A plate with a sad face drawn on it, with a knife and fork, on a pink background.

CW: This article mentions eating disorders and subjects relating to this topic.

Seven Standen

Today, it’s estimated that up to 3.4 million people suffer from an eating disorder in the UK. Anorexia nervosa affects 10% of those people – but I still find it hard to believe, I am part of that 10%.

The first step towards getting help is admitting you have a problem. This sage advice is taken from the 12-step program behind Alcoholics Anonymous, where the actual step is admitting you’ve become powerless over alcohol, but it’s still applicable to a range of mental illnesses. You can’t pursue treatment until you admit you’re sick.

“While I’ve confessed to a handful of people about the illness that has gripped me — for far longer than I’m willing to admit — I’m not sure I’ve been completely honest with myself”

A common misconception about taking the first step is that you only have to admit to having a problem once. But it’s actually necessary to do so repeatedly, to various people – friends, family, medical professionals – but most importantly to yourself. While I’ve confessed to a handful of people about the illness that has gripped me — for far longer than I’m willing to admit — I’m not sure I’ve been completely honest with myself.

So, here’s the truth, written down for everyone:

I have anorexia.

A hard pill to swallow

It’s not an easy thing to say. There’s nothing to stop me from ending this article here, deleting the entire thing, and shutting my laptop off. I could keep this a secret forever. Plenty of people struggle with eating disorders privately and never tell anyone about it, regardless of whether they continue battling the sickness or make a complete recovery. Most of them, like myself, probably feel like they’re over-exaggerating.

“I’ve never actually used the word ‘anorexia’ to talk about my mental illness, even though I fit the criteria.”

The word “anorexia” is frightening to all of us. It’s a sharp, spiky word with dangerous connotations. It brings to mind images of scarily thin people, who aren’t able to swallow a bite of cucumber. For those of us who have done our research, the word evokes a disturbing statistic, as anorexia has the highest mortality rate of any mental illness. Less than half of those diagnosed will make a full recovery, while 20% will continue to suffer for the rest of their lives. Most will relapse. Many will die.

Because of the stigma, I’ve never actually used the word “anorexia” to talk about my mental illness, even though I fit the criteria. When it does come up — and it’s always deeply uncomfortable when it does — I talk about my “food problems”, maybe my “eating disorder” if it’s someone I particularly trust. But it’s a way of ignoring the reality I’m facing.

Misconceptions of anorexia

Most people will be surprised to hear about my ongoing fight with anorexia, due to the stereotypes that surround the illness.

For one thing, I’m not dangerously underweight. While a body mass index (BMI) of 17.5 was previously a requirement, it has been removed from the diagnostic criteria and is now considered to be an outdated measure. Anorexia is a mental illness: no matter what I look like on the outside, my mind is disordered when it comes to food and weight. I’m still abusing my body. I’m still dealing with a deadly illness.

I’m grateful my GP didn’t wait for my weight to drop further before helping me and, instead, made a referral based on other symptoms. I suspect most people with eating disorders are able to fly under the radar — or get neglected by professionals — because they don’t reach the point of total emaciation.

“Baking is a soothing activity, but I don’t eat the cookies I bake, or even give them away to someone else.”

There’s an expectation for people with anorexia to survive entirely on a diet of fruit, vegetables, and fasting. I’m not sure if other sufferers are like me, following their list of rules some days and breaking it on others, or if it’s because I’m actively fighting what anorexia tells me. But what I eat isn’t so simple. Some days, I eat very little. On others, I find it hard to stop eating at all and celebrate being “recovered”, knowing I’m lying to myself.

Most days are somewhere in between the two extremes, following restrictive rules that make no sense to me or anyone else. I can’t explain why some foods like white bread, granola, and avocado are suddenly forbidden from my plate, while others like chocolate and marshmallows are permissible.

An obsession with food

One of the biggest differences in my life, rather than my weight, is how my relationship with food has changed. To me, these strange behaviours are what distinguish a “diet” from an “illness”.

Baking is a soothing activity, but I don’t eat the cookies I bake, or even give them away to someone else — I like keeping them in the freezer. I enjoy being around food, having control over it, and baking fulfils this urge. Freezing the food guarantees I won’t become overwhelmed by temptation and eat it by accident. The idea I might disassociate and binge without realising is frightening, especially since it’s happened before.

“Although I have a strained relationship with food, I’m obsessed with watching other people cook, bake, and eat.”

Carrying snacks around with me is comforting, like a baby blanket almost, even though I don’t want to eat them. Although I have a strained relationship with food, I’m obsessed with watching other people cook, bake, and eat. Part of it is due to envy, as I’m jealous that others are “allowed” to eat food my disorder won’t let me have. The other part is vicarious enjoyment and tricks my brain into feeling sated as if I’ve eaten the food myself.

The urge to be near food, when you’re restricting your intake, is purely biological. Your brain is reminding you that you’re hungry and need to eat something. It’s trying to keep you alive. If nothing else, fighting my body’s cries for fuel shows I have a problem that runs deeper than a diet.

When a problem becomes obvious

Some of these behaviours pushed me to confess my problems to other people. It’s hard to pretend everything’s okay when you’re dissecting a vegan cheeseburger into “acceptable” portions. Suddenly, you realise a stranger is staring at you like you’ve lost your mind. For a moment, you see yourself through the eyes of an outsider. You realise there’s a good chance that you have, indeed, lost your mind. The evidence is sitting right there on your plate.

“It’s hard to see a future where I won’t wake up in the middle of the night, panicking, and obsessing over what I’m going to eat the next day.”

Despite it staring me in the face, admitting that I have anorexia has been a lengthy process. I can’t pin down exactly when it started. I don’t exactly know when I realised I had become “powerless” over this disease. But it has been a long, slow journey to get here.

I know the road to recovery is going to be even harder to trek. It will take a lot of work on my part and it won’t be easy or quick. Right now, it’s hard to see a future where I won’t wake up in the middle of the night, panicking, and obsessing over what I’m going to eat the next day. But I’m going to take it one step at a time.

Admitting to myself — to everyone — that I have a problem is just the first one.

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Featured image courtesy of Thought Catalogue via Unsplash. Image license found here. No changes have been made to this image. 

Seven (they/them) is a BA History and Sociology student at the University of Warwick. They are a freelance journalist, disability advocate, and lover of cats.

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