In Joyce’s moment of mental breakdown-slash-denial of sexual self, she goes to feed the pet she named after the guy she loved but can’t remember.  Even in her attempt to escape to something else, to bury the confrontation, she can’t really.  She knows, subconsciously, there is no escape.  It’s in her brain with her, flooding to the four corners of her world.  There must be a reckoning, and it can go the easy way or the hard way.  Accept herself or explode.  Joyce chooses the latter.