Anorexia Kills

For whatever reason, I feel the need to preface this post with a declaration that I do not buy the Daily Mail. Finding it, all too often, a thinly veiled excuse to propound nationalistic views, I frequently have to remind readers that the world is not really that bad a place unless they believe all they read in this trussed up tabloid.

I was, however, drawn to the full page article about a long suffering mother, who, five years after her daughter’s tragic death, has made the decision to release the girl’s diaries. Diaries that record the tortured journey of Loredana Verta, a bright, talented sixteen year old, who was dead within three years. Heart attack.

Rightly or wrongly, some of  this young sufferer’s innermost thoughts and feelings are laid bare in newsprint for all to see.

The workings of this girl’s mind are utterly consumed by the illness. Her writing is littered with scribbled self loathing, capitalised screams of  “I HATE ME… I HATE MY BODY”.   Most teenagers feels like this at some point. Hormones, skin, peer pressure, perfection culture, fashion… It’s all there to taunt the aspiring, spot laden, hormone raging teen.

Except Loredana’s thoughts are all centred on weight loss and weight gain and wrongly perceived fat.
To my mind, what is more haunting than the poisonous self hatred, the desperation, the pleas to God and the cries for help, are the words of a grieving mother, who says,

“Lorry thought she could live with the condition – that as long as she was thin, she would be OK. She didn’t realise that anorexia is a deadly disease. It is a killer”.*

For long term sufferers, ‘old hands’,
 Anorexia can be so ingrained, so deeply habitual, that we forget that it is something UNnatural… an invasion. It becomes like Stockholm Syndrome… It’s is our natural fall back position.

It KILLS.
Let’s get real.
It is deadly.

We think it won’t ever happen to us, and yet, why wouldn’t it? It killed Loredana in just THREE years.

Of all psychiatric disorders, Anorexia is the biggest killer. TWENTY PERCENT of sufferers die prematurely.^

I hear my wake up call.

Can you hear yours?

* Emphasis is mine
^ Statistics according to B-EAT

Anorexia: Disease or Lifestyle?

Monday’s Telegraph newspaper marked the beginning of Eating Disorders Awareness week with an article about ED websites: More specifically, ‘Pro Ana’ sites.  (For the uninitiated, these sites are sites set up to encourage those who want to starve themselves. They share tips and tricks about hiding food, fighting hunger, effective purging, dealing with interfering parents / loved ones and often sporting photographs of skeletal bodies to give ‘thinspiration’ to followers).I skimmed Sarah Rainey’s article , too tired of the topic to want to engage with the politics and the emotion held between the lines of the pro ana blogger, the parent of a (nother) very bright, talented ‘whole life ahead of her’ dead Anorexic and ED organisations. One thing however, leapt out at me.This:“Anorexia is a lifestyle, not a disease”.It’s something I’ve heard many times in various forms and generally from sources who, clearly, have no understanding of the pathological nature of Anorexia. Without wishing to state the obvious, I find the implications of the statement upsetting because it embodies the attitude that somehow, Anorexia is a choice one makes. For me, this is an absurd idea. However, as I have previously tried to explain (here), I think there are different types of Anorexia and it is possible that, for some people, devoting their time and energy to becoming extraordinarily thin, is a lifestyle choice, in much the same way that a total devotion to anything may lead to radical lifestyle choices. All well and good (excuse the irony), and perhaps in this instance, starvation is a choice… just another way of living. But, can a disease be a lifestyle? Unfortunately, what the article I read didn’t point out, was that if this is a choice, it can’t be Anorexia or Bulimia or EDNOS. A disease, by its very definition and nature, isn’t a choice… Nobody CHOOSES to suffer with a disease. True, it can appear that way with some mental illness’, but nobody makes a choice to become sick. People don’t choose to die from malnutrition any more than they don’t choose to develop leukaemia. And this is where it all becomes very complex… because CHOICE plays a large part in the distortions that characterise this illness so vividly. A person suffering with Anorexia, believes that they have CONTROL of their weight and their body. They believe in the choice element. They believe that they are IN CONTROL. In fact, the extreme opposite is true. It is the disease that controls them and the disease which distorts their thinking. The disease ROBS the Anorexic of choice. It STEALS their capacity for logical thought about their weight. It DILUTES the ability to rationalise their fear of weight gain and to recognise that they are no longer in control of their mind. I understand the Pro-Ana blogger’s statement in the light of those who wish to diet, but “choosing an Anorexic lifestyle” is an oxymoron. One last point, and perhaps the most important: Luckily, there IS some element of choice.It is reserved for those who are in the grip of an Eating Disorder (or addiction, I think) and it is this: The sufferer may choose to remain in the half life that it forces on them. They may CHOOSE to give up the fight for wellness. Just as somebody who is diseased with cancer may choose to stop treatment, an Anorexic or Bulimic can CHOOSE not to fight the illness. RECOVERY or NOT is the choice. A lifestyle of recovery is agony, but a lifestyle led by the choice NOT TO recover, is to submit to the power wielded by this dreadful disease. 

Going... Down?

Okay...Title only meaningful to those who are familiar with the old Aerosmith track, 'Love in An Elevator', a good but vastly overplayed track (at one time). My frustration with my one time favourite band has increased as the teenage, rock-chick-love has lessened; all because they sold out to the soft rock market with dribbly anthems like 'Don't Wanna Miss A Thing'.
Apologies. My intentions to write about 'recovery' have been twisted into a rant about my old musical idols.

(Aside) It occurs to me as I apologise, that actually, Steve Tyler and Joe Perry are a long way from being completely irrelevant links to the subject in hand. Both singers have grappled and battled with serious alcohol and heroin addictions. Both know the agonies that come with fighting to be free from that which has possession of your mind.

Addiction comes in so many forms and is something so closely related to the topic of Eating Disorders that it is worthy of some careful thought.
Now however, my mind is too tired to begin debating the fine lines and the overlaps. I regularly feel the urge to write some more informative pieces about Anorexia and Mental Health here but every time I sit down to write, the words sort of ebb away from my (cognitively impaired) mind. 

That's right. 
"Cognitively Impaired". 
The term, used by the experts, to explain the condition of a mind weakened by the effects of malnutrition. 
It makes me wince to accept that this is my current state and yet, all my Anorexic protestations, the frantic scrabbling to deny truth, dwindle in the face of plain, starkly real figures. 
The scales don't lie, although, typically, in the mind of someone suffering with an Eating Disorder, they are incorrect. Not day upon day upon day they're not. 
I'm following that bloody line of decline, and I KNOW it... It's as though I am rendered completely helpless by the power of the Anorexia. 
My daylight head says, 'C'mon! Get a grip! You have to find the strength, the power, to beat this';  In the lonely darkness of the restless night, the more sinsiter voice, 'You'll be lucky if you wake up to see a new day. Your internal organs are tired. Your heart is weak'. 

A young lady who I was an inpatient with for six months, died last week. 
Multiple Organ Failure caused by a long term Eating Disorder.
She was strong, lively, witty, intelligent. 
Her death rocked the ED community I 'served time' with. 

What a TRAGIC WASTE. 

At the same time, my best friend here in ___________  gave birth to a little girl. 
And so, the cycle of life and death continues. Everywhere today and tomorrow and for the rest of time, the mortality drum will continue, beating out it's rhythm on the lives it chooses. I get that. 
What I struggle to accept, is the slow suicide that this illness contributes to this pattern. It's so... horribly pointless. 
Life is to be lived, to the fullest. Jesus said that. And he is not to be argued with. 
Why then, am I, and so many beautiful, talented, young lives, subscribed and obligated to serve this hideous monster?

All answers on a postcard...

Eating Disorders Awareness - One Truth About Anorexia

I'm conscious that it's National Eating Disorders Week. 
I'm also conscious that much of my writing here has borne witness to my own, very personal, struggle with Anorexia and that, whilst there are many apparent similarities between sufferers, each and every person has their own 'strain' of the illness. 
I recently watched a BBC documentary by a now recovered minor celeb who, having suffered from Anorexia in her youth, embarked upon a quest to find out 'The Truth about Anorexia'. I watched with a  degree of cynicism, (typical of me) because the results of this exploration were pretty obvious from the outset. 

(Aside) As it happened, I was more intrigued the next day, by the widespread and vicious backlash on various discussion forums, where anorexics ripped the programme, and its celebrity 'investigator', to shreds, claiming that she obviously hadn't been a 'proper' anorexic! 
That would be another topic!

One thing that I've learned from the large number of patients in the treatment centres I've been in, is that there IS no single 'cause' of anorexia. There can be no 'getting to the bottom of it' because it's as shape shifting as the virus for the common cold.  

You think you can spot an anorexic? It's the legs that give it away right? The two pins that, by some miracle, are holding them up. And the face. The way their eyes sink into the skull, dark skin sagging at the ridge of bone which runs from the top of their cheek to the deep line around the mouth.
The clothes that hang baggy off their shoulders. Tired, tiny arms, narrowed, fleshless at the tops. 
Yep. Definitely.
As I type, I sit in Cafe Nero. Couples sit sipping valentines coffee. A barrista sweeps conscientiously, moving the easel with the 'Hot Soup' ad, concentrating on each swish across the tiled floor. A young man sits at his laptop, looking over dark glasses at intervals. 
I'm drinking a one shot Americano with skimmed milk, hot. My make up is immaculate (last time I checked anyway). Subtle grey eyeshadow, a touch of mascara, a little blush. I'm about seven stone; that's forty five kilos to the metric crowd. My clothes are an eight. I've just eaten a Kit Kat. 
Nobody knows I'm anorexic. 
Nobody can see that beneath the recently acquired flesh, a cold skeleton howls, like a forgotten child. Nobody can hear the whispers, the taunting desire to have one of the brownies that the rosy-glow girl to my right is enjoying. Nobody can see the rapid calculations, the figures flicking up and down as I add, divide, add, multiply; 107 calories = my biscuit, 100ml of skimmed milk =  43Kcals x 2 plus a bite of cereal bar. It's too much. How can I compensate at dinner? 
Nobody sees the anorexic who knocks around in a body too large.
I may be sitting near another at this very moment.

I think I've digressed somewhere. 
I set out to illustrate the fact that the one truth about Anorexia I know is that everyone's illness is different.

During inpatient treatment people presented with dangerously low BMIs. But how they got to that point varied. 
Okay, we all have an issue with food. But some anorexics are calorie obsessed, whilst others are more preoccupied with the fat content in foods. 
Some are addicted to exercise (myself included) and can hardly sit down for more than ten minutes without having to get up and do press ups or squats; others can happily lie on a sofa for hours and sleep. 
Some patients have buggered up their system by taking laxatives and/or making themselves sick. Others won't take a tablet, even for a migraine.
Some quake at the sight of a potato because carbs are sworn enemies, others are too afraid to eat a carrot because it has somehow become a 'fear food'. Still more are terrified of dairy products, not touching milk or cheese for years.
I met patients who will 'water load' to throw their weight (water loading is a common but dangerous behaviour practised by eating disordered patients who consume vast quantities of water in order to fake weight gain). Then again, some people are so obsessed with knowing their actual weight that they will wear exactly the same clothes to be weighed. 
Some anorexics are so scared that their body will absorb fat that they won't use cream shower gels or moisturiser on their skin. 
I've met anorexics who drink copious amounts of alcohol, whilst others won't even sniff it.
When I was at my worst, I couldn't drink coffee for fear that it contained hidden calories. I couldn't trust the calorie content on certain labels and so I ruled out anything which I deemed to have 'too few calories to be believed'.
Some people can't watch food programmes, others read cookbooks obsessively and liked nothing better than to cook a three course meal that they could never eat.

Eating Disorders may present similarly, but no one sufferer has the illness in quite the same way, which may be why they are so difficult to treat and why they are still so widely misunderstood.

Social Comment - Proportion

Horrified mother's of too plump children spat and cursed; weight conscious women frantically defended a woman's right to look however she chooses; Men everywhere kept their heads down... 

Once again, the British media successfully caused an outcry last week when they gleefully sensationalised versions of designer Karl Lagerfeld's remark on Adele's weight. 

The all too emotive word 'FAT' was splashed over front pages right, left and centre and the worst possible angled shots of Adele placed underneath. 

Lagerfeld, demonised by the press as they subtly edited or paraphrased parts of the comment, must have wanted the ground to swallow him up.

Support for Adele had never hit such a high, and thank goodness because, in fairness, it WAS a bit of a stupid and thoughtless thing to say. Stupid and thoughtless however, is about the size of it. 

(Spot the pun)

The guy isn't a demon. He's not a terrible person. He doesn't deserve to be hung, drawn ad quartered.

He didn't just say she was 'too fat', as many of the papers implied. The comment, however crass and insensitive, was taken out of context in order to sensationalise an already highly controversial subject. 

And let's face it, Adele IS a little overweight.

(Okay... Put the shotguns away...)

No big deal.

So what? 

The average person on the high street is a little overweight.

Why should our celebs have to be different?

I'm glad that there was a public cry against the concept of 'the perfect figure'. 

I'm glad there was more recognition of the pressures put upon celebrities to be thin.

But I'm not glad that our press have, once again in a rush of greedy glee, apparently lost the notion of relative importance, and blown things far beyond their proportions. 

Memorial

I have to admit that my blood ran a little colder as I drove back to the gym and heard this report on the radio...

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20100928/tuk-eating-disorder-victims-are-remember-45dbed5.html

I guess it is silly to get worried. After all, my choice right?

But the girl who died was six and a half stone.

I have fallen below six that there's nobody to scrutinise me.

My fear of a heart attack doesn't seem quite as strong as my horrible determination to lose weight.
Until I'm alone in the dead of the night, that is.
Then the fear of death at least matches the will to risk it.