I grew up in the Nineties; the time of “cocaine chic”, hip bones jutting out over jeans – and Kate Moss. When a close friend of mine developed a debilitating eating disorder, it was shocking but almost inevitable, like we’d been conditioned to hate the bodies that carried us.
Despite studying fashion design in New York, I was lucky that it was the artistic side – rather than the inescapable pressures of appearance – that stuck closest to me. Although I struggled with some disordered eating of my own when I was a teenager, it was short-lived, unlike what my loved one went through. Over two decades, I watched them suffer and push everyone away. I tried to help, but I felt panic-inducingly ill-equipped. Even now, I still wish I’d done better.
