How is anorexia experienced? (individual and others)

Life Put On Hold

'I hear from people whose lives have been put on hold'

Helpless

Observation

Something Inflicted

'The academic achievement marked the physical and psychological pain Emily was inflicting on herself and her mother'

'she spent ten years watching her beloved teenage daughter slowly self-destruct'

Action

'Sue seemed unable to do anything to stop her daughter's decline'

Pleasure

'I remember just for the first time experiencing hunger as a pleasurable, almost exhilarating, sensation.'

Normality

'But then I've looked back at diaries from previous years, and already I was talking about the usual sorts of teenage things'

Control

Improving Reality

Creation of Reality

'if I were to be thinner then things would be better'

'explain to me when you first slipped into anorexia.'

Family Disturbance/Reactions to Family

'I had split up from her dad, Tom, not very long before and was with my new partner, Adam'

'And I think I was more concerned about, how are we going to get this different sort of family to work'

Not Noticing

'And I think I was more concerned about, how are we going to get this different sort of family to work than I was thinking, oh, this is the beginning of anorexia'

'a few small little signals of her being very very peculiar'

Abnormality

'a few small little signals of her being very very peculiar'

'That's normal behaviour – I've got a teenager who does that!'

'You don't instantly think ‘anorexia', you think, ah, this is a bit annoying, or difficult'

'but it didn't twig – I don't even know when it did finally twig to me, do you?'

External Noticing

' I don't know whether the people at school started to get worried before you did, perhaps.'

'No, I always loved food, I think.'

Misconception

'CE: That's quite surprising to hear, from someone who's been anorexic. Explain what you mean by that; that seems like a real contradiction.'

Perfection

' the point of not eating was to make the food that one did eat all the more perfect: the longer one could go without eating, the more wonderful eating felt.'

Sacrifice and Reward

'CE: Was there particular food that you sought out at that point, to kind of reward yourself for the fact that you weren't eating it all day?'

Secrecy

'she was very very secretive'

' she was very very secretive, so a lot of the time I didn't know what was going on,'

'And that seemed so odd to me, because obviously you think people who are dieting, they're going to be eating carrots, and lettuce, and things – but chocolate?! '

'a really mad thing to do to your body'

Sense/Rationalisation

'you weren't rationalising that actually this made no sense, and it was a really mad thing to do to your body?'

Isolation

'it went along with just becoming increasingly solitary, because I never wanted to eat anything with other people, never really had energy to do things with other people'

Destruction

'I knew it was destructive to my body'

Purity

' I thought maybe it was a way of having a sort of intellectually pure life'

Nocturnality

'became increasingly nocturnal, so I couldn't really do normal things in the daytime with other people'

Achievement

' the background logic was that I wouldn't do as well at university if I were to live otherwise'

'you had to basically be in that state to be able to concentrate on your work'

'Is that what you're saying: that you couldn't be a normal person, and eat normally; this was what worked for you?'

'I'd work and work and that would be the way of earning food at the end of it all.'

'Nor could I imagine there being any other pleasure comparable to eating'

'this mouthful of chocolate last thing at night, on one's own in the dark'

'‘But think of all the things you're missing! What about all the fun, what about all the music, and the dancing, and the sex – and you're not enjoying any of it!''

Communication

Difficulty Communicating

'I think loosened her tongue to say things that she'd been wanting to say, that she hadn't dared say to Emily'

'it's difficult to speak'

'you don't understand what pleasures I do have'

'you don't understand what pleasures I do have.'

'You were controlling your pleasures; you were deciding what the spectrum was for pleasure.'

'One of the disturbing things is how used to it you become, because you see her every day'

' I never got used to putting my arms around her to give her a hug, and just feeling a row of bones'

Societal Ideals

'and you get this awful thing of being torn between: you look awful, you're so thin! and then the fashion –'

'Not quite admiring her, but the fashion and the way clothes are cut and so on, they just look nicer on thin people'

Understanding

'but the fashion and the way clothes are cut and so on, they just look nicer on thin people, and so sort of understanding, in a way, that--'

'but chocolate?! But I understand much better now, why she did that.'

'You're watching your daughter disappearing in front of you; you're beginning to think, I might lose you, you might die, you're getting so scarily, scarily thin now, you're wasting away.'

'I suppose I knew people would think and see that I was ill – but I wanted that rather than looking normal; because I thought it marked me out as different, and that that was a good thing.'

'I thought the shockingness was an accurate reflection of how I was, so it seemed – it seemed right.'

Whatever the opposite of helpless is/Acceptance

'I knew that she might die, and I had to face that'

'CE: You can do something – or can you? – to stop that.

SB: No you can't do that – you can't, no you can't.'

'A very very helpful thing was, a friend of ours, who was also anorexic, suggested I went on a carers' day course about anorexia....most of these people had really, really put their life on hold'

'they'd given up their jobs, they'd spent money they couldn't afford, they'd devoted themselves to trying to help their anorexic daughter or son – to no avail. To absolutely no avail at all.'

'Because I felt, as a mother, if she genuinely wanted to die, well, that's her prerogative, I shouldn't be forcing her to life'

'I thought I was doing better than the anorexics who seemed out of control because they'd be, you know, in and out of hospital. I had it in complete control: it was always just this very very gradual decline'

External Control

' I thought that that was the height of control, not getting to the point where you have to be put on a drip and, you know, other people take over.'

'I wanted to keep it at the point at which no one could really do anything about it. That seemed more powerful than dying, to me.'

'a solitary little individual, just beavering away?'

'And the one friend I did have at college, who was also a slight outsider type, really didn't notice, I think.'

'I suppose it was a slight secrecy about how my body was – so I'd always look OK, I think'

'she was actually instrumental in 2008, finally when I decided to do something about it'

Support from Others

' she was actually instrumental in 2008, finally when I decided to do something about it, in finding the therapy for me, and taking me along to my GP, and sitting with me, and everything.'

'she just thought I was one of those thin types who – was like that.'

'she rang me, in secrecy, and said: I'm really, really worried about Emily'

' she just dropped everything – all her academic work, for three days, and spent – and rang me, a few times –, and spent those days online, in the library, finding out everything she could possibly find out; located, in Oxford, an experimental programme for comparing two methods of treatment for anorexia; persuaded Emily to go back to Bristol to her own GP there and, you know, got everything in motion'

'despite starving herself, Emily gets through all this, and gets an amazingly good degree, and then gets offered a lectureship, and she's written two books with your partner, Adam Hart-Davis'

'Her life is in limbo; is that the way you're seeing it?'

'we tried to have a rule that she had to be up by lunchtime, even though we knew she wouldn't eat lunch with us; and even that, she didn't seem able to manage.'

'by sort of half past three, four o'clock we've done most of our day's work, we're having a cup of tea, Emily finally wakes up. '

'and her whole day is starting then, in the dark.'

' it's hard to believe that somebody can be voluntarily living that way. They don't have to; there's nothing making them live that way other than their own determination to do so.'

Life Starting Up Again

'you've got an opportunity to change the way your life is, as well, and the way you're living it'

Parents

'but where she is going to dig herself in, with a doctor, and a bike, and everything. And I just thought: I don't want that.'

' I suddenly thought: this isn't going to be my house; this is going to be our new life together. '

'something went wrong, and we were both sort of awkward on the phone'

'your anorexia is not welcome at our new house.'

'I sort of wanted to reject them completely, I think, and just escape'

Lack of Control

'I would have to memorise all the numberplates'

'it was already a massive problem how late I was going to bed'

'they really angered me, because they sort of belied the illusion that I had that I was in control....I called them whores, because I hated them; and yet I couldn't do anything about them.'

Purposeful Action

'CE: How did you climb out of that, then?'

'Too low, for an eating disorders clinic!'

'she told me that I wouldn't be able to be accepted on the programme in my current state, because my weight was too low'

' I just felt really really trapped in everything'

'and decided: I have to just start eating again, I have to try it, at least.'

'I couldn't quite believe I was going to do it, but I knew I was, somehow, I think, once I'd made that decision.'

'it was just such a pleasure – a real pleasure [sighs] – and I felt I could have eaten ten of them'

'I'd decided now to eat'

'I'd decided now to eat, so hunger didn't seem like it was my choice; it felt like something uncontrollable.'

'And they showed me this graph and said, at this point, the obsessive compulsive things will disappear, at this point this will happen, at this point – and it almost always did.'

'rounded life'

'I do feel terribly sad looking back, about – partly about how much pain I caused to other people'

' I'd done it for so long, I'd done it so well'

'I went as far as I could with it – and it gave me all the answers it could'

'It doesn't seem to overwhelm anything any more. Which is kind of hopeful, isn't it – I mean, hope to other people, that sort of realisation that you can have all that'

' It was terrible hurt; it was awful, awful pain, to lots of people.'

'and life's moving on, instead of just being stuck, like it was.'

'and another friend of mine, who came to Oxford the evening after the eventful appointment at the clinic, bought me wine, and talked and talked to me; he talked, with me, tirelessly around and towards the decision that had to be made. He then came to the supermarket with me, and bought the food for me, when I couldn't bring myself to. (I say more about that pivotal evening here.) And he carried on coming up by train and buying me food, for as long as I kept needing, it, whenever my supplies ran out. I will be forever grateful to him for all this and for much else.'

'my sense of powerlessness and lack of dignity in the experience of OCD'

'my angry and impotent state back then.'