Shopaholic takes fibromyalgia

While this blog is dedicated to finding love with a man, this particular entry will be about my other love -- shopping. As stated in my previous post, I am soon embarking on a quest for disability benefits as I'm realizing I'm too frequently unwell to hold a job. The biggest threat this poses to my personhood is my undying quest for both personal space and personal possessions.

I'd like to say it all started with my stepdad who brought home clothes he found in the park. With my dad's own disability insurance which translated into social security benefits for me, I bought fake Keds at Walgreens because I couldn't afford the real ones. Sophomore year my favorite teacher gave me a coat she never wore because I didn't have one. One the walk home, classmates yelled torturous comments to me as I carried a bag with a label they knew I could not afford -- and quite possibly one that was completely out of style for a teenager. For high school graduation one of my best friend's moms bought me and one of my other best friends our first pair of new jeans. Well, first new pair in as long as I could remember. After a few years of wearing my step-aunt's hand-me-downs, I was ecstatic to learn what size I really was and to get jeans that weren't about to fall off.

My clothes spending stayed pretty on target after I moved out and got my first job. I shopped Mervyn's mostly, then moved up to Old Navy once I got married. My husband and I had a budget we drew up with care and every month I had a certain amount allotted on clothes. While my husband was generous with this sum ($50 or $80 a month), I felt stifled, especially as I had re-entered the full-time working world and had to dress the part. The stifling feeling also came from having a man ultimately in charge of my wardrobe or lack thereof, reminiscent of my stepdad and his free treasures. But the biggest problem, you see, is that money burns a hole in my pocket. When I have it I spend it because I'm afraid it's going to go away and that I'll never have it again. Vicious cycle, I know.

When I got divorced I applied for my first credit card and bought myself a bathing suit. It felt liberating. Of course it was about three or four months before I had a job, but the bathing suit was "all mine" and no one told me if I was allowed to spend money on it or not. Years of pent-up money woes released themselves in an extreme desire to reinvent myself through cloth. I buy clothes to define myself. I dress myself the way I want to be seen. Now, contrary to most with this mindset, I don't desire to dress "rich." Rather, I bargain shop, applauding myself at every sale price and deal. I won't spend more than $25 on a shirt except in rare occasions, and if I spend $300 on a pair of boots I wear them every day for 5 months each winter season until they fall apart. Does my spending make me a shopaholic or does my frugality make me a smart consumer? I'm betting it's a mixture of both.

Sometimes I'll go on a hunt for the perfect something-or-0ther and search stores and online websites for hours. Sometimes I find what I'm looking for, other times I don't. The first instance I remember this happening, it was the year 2000 and I was searching for this surfer girl shirt I had in my mind -- blue with a green and yellow floral design across the top. To my surprise I happened upon the exact shirt in Pacific Wave Surf Shop and bought it. It was as if the shirt were calling to me and I had to search it out. More often than not I find the clothes I'm looking for when I don't look for them at all. While outlet shopping with my roommate last month, I came across the rain trench I had been looking for for about a year after seeing it on a woman at the bank in Manhattan. As I said earlier, I won't pay for something that's beyond what I deem a reasonable price even if it's the perfect item of clothing, so I didn't break the bank when I bought it 40% off at Tommy Hilfiger. This past winter I needed to replace my boots and searched for hours and days for the perfect pair. After having no luck and buying a pair to tide me over, a month ago I found that perfect pair on a clearance rack at Macy's and bought them for $33. Because I believe clothes call to you, search for you, and because I feel that they exude your personhood in a totally tangible way, when I find the perfect item of clothing I don't like to let it pass me by.

A couple weeks ago I was looking at a JC Penney's catalog and pretending that I had to be restricted to only their clothing. It was a fun game and I saw that I wouldn't be completely horribly dressed if I had to shop there, albeit it would be very hard to avoid an acrylic wardrobe which would look old and ratty in a matter of weeks. My dresser and closet are by no means stuffed with clothes, but I make quick turnarounds with items I never wear or that have gone out of style, and I always search for items that will stand the test of time. This is compounded and disrupted by my fluctuating weight caused by fibromyalgia medications. I have to continually redress my body to fit what it looks like at a particular moment. Mostly this means getting bigger and bigger sizes and keeping one size smaller on hand for when I lose a few pounds. Having an extended stomach makes me even more clothes conscious as I try to hide my fat in a way that I couldn't do with my former polo shirt obsession (aka rut).

If I apply for disability and get it I don't know what that's going to mean for my shopping habit. Will I become the girl I was in high school -- the shy insecure girl who hid behind ill-fitting clothes? Will I have to go back to buying knockoffs from Payless Shoe Source? (Notice I didn't even say Walgreen's.) If I wasn't ill at all I would become a personal shopper -- not only can I dress myself but I am an expert at dressing others. As it is I look in my closet and in my dresser drawers, and I know that in a month, after re-losing weight, my new mid-rise jeans won't fit anymore and I won't want to go back to the low-rise pairs a size smaller, having discovered that mid-rise better hides my stomach. But what will this mean? More money spent on clothes.

I'm a frugalista, a fashionista, and a shopaholic all rolled into one. I hold onto tangible items as a girl who existed inside her own bedroom and had control over only that sphere. My possessions carried me through childhood moves and tumultuous living situations. My hundreds of books (mostly from used book stores -- bargains!) hug me with shared experience. My laptop opens its world to me and enables me to write my own destiny. My camera captures my world for an eternity. My cell phone reaches out to loved ones and I get to decide how frequently I get to send a text. Money can't buy happiness, but having one's own money can buy a sense of security. Now if only the money on my credit cards --which aren't exorbitant except to a family who rarely buys new underwear -- would disappear and give me the freedom that it's purchases afford.

And now I sign off, in a $5 shirt from a street vendor in Boston, the perfect pair of pajama pants from Target (where I now only buy pajamas) and Victoria's Secret slippers that came free with a purchase. My clothes and I say goodnight and hope that they and I will be around to carry me forward in my envisioned chic and classy existence, filled with loveliness and charm.