By: Eleanor Dollear
Content includes references to mental illness and eating disorders.
Kara Blise (name has been changed), a senior at a small liberal arts college in Minnesota, initially appears to be a typical college student by anyone’s standards. She has a core group of girlfriends, a work-study job at the library, is anxious to graduate, and has a good sense of humor. She plays Frisbee and studied abroad in Asia. She calls home about once every two weeks, and describes her life as “relatively drama-free in all aspects.” However, when you begin to dig deeper, you might find a more troubled past and a complicated present.
Kara first saw a therapist at age 8, after years of urging from her primary school teachers. At parent-teacher conferences in kindergarten, her teacher noticed her taking small pieces of her lunch and taking them one by one to the garbage and throwing them out. This concerned her parents, but her behavior at home seemed normal so they decided to let it slide and hoped it would stop soon. And eventually, it did.
“I made better friends, so I just wanted to spend more time with them at lunch instead of just pacing around like a freak,” she explained to me over coffee, “but then soon after quitting the garbage deal I did other weird stuff.” She began to take other kids’ things from their desks, at first just when they were absent from school that day, because she thought nobody would be paying attention to that kid’s desk. Quickly, though, her habits progressed and she decided to take more chances. That’s when she got caught.
“Actually looking back on it, it’s kind of funny. My teacher was like, ‘um…what’s in your hand?’ and I was just like, ‘well, nothing in this one!’ and waved my empty hand. But then she came over to me and made me give her whatever I grabbed, like a Jolly Rancher or whatever, and of course flipped out at me.” Kara took anything that could fit in her hand quickly and easily—change from buying lunch, pieces of candy, erasers. Nothing of value. Her parents, an ICU nurse and an epidemiologist, were upper-middle class. Kara says she knew her parents could afford almost anything she’s ever really wanted, and she knew that from a young age. So, understandably, they were confused why she kept taking things. They thought it might have something to do with her not getting along with some of her classmates.
“I don’t think that was it though,” Kara reflected, “I mean my best friend was this girl Julie (name has been changed) and she had strep throat for a few days and I swear everything in her desk was almost gone by the time she came back to school.” Upon hearing Kara confess that she did not have a clear rationale for this behavior, I began to understand that this was a much more complex pattern of behavior than I anticipated.
She didn’t click well with her therapist and says she didn’t like feeling pressured to share her secrets with someone. So eventually her parents let her stop going. “Maybe I should have made them look around for a new therapist, especially in high school where I started this weird relationship with food.”
A picture taken from one of Kara’s recent shoplifting trips
Beginning around fall semester final exam time of her freshman year of high school, Kara started to binge eat. According to the Mayo Clinic, Binge Eating Disorder is characterized by eating large amounts of food in a short time span, without feeling in control. It is typically done in secret, and is often comorbid with depression and anxiety. However, a representative from the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) told me that this largely varies from person to person, and that “eating disorders can be brought on by environmental factors, biological factors, something from previous years that hasn’t been dealt with,” or something else entirely. While Kara was never diagnosed, she feels like she met the criteria for that diagnosis. Kara would try to purge, she said, but “for some reason my body wouldn’t let me really fully do that,” and she gained weight and “probably fell into depression.”
She also became somewhat obsessive about her grades and getting into top-level colleges. It was “the perfect distraction” from the obsession with food she had acquired. She would either be obsessing over food or grades, and she continues to struggle with both of them to this day. At the start of college, considered paying extra to have her own room in order to continue these habits easily. She would bring an empty backpack to the dining hall and fill it up with Tupperware that would have whatever the dining hall served that day. She would tell her roommate that she “needed the room,” and would therefore be alone and binge. “It made me feel like shit,” Kara said. “I hated myself.”
Kara quit binge eating the day she began to shoplift, which was some time in the late fall of her sophomore year of college. She describes the decision to shoplift for the first time a “spur of the minute decision.” She loved the rush and the thrill of the event.
“Some days I convince myself that I am really doing a good thing, like I’m making kind of a racial statement for equality. Like once in a while I’ll notice them asking some Mexican high school boy put his backpack at the front or something but not once have they asked me to do that. But I only say that on my bad days, when I feel bad about myself. I know that’s not why I do it though.” I ask her why she does it and she tells me that she wishes she had a good one. “It’s so messed up but I wish there was a trauma in my life where I could just completely explain all of this.” All she says she knows for certain is that she can’t stop. She tells me every detail of how she does it.
At first, she just stole things she couldn’t justify paying for. “Like, I could get just some cheap generic brand of tea, but then also I want to try the $7 kind. But maybe I won’t like it! And I just wasted the money! So I stuck it in my bag.” That didn’t last too long, though. Sometimes she would randomly choose groups of foods to shoplift, such as all yellow foods on her grocery list, or all vegetables, or all sweet foods. Other times it’s a completely random group of foods that she ends of shoplifting. Kara couldn’t think of anything that influenced her decision of what to shoplift—her mood, foods she was craving, etc. had no bearing on her choices. She decides on her way to the store what her plan is, or even if she has one. That’s when the adrenaline kicks in.
Many might be concerned about the aspect of being in trouble while shoplift, but Kara has never been caught, so feels like she has the process under control. She brings a reusable black bag that has a zipper, and if she doesn’t have that bag then she refuses to shoplift. She always grabs a cart “because the bag doesn’t look as full when it’s in this big empty cart,” she explained. She simply fills up her bag, and puts the items that she intends on paying for in the cart, surrounding the bag. “People have specifically seen me put items in my bag. I just smile and they just assume I’m going to pay for them. It’s amazing. One or two times people who saw me put stuff in my bag ended up being the cashiers that I check out with. They don’t even bat an eye! It’s amazing!” After paying for the items that she doesn’t lift, she puts them back in the cart as they were before instead of opening her reusable bag. I asked if there’s a moment she ever gets nervous. She paused and said, “Yeah. When they ask if I want paper or plastic, and they obviously see my black bag. I feel like they’re onto me a little bit.”
Katie might be comforted to know she is not the only person with these issues: the National Association for Shoplifting Prevention (NASP) explains that there are “550,000 incidents of shoplifting per day,” which results in a loss in the economy of “more than 35 million dollars.” It’s possible that as many as 1 in 11 Americans regularly shoplift, making it an extremely prevalent crime in the country. NASP offers support through various education programs that aim to help people understand why they shoplift. Possible reasons for shoplifting might include sensation and risk seeking personalities and coping with depression. The NASP also provides strategies for how to stop, as well as telephone coaching from professionals who offer advice specific to the individual caller, and help finding psychotherapists to help those who shoplift.
The NASP also includes profiles of people who shoplift, and many of them remind me of Kara and not because of any demographic similarities or trends, as there is no one demographic. Instead, the profiles reflect a key characteristic of Kara’s behavior: the lack of purpose to their actions. Some quotations from the profiles on NASP could have been said by Kara: “I don’t know why I do it,” “Shoplifting makes me feel better,” “Why can’t I stop?”
Chances are that nobody could be completely sure as to why Kara chooses to shoplift. I’m beginning to piece together theories, most of which revolve around the apparent need she has to appear completely perfect, but ultimately I can’t really be sure. Her best friend at school, Maria (name has been changed), who I met up with after my first meeting with Kara, knows that Kara has shoplifted a few times and told me she thought that she “just did it as a thrill, and her life is so put together that I think sometimes she wants to deviate from the norm and mix it up.”
Maybe that’s true—I noticed Kara’s color-coded binders in her backpack and her perfectly manicured nails, and it really seems that her life is far more organized than most. And at some point, Kara acknowledged that. “I love that that’s what people see in me. They don’t see this uncontrollable monster.” I don’t see Kara as a monster, and I told her that. I think she deserves to receive good professional help; I see deeper issues in her, as well as a distinct sadness that nobody should have to live with.
The last time I saw Kara, she said she didn’t plan on seeking professional help for these issues. She seemed discouraged and wanted to take a break from thinking about it. At the same time, she expressed relief for finally being able to talk about it. Shoplifting is a taboo issue that nobody wants to admit they do (but clearly is very pervasive)—it’s certainly complicated, but one that goes significantly beyond the surface level of just stealing things in order to avoid paying for them. I came away from our conversations with a deep sympathy for her and a wish for her to get help and feel better.
Sources:
National Association for Shoplifting Prevention
National Eating Disorders Association
DSM-IV
Mayo Clinic
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