My battle with bulimia: Eight years on and stronger than ever

From the outside, Queen’s student Colette Lydon seemed like a happy, fun-loving teenage girl, which she was and is even more to this day. But Colette, like many young people today, was battling with an inner turmoil that she grappled with for nearly seven years.

At just 13, the Co. Down girl felt isolated and different due to being overweight: “I started restricting my calories. Undereating became a way to control my sadness. Losing weight made me feel like I was good at something.

“I lost weight but because I was eating so little, I developed a binge eating problem where I lost all control and turned to purging to try and undo my horrible ‘binging’ habits. My weight fluctuated for five years but on the outside I looked ‘normal’.”

When Colette moved out for university two weeks after her 18th birthday everything got worse. Feeling like the “bigger” girl in the group during freshers she only felt worse and made friends with others that had eating disorders, which is when things took an even more drastic turn.

“I really think people with eating disorders can sense other people who have them. I know I still can tell immediately if I meet someone if they have an eating disorder. You get really good at spotting the signs because you have all the same issues yourself.

“I met a girl like this in halls in first year and we never ever encouraged each other to binge or purge – not once. But we hung out together all the time and would be restricting calories all day just because that’s what we did separately anyway. So at night we always ended up binging together and purging together anyway. Literally in the same room. But it was horrible and I always felt disgusting afterwards and she would always cry so much.

“In the past I’d had friends to distract me because they were mentally stable, but I felt lonely at that time and like no one understood me. Then I got this Bulimic friend and she understood me but then there was no distraction. It wasn’t her fault and it’s heartbreaking but we were sick and depressed together.”

Colette at the height of her illness

People often think that someone with an eating disorder might feel better when they lose weight, like they’ve reached a goal. The situation is exactly the opposite, Colette says: “I didn’t care about my weight so much when I was very sick. I was extremely suicidal and basically just wanted to starve to death. Eating made me feel so guilty that I would cry and if I didn’t purge I would have felt even more disgusting.

“It began to numb the pain and then it spiralled out of control. I even started self-harming daily. It wasn’t about weight loss but that just came alongside it and was probably the only ‘good’ thing to come out of it.”

Colette now

In May 2013 Colette realised it was either die or get help and so she walked into a doctors and started to see a specialist. She began a health-based Instagram, took up yoga, now lives on a plant-based diet and couldn’t be happier: “I eat as much as I could possibly need – I finally love myself.”

Colette plans to keep speaking up about her story to help others in the same situation she was in: ” I want to show them there is nothing to be ashamed of and that a mental illness isn’t your choice. I really hope we can get to a point where people fully accept mental illness as on the same level as physical illness.”

Not everyone feels brave enough to come forward about their mental illnesses and asking for help is scary, but mental strength determines physical strength, mind over body. If one girl that battled with something so severe for the entirety of her teenage life, anyone can.

You can watch Colette’s story here.