“Just Eat” Documentary Takes on National Injustice
Eating disorders are deadly illnesses. Whether it’s the physical complications that kill you — cardiac arrest, organ failure, or otherwise — or it’s suicide prompted by the extreme mood disturbances, eating disorders, if left untreated, do not end well. In fact, they have the highest mortality rate of all mental illnesses. And yet, in addition to being the deadliest, they are the most overlooked, underfunded, and misunderstood. We in the eating disorder community are very familiar with these incongruities. Now, the public will also get an inside look at the things we suffer day...
Read MorePost-“Denied”: Keep the Pressure on Insurance Companies
Insurance Coverage: Benefit or Barrier? Dear Friends, I’m writing on behalf of the women, men, and children I met this year while in treatment for an eating disorder, and I’m asking for your help. Many of those I met have been suffering from their illnesses for years—but not necessarily because of the illness’s severity. Rather, their eating disorders have been dragged out because their insurance providers consistently cut off treatment prematurely, even against clinician advice. Time and again, these patients leave treatment or (if they’re lucky) are moved to lower...
Read MoreWhy I Am Grateful for 12 Years With an Eating Disorder
On Sept. 30 and Oct. 1, I traveled to Washington D.C. with hundreds of other eating disorder advocates to participate in the Eating Disorders Coalition’s fall Lobby Day and to join the first ever M.O.M. March on Capitol Hill (#MarchAgainstED). I’d never done activism of this sort before. So, on Monday night as I was packing for my trip, I Googled “What do you wear to go lobbying?” The answer: “Look good. Damn good. You’re representing millions of people in these meetings.” (But hey, no reason to be nervous, right?) To be honest, the fact that I would...
Read MoreNational Suicide Prevention Week: An Open Letter to a Survivor
This week is the 2014 National Suicide Prevention Week. Suicide is a topic that has been hitting home lately, having experienced three brushes with suicide among friends and acquaintances this year, two of which were successful. Suicide is a difficult topic to talk about, because it spotlights what most of us try to run from — our mortality. For me, trying to fathom the literally unimaginable moment I cease to exist brings up something akin to horror. To then grapple with the startling truth that we each have the capacity (and occasionally the impulse) to deliberately launch ourselves into...
Read MoreInsurance: The Greatest Barrier to Recovery
I wondered whether it was too early to write about this topic here, seeing as I’m still building, persuading, cajoling, and outright begging a following for this blog. But because this issue is so critical, I will probably end up writing about it again anyway (and again, and again, and again…). Insurance coverage. In the eating disorder world, I have yet to see a bigger obstacle to recovery. That might sound hyperbolic, but I assure you it is the truth. Eating disorders are insidious, complex, deadly illnesses that are notoriously difficult to shake. As far as anorexia goes, an estimated...
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