"Your talk here at KGS really went down brilliantly and I had loads of students telling me (and other colleagues) how interesting and hard hitting the talk was, and it is clear that your gentle and direct approach really allowed your story to speak for itself. Thanks again for an excellent talk"

Assistant Head of Sixth Form, Kingston Grammar School

EATING DISORDERS


CLARE SOLE

My name is Clare and I would like to share my story with young people, to give them an insight into what my life was like with an Eating Disorder.  I am in recovery from both Anorexia and Bulimia which started at the age of 15 but I did not seek help until my mid 20’s due to my denial; I thought I was ok or at least that I was in control.

For me, my eating disorder was an escape from reality. Whilst I was actively in my addiction, I was able to suppress my feelings and withdraw from any emotions I may have been feeling. It was a coping strategy that I ended up becoming trapped within and it ended up causing me more problems than it actually solved. 

I felt powerless in my everyday life but I had complete control over what I did and did not eat; having that control, knowing no one could stop me gave me huge satisfaction.  My disorder was a way to deal with painful feelings of anger, shame, guilt, fear and self loathing. 

I experienced childhood trauma which left me feeling completely worthless. These negative feelings continued into my adolescent years and my disorder progressively got worse; where I felt the eating disorder would help me to feel better it actually caused greater emotional pain and isolation, not to mention the physical pain. 

My disorder ended up taking over my life, I was no longer in control, and it was now completely controlling me. It was only when I was told I could die from this illness that it really did hit me that I had a problem. Over a period of 5 years I was in and out of inpatient treatment centres.

I needed to start looking at the underlying issues and start to talk about how I felt rather than suppressing it which was incredibly difficult as I had lost my trust in people. I realised that food was not the problem, the problem was inside me!! Slowly I began to rebuild my life through counselling and found new coping strategies which completely changed my life.

My talk will cover:

My own personal experience of having an eating disorder
I will give an insight of  the symptoms to look out for
I will cover the different types of eating disorders
The treatment I received and how I was fortunate enough to find recovery
Time for students to ask any questions