Eating away at yourself

AROUND 60,000 people are estimated to be suffering from eating disorders in this country. Experts reckon that each year there are 4,500 new cases of anorexia nervosa, and 6,500 cases of bulimia. Anorexics starve themselves of food and become obsessed with avoiding eating. One in 10 sufferers will die as a result of the illness. Bulimics binge eat, then purge themselves of food, often by vomiting.

Contrary to popular belief, the disorders are not "slimmer's diseases".

"If you are starving yourself or binge eating, you could be trying to cope with problems that have nothing to do with food," says Nicky Bryant, chief executive of the Eating Disorders Association (EDA).

Adolescents are most vulnerable to anorexia, while bulimia strikes at a slightly older age, although both disorders can arise at any time of life.

And men account for around 10 per cent of eating-disorder victims. The two women below, featured in Channel 4's Trouble With Food series starting next week, are typical examples of eating-disorder sufferers. They spoke to DANIEL LEE

SARAH MIDDLETON anorexic for 22 years Sarah, 43, sits down in her Norwich flat and crosses her legs.

They look thin enough to snap.

Her clothes swamp her fragile frame. "Breakfast at 6am is my most successful meal of the day. I have a small slither of cucumber, some cheese and a couple of glasses of fruit juice - if I eat much more than that at any time, I throw up." Sarah, who is 5ft 2in and weighs less than five stone, is anorexic.

"I am a voluntary worker at a women's support organisation, but I have been unable to hold down a paid job for a long time because of my lack of energy," explains Sarah, who has never married or had children. Twenty-two years of anorexia have left her with wrinkles, weakened teeth and nails, fragile bones and infertile. She shows me pictures of an attractive, energetic blonde.

This was Sarah before anorexia took over her life.

She began to worry about her weight when she was working on a yacht, cooking the meals. Soon the worries about being slightly fat became an obsession with weight control. "When you suffer with anorexia you lose rationality. You look in the mirror and think you're huge," Sarah says. "I enjoyed being in control of my body, but then I went too far. I drink coffee during the day and every evening I cook a complete meal - fish or chicken with vegetables - and I usually eat it. Then afterwards I throw up. I should cut out the middle man and put it straight in bin.

"When I go to bed I take fruit and cheese just in case I wake up starving in the night. If I eat a small amount in the night it stays down. Night starvation is a recognised symptom of anorexia, so my sleep pattern is wobbly. I normally go to bed at midnight, waking at 2am and sometimes again before I start my day at 6am." Her life is dominated by counting calories.

None of Sarah's family suffers from any sort of eating disorder.

She is still searching for an explanation. "When I was 13 or 14 people called me thunder thighs. I weighed about nine stone and I used to do stupid things like miss lunch at school. But it was a gradual thing until I was about 21, when it became overwhelming."

Treatments for anorexia and other eating disorders have ranged from force feeding to more humane counselling.

"When I first arrived at hospital in 1988 I didn't regard myself as ill and I was shocked to be lumped together with people who were very sick," says Sarah.

She now has counselling and believes she is beginning to tackle her condition. She is becoming increasingly involved in her voluntary work, which, she says, "is important because it takes me out of myself.

Anorexics tend to be very self-centred because they concentrate on fulfilling the obsession. Work helps keep things in perspective.

Now I can manage the occasional sandwich at lunchtime."

SARAH CHAPMAN: bulimic since she was 15 Sarah, 24, is studying for a psychology degree and works part-time, exercising race horses. There is no outward appearance of her eating disorder. She began dieting as a teenager but, after her desire to lose weight turned into an obsession, she developed anorexia and then bulimia.

"When I was about 15, a friend and I were both a similar weight and decided to lose about half a stone," 'I became waif-like and loved it' she says. "We did and she stopped, but I didn't. I became waif-like and loved it." She managed to keep her weight at around six stone (she is 5ft 3in) for about 18 months, simply by starving herself. Then her food consumption swung violently in the opposite direction. "I ate anything I could get my hands on.

I ballooned, so to keep myself looking normal I would take laxatives and make myself vomit after eating." At one stage she was swallowing 100 laxatives a day.

Even though Sarah weighed only a fraction over nine stone, she still wanted to lose weight.

"To my eye I was humungous," she says. But because she appeared healthy, she was able to conceal her condition. "With bulimia, you can do all these mad things and still look perfectly normal." She is not overweight, but still wants to shed more pounds.

"That's the thing. If I lose a half stone, then I will think I need to lose another, and another ... It is exhilarating watching the pounds fall off."

Sarah, who has a younger sister, is at a loss to explain the cause of her condition, but she can remember being called tubby by her teacher during swimming lessons when she was nine and other people calling her similar names afterwards.

Although therapy has helped, it has also left mixed feelings. "In a way I handed over responsibility for getting better to the therapist while I concentrated on maintaining my bulimia obsession." But Sarah has now told her parents, who are being supportive. She feels that, with the help of slimming tablets, she has stabilised her weight and will improve further with continued counselling. "Hopefully I have avoided any long-term effects," she says.

Diet Diaries, featuring Sarah Middleton and Sarah Chapman, starts Channel 4's Trouble With Food season at 9pm on 21 February.

This is Eating Disorder Week. The Eating Disorder Association helpline can be contacted on 01603 621 414 from 9am to 6.30pm weekdays only.

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