Eating disorders can affect anyone #EDAW2025

Anyone can develop an eating disorder. Anyone can have an eating disorder

By EmpowerED Expert by Experience Molly,

Describe an eating disorder. What does it look like? A skeletal frame; frailty; eating nothing at all; selfishness; an obsession with body image…? We all have preconceived ideas about eating disorders.

My family used to joke that “Molly could never develop an eating disorder”.  “She loves food too much” they’d say. And they are right – I love food. Ignoring it, restricting, was and still is, hard work. It’s a real test of willpower. But that means there’s a strength that comes from beating the temptation. When I succeed in restricting, my body feels strong. I become acutely aware of it. My legs ache and let me know they’re there, my body shivers with cold and my stomach grumbles. My heartbeat even feels stronger – I’m certainly more conscious of it. There’s something very grounding in the sensations of a starving body. An aliveness that comes from being on the edge of death. I feel mentally alert too. I detach from hunger pangs and concentrate with an intensity that feels energising. I’m taking that idiom, ‘mind over matter’, a little too literally. Testing it out, my mind defeats my matter.

“My life is going too well to develop an eating disorder”. And outwardly, it was. I could hide behind my achievements. After all, a problem is surely only really a problem once my work is suffering. Success equals happiness and while I’m successful... well, I must be happy enough. I got onto my dream course at my ideal university. However, there was a growing disorder behind this success. I never quite felt I fitted in. An eating disorder begins to emerge, giving me someone to be, an identity and a degree of control. My safety blanket.

“Molly is too sporty”. Too physically fit and strong to develop an eating disorder. My body has a purpose and I enjoy feeling powerful. And I know too that to be strong a body must be fuelled. Without food I cannot be powerful and my performance suffers. The thing is, we can know and believe two very different things. I know I need to eat well; I don’t believe my body will fail. How far can I push it? Exercise becomes another form of abuse for my body.

Then, once you begin disordered behaviour, it becomes an addiction. Politely declining a biscuit as the tray is passed around, becomes who you are and your next high comes in affirming that identity. If you think of yourself as someone who’s a good cook, then a successful dinner party leaves you feeling good. In the same way, I feel a high when I successfully decline food. This is my central identity and I affirm it again and again. Each time it becomes more the core of me until nothing is more important than scoring my next hit; food and resisting it.

I feel safe, strongest, like the best version of me, now my physical form is shrunk, now my mind is singular and focused on one thing. Now there’s rules to contain me in too open a world. I am in control.

It’s hard for people, me included, to see an eating disorder when the person doesn’t fit your preconceptions of ‘a person with an eating disorder’. When they are in its grip but not skeletal, when they are outwardly successful but developed strategies to hide disordered behaviours.  I don’t necessarily act like the assumed stereotype – I’ve never shown any interest in fashion, I don’t use social media and am not obsessed with body image; we’re a close family who always ate around the table, together; and I never entirely stop eating.

So, what does an eating disorder look like? … It’s not a dichotomy of course – eating disorder and non-eating disorder. It doesn’t look like any one thing and it refuses to be contained in stereotype. An eating disorder is the perfect strategy for someone like me, like a person you know, who “could never develop an eating disorder”. 

“People generally see what they look for, and hear what they listen for” [Harper Lee] Challenge those preconceptions.

Over two decades ago I received a diagnosis that would profoundly shape the rest of my life: an eating disorder.

Despite an early diagnosis by my GP, lack of specialised treatment in my area meant I waited seven years before receiving professional help. This delay caused immense psychological distress for both me and my family, and it put my physical health at serious risk.

How did my diagnosis feel?

Scary. Confusing. Isolating. Yet having my experiences, symptoms, and behaviours collectively labelled as an eating disorder, in my case anorexia, felt overly simplistic. Beneath the surface, there was much more at play. Intrusive thoughts, negative feelings, and difficult emotions stretched far beyond food, hunger, and body image. My internal struggles deprived me of opportunities for comfort, belonging, or acceptance. I was fearful of many things, not just eating, but of my performance at school, college, and university, my relationships with family and friends, and my place in the world. I resorted to restrictive and highly repetitive eating patterns to cope with everyday challenges. I found it impossible to share this experience with anyone. I felt like I did not fit it anywhere or with anyone. I became deeply depressed and withdrawn.

Professional support

Building a trusting relationship with my therapist took months. Initially, I struggled to effectively communicate my thoughts, feelings, emotions, and experiences. I just did not know how or where to start, and I hated having the attention on me. Each session I would arrive terrified, resistant, and reserved. The quality of the relationship that developed between me and my therapist was key to overcoming these challenges. Progress was slow at first, but I felt supported, listened to, and cared for, which gave me hope.

I am pleased to say that the therapy and support I received brought many positive changes to my life. When I left therapy, things were ‘good’—at least compared to the past. I secured a dream job, moved out of the family home, and started my first committed relationship. Although I continued to experience depression and anxiety, I managed to maintain relative stability with food and weight. Surely, this meant I no longer had an eating disorder?

Relapse

Several years later, personal challenges triggered the return of my food-related anxieties, my Achilles’ heel. That deeply ingrained neural pathway was my default coping mechanism. However, this time, the pattern was a little different. I experienced extreme swings between food restriction and binge eating. The more I leaned into one behaviour, the harder and faster I swung to the other, rarely finding a safe middle ground. My body resisted food restriction to the point where any perceived threat of food scarcity compelled me to consume large amounts of food.

These two seemingly opposite behaviours—restricting and bingeing, feeling in and out of control around food—were deeply confusing and frustrating. I was consumed by anger and shame about myself and my actions. I also felt deflated, as I had believed my eating disorder was behind me and struggled to accept that it was still present. Although I kept my struggles a secret from friends and family, I sought professional help. Unfortunately, this time, I did not receive the support I needed. The focus on my behaviours, rather than the underlying psychological and physiological issues, only worsened my condition. Feeling hopeless and alone, I withdrew from the service; despite knowing I desperately needed support.

Present day

Therapy, combined with educating myself through books and online content, has helped me to recognise, accept, and experience my emotions without resorting to food, self-punishment, avoidance, restrictive or dissociative strategies to cope.

By talking about my experiences and listening and learning from others, I continue to learn, grow, and deepen my understanding of myself and my experience of having an eating disorder.