What is life with an eating disorder like?

Imagine that you live in a world permeated by pain and misery that is directly attributable to an unhealthy medical condition; physical and mental discomfort are always in the background, and often in the foreground as well. The condition from which you suffer is epidemic. In fact, more people share your malady than any other medical condition known to exist, yet very few people acknowledge that this is so even though the condition is officially classified as an “illness” with recognized criteria for diagnosis. No one has seriously attempted to find out just how many people share your malady, and as a result very few people indeed are trying to find out how to alleviate your painful and life-threatening symptoms. Most people in the general population are vaguely aware that such “sickness” exists somewhere, but when people find out that someone has this condition they tend only to respond with ridicule, disgust, fear, and pity. Media attention regarding your condition is focused solely on celebrities who have died and the resulting jokes of questionable taste told by comedians and talk show hosts. Despite the wide-spread cultural and social pressures which have been demonstrated to trigger your unhealthy condition, reporters and academics spend more time demonizing sufferers who are publicly self-affirming than they do criticizing the known causes of the suffering. So, when people manifest this condition they try not to tell anyone. You suspect that others suffer as you do, but you’ve never actually spoken to another person who admits it. You’ve attempted to communicate with other sufferers online, but web-sites which facilitate such discourse are routinely shut down by people who accuse them of “promoting” an unhealthy life-style. Health care providers attempt to treat people who, by virtue of their deteriorating health, can no longer hide the fact that they have this condition – often against their wishes. But since research that might help find solutions is poorly funded, the treatments are mostly ineffective and often even make the symptoms worse. Despite the lack of research funding and efficient treatments, many healthcare providers continue to insist that people with your condition “just make very bad patients.” As a result of all this, you’re more frightened by the prospect of being treated than you are about dying. And dying is a very likely outcome, since the condition you have is more deadly than most known illnesses.

Those of us with eating disorders live in this world.

Chris Kraatz, Radical Recovery: A Manifesto of Eating Disorder Pride

                                        University Press of America, 2006