A former teacher has described the lengths she would go to in order to keep her eating disorder hidden from friends and family as she continues to push towards complete recovery.
Niamh Brownlee began to develop an eating disorder when she was studying for her A-levels in school which would soon take over her life and occupy her thoughts every second of the day alongside a deep depression that would eventually lead to her being admitted to a mental health unit.
In an effort to help others and spread awareness around mental health issues and their treatments, she has written a diary of her experience on the ward called 'Struggling to Breathe'.
Read more: Belfast woman's diary of her experience being admitted to a mental health ward
It comes as Eating Disoder Awareness Week begins on Monday, February 27.
Speaking to Belfast Live, Niamh said that when she was around 18 years old she started to have negative thoughts about her body and weight which had a huge impact on her self esteem and sense of self worth with this leading her to develop bulimia.
She said: "I also was very aware of diets and diet culture and all the different slimming and weight loss clubs that existed and I was always surrounded by that. Then when my low moods started my depression started to push into my relationship with food and my body and over the course of a few months in my final year in school I had started to develop an eating disorder that started with bulimia and then continued in secret for years.
"Through university and beginning my job as a teacher I kept it hidden from everyone and I became very secretive and would lie all of the time about my eating habits.
"I was going through the same cycle of heavily restricting food, which would then lead to me binging and then a purge that could be physical or over-exercising, it was really just doing anything I could to punish my body and rid myself of food and calories and that cycle could happen, 20 or 30 times a day at the worst times.
"I had a sweet drawer with sweets and chocolates for the kids in the classroom and when my mood started to take a dip and that voice started to get louder and louder, I could eat half that drawer in five minutes, take myself off to the bathroom, rid myself of it and be right back into the classroom teaching again. The whole cycle could take less than 10 minutes and nobody would know.
"There were times in the evening when all my family were in bed and I would eat as much as possible, not tasting anything and then take myself into the garden and be sick in a bag and throw it over the fence. It is embarrassing to say but that was how brutal and dark things had got and the things that I was doing to myself and what the eating disorder was convincing me that I had to do, it was really difficult."
Niamh said that the disorder had the biggest effect on her mentally and that her mind felt like it was "in overdrive" and that she was tortured by her thoughts and constantly checking her body every ten minutes to see if it had changed.
She said that she would avoid mirrors and can now recognise the body dysmorphia that she had as part of her disorder and that she would avoid going places because she felt that others would be "offended by what she looked like".
After years of suffering with the disorder, it was her mum that eventually noticed there was a problem and helped Niamh reach out and get the support that she needed to begin recovery.
Niamh continued: "I knew that there was something going on, but I was kind of in denial and it was my mum that came to me and said ‘this is not you, something is really going on here and it's serious.’
"So after that conversation I went to the GP and explained to her that I realised there was a depression going on and that I had an eating disorder.
"During the first lockdown I got a referral for the eating disorder services here and we started a course of around nine months of CBT-E which was eating disorder specific and for the next load of months I worked really hard to undo some of the thoughts that I had been having for a decade. I combined that with going weekly to the Eating Disorder Association support groups and contacting them whenever I felt that I needed to, they offered so much support and advice.
"It is only in the last two to three years that I have seen that there really is a way out from the eating disorder and that recovery is possible and full recovery is possible and that is not somewhere I ever thought I would get to."
Niamh said that many of her friends did not know that she had been battling the disorder until she released her book Struggling to Breathe and that her relationships have strengthened now that she is able to talk freely about her condition and what she had been going through.
She said: "When the book came out so many of my friends said they had no idea and they didn’t even know that I had been in the hospital for that period, but it has actually brought a lot of my relationships closer, because it felt that there was this massive secret for so many years and I had been in the hospital and had this horrendous time but I couldn’t find the words to really express it or explain it.
"I was worried that if I did then everybody would leave, people wouldn’t want anything to do with me anymore and they would be scared to be around me.
"But actually being honest and working on having those conversations around eating disorders, my mood and depression, I think it has actually made those relationships so much stronger and lets other people know there is nothing they could say to me that could shock me or make me feel badly towards them, because I have probably thought it or done it myself.
"Even with my family now I have such an open relationship with them, especially my mum. For years I hid everything awful that was happening because I didn’t want her to feel bad or stressed. I can see now the benefits of getting it all out there, never expecting anyone to fix anything, it is just getting it out of my head that makes such a difference."
Niamh also had a message to anyone who may be concerned that they have or are developing an eating disorder, saying that there are supportive services such as the Eating Disorder Association that are able to provide help and advice.
She said "If there is something telling you that there is something not right with your relationship with food, whether you are under eating or overeating, or over exercising, whatever it is that makes you feel uncomfortable or distressed, is to try and tell somebody.
"If there is somebody around you that you feel comfortable talking to please do or go to your doctor and have that conversation with them.
"The Eating Disorder Association has a 24 hour helpline and you can contact them at any time, you don’t need a diagnosis, sometimes speaking to someone who is trained, that conversation can be enough to start turning things around, but what you are experiencing is important and valid and there is help out there.
"Whatever you are going through is not permanent and things can always get better."
Video by Dylan Hegarty.
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