When I first started showing symptoms of anorexia and collapsed at school, the head of pastoral support asked if I had been eating enough. I was in the early stages of anorexia and everything in me wanted to say “No, please help me, I don’t think I’m in control anymore. It started as a diet.”
People assume that Anorexia is a strictly female phenomenon. Well, it isn’t. It isn’t selective. It doesn’t matter what sex you are or what colour your skin is. For the past year, I’ve been battling with Anorexia. It hasn’t been easy.
There are so many things I have gained since deciding to seek help for my eating disorder. While I’m not 100% of the way there, and still have some weight to gain, there have already been so many improvements.
After locking myself up for a whole spring, moodier and more stressed than I had ever been, pounds shredding off my body like grated cheese, I finally sat the CFA level III exam.
I turn 35 later this year. I think I’ve ticked a fair few of the stereotypical boxes – husband, career, mortgage. No children yet but we’re working on it. In a lot of ways, my life has gone to (a very happy) plan.
Through a lack of intervention, I have moved from one eating disorder to another over the last 11 years. This is why it is imperative to seek help for yourself, or for someone you care about, because it isn't going to end on its own.
I have only ever been diagnosed with anorexia nervosa and even within that, was someone who was able to access care after only around a year of struggling, which I know, sadly, is not the case for so many people.
Within four weeks of seeing my GP I was sitting in front of two eating disorder nurse specialists, who confirmed a diagnosis of anorexia. I was offered a weekly outpatient appointment for six weeks.
I remember when I was younger asking my mum what an ‘eating disorder’ was in the car. I was about eight years old and had heard it mentioned on the radio. She said that ‘people who can't eat’ have them. I thought nothing of it after that.
You lied to me; you twisted and warped my reality. Isolating me. Tormenting me. You told me that all I needed was to lose a few more pounds. But you were never happy. You made me hate myself.
There I was, sitting in front of the GP, age going on 33, a decade of anorexia behind me. Was I going to tell the whole story? 'I’ve had a chest infection for six weeks and I’m scared I’m losing my hearing. Pause. Deep breath. “The real reason I’m so ill is anorexia. I’ve got anorexia.'
Zero is the number I am driven to reach by the 'friend' in my mind. I am to eat zero of this and that, and I am to take up zero space.