, you joke about it; how serious can it be? It’s the things we don’t talk about that are most important.”
“Bullshit!” I fumed. “You asked me to talk about it! You questioned me! I never volunteered any information.”
“I should never have shown you the story,” he said.
“No,” I said. “You should never have written it.”
We broke up soon after, and got back together, and repeated that pattern a few more times, like a flu you can’t quite shake. We pretended to get along, but it was clear that the gap was too wide, torn by my lack of trust and his insistence that he was just being a writer (“Maybe so but all of Truman Capote’s friends stopped talking to him after he betrayed them in print,” I pointed out). Every time Sam asked me a question I wondered if he was looking for material for some future story, and I was never able to relax around him again.
Six months later he was offered a job at a newspaper down south and took it. It was unspoken but understood that we were breaking up for good. Within weeks he found a new girlfriend. I hope she knows what she’s getting into. I’ve never met her, but I expect to read all about her in one of those well-respected literary journals.
It’s been four years since all this happened, but my chest still tightens and a howl forms in my throat whenever I think about it.
Still, I’ve learned some things since Sam and I broke up. For starters, musicians travel too much. Painters have dirty fingernails. And filmmakers hide behind cameras. As for writers, well, that’s what I do. I don’t need some guy to immortalize me in print; I’m quite capable of doing that by myself.
