Body Image and Mental Health
Lecture 2 of the “Five Lectures on Psycho-Analysis” written by Sigmund Freud, explains repression and wishful impulse, and the short story “Eight Bites” by Carmen Maria Machado provides us with an illustrative representation of those terms. Freud argues that repressed wishful impulse still exists in the unconscious mind, which later on presents itself as a replacement with the same revolting feelings(2215). Machado describes the narrator’s experience, thoughts, and emotions through the process of getting bariatric surgery. The narrator’s mother implemented the idea of only eating eight bites to have a normal body(Machado); consequently, the narrator disliked her body image and the way she ate because she was not satisfied with just eight bites of food. “Eight Bites” by Carmen Maria Machado represents Freudian’s concept of repressed wishful impulse as the narrator in this short story goes through bariatric surgery to attain a beautiful body and struggles with an eating disorder and body dysmorphic disorder.
To begin with, Machado demonstrates Freud’s idea of wishful impulse by describing the narrator’s thoughts and emotions before going through bariatric surgery. By the hand of her mother, the narrator learned that to have a normal-looking body, you must only eat eight bites. The theory of “eight bites” was introduced to the narrator since youth, which led her to believe that to attain a beautiful body like her mothers’ she needed to follow the diet of eight bites. Although she tried her best to live by this ideology, she was not satisfied with only eating eight bites of food. The author argues that “I ate eight bites and then stopped… I pressed my finger into the shard and carried it to the trash can. I turned and looked back at my plate… I sat down again, picked up my fork and had eight more bites… After, I finished what was in the pot on the stove and I was so angry I began to cry.” (Machado). Undoubtedly, not being able to succumb to only eating eight bites caused her sadness and pain. She wanted to have a body shape like her mother, but she was not satisfied with the small portion of food required to reach such a goal. Freud states that trying to give in to an “incompatible wishful impulse… would have produced a high degree of unpleasure; this unpleasure was avoided by means of repression”(2212). As shown in “Eight Bites” the narrator attempts to eat eight bites bruised her self-esteem; getting bariatric surgery was her way of repressing her impulse to eat more. The narrator’s wishful impulse of eating more interfered with her desire to have the perfect body. With bariatric surgery, she was able to eat only eight bites, thereby repressing her wishful impulse and the unpleasant feelings that came with it.
Without a doubt, Machado demonstrates Freud’s idea of repressed wishful impulse manifesting itself as a replacement through the narrator’s journey after the bariatric surgery. After the surgery, the narrator was able to get into the habit of only eating eight bites, and although she did not eat more, she would still hesitate to throw the food away after those eight bites. The author argues, “I count the bites and when I reach eight I throw the rest of the food in the garbage. I stand over the can for a long while… ”(Machado). Before surgery, she would be hesitant to throw the food away and would end up eating more bites; now, although she is hesitant, the wishful impulse of taking more bites is repressed, but the idea still resurfaces in her mind. In lecture 2, the author demonstrates, “It is true that they have driven it out of consciousness and out of memory and have apparently saved themselves a large amount of unpleasure. But the repressed wishful impulse continues to exist in the unconscious.”(Freud 2215). Thus, repression may cause more damage in the long run. Repressing wishful impulses helped get rid of the pain, but because the impulses still exist in the unconscious mind, they can reappear in the conscious mind. Freud states that the repressed wishful impulse may appear again in the conscious mind, this time disguised and unrecognizable(2215). This new substitute can cause unpleasant pain, so repression is just a temporary solution causing more pain. In essence, repeating such a cycle of repressed impulses reappearing in the consciousness corroborates to new displeasing feelings resulting in what can be more wishful impulses.
Ultimately, the conflict of repressing wishful impulses depicted through the process of bariatric surgery helps others understand the linguistics behind psychological concepts. Learning the connection between Freudian concepts helps acknowledge new ideas in psycho-analysis and helps psychologists understand what their patients are going through. The short story “Eight Bites” shows the narrator’s surgery journey to illustrate an eating and body image disorder. Freudian concepts represented in a common topic such as eating disorder and body dysmorphic disorder helps nondoctors understand the analogy of psycho-analysis concepts.
Work Cited
Freud, Sigmund. “FIVE LECTURES ON PSYCHO-ANALYSIS.” Semantic Scholar, Sept. 1909,pdfs.semanticscholar.org/b446/cfb00094a2e62f82e8c8e430581891ca4e47.pdf?_ga=2.153662776.1893964575.1597526595-1709737971.1597526595.
Machado, Carmen Maria. “Eight Bites.” Gulf Coast Magazine, 2017, texas.gulfcoastmag.org/journal/29.2-summer/fall-2017/eight-bites/.
