A conversation with:
Eating disorders are some of the most challenging and dangerous mental health conditions to live with. While it’s important for all people to raise awareness around the truth of these conditions, sometimes the message can be more powerfully or uniquely delivered by those who have actually experienced eating disorders first-hand.
Amelia Tait is a journalist who’s written for prestigious publications like the New York Times and the Guardian. While fully recovered now, she struggled with anorexia nervosa and chewing and spitting disorder when she was younger.
Jason Wood is the director of communications at the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders. He is a survivor of several mental health conditions, including obsessive-compulsive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and an eating disorder he says closely resembled orthorexia nervosa.
Dr. Robert Duff is a clinical psychologist, author, journalist, and podcast host. While he has no personal experience with disordered eating, his experience in the medical field has given him an intimate look at the truth of eating disorders.
Together with moderator William Hornsby, an advocate for eating disorder awareness, the group discussed the truth of living with these conditions and the importance of spreading awareness in an authentic, heartfelt, and personal way.
All panelists agreed on the importance of spreading awareness of eating disorders. While traditional reporting can be informative, writing and reporting from an experienced point of view can add extra nuance to a subject that regularly gets sensationalized or misunderstood.
“You can read about these things in a textbook, but when you read the scientific explanations, it doesn’t really resonate,” Wood says. “When you can pour in those emotions and lived experiences, that’s when it really connects, it really resonates, and you can truly paint a picture of what a lived experience with an eating disorder is actually like.”
Tait agreed, though her experience as a journalist often had her on the other side of the fence, interviewing people about their thoughts and behaviors rather than speaking up about her own. Still, she says, once she started being more open about her past, it helped her craft a more nuanced story and connect to her interviewees.
And though he hasn’t experienced an eating disorder himself, Duff said reading personal memoirs of people with mental health struggles was an eye-opening experience for him, helping push him toward his eventual work in the field.
“You can learn a lot from textbooks, but you can get stuck in a bubble,” he says. “Reading from the first person perspective has been very helpful, helping me understand things from the perspective of real people, rather than sitting in a medical ivory tower.”
With the most direct experience in reporting, Tait had a lot of insight into the importance of having someone with a history of eating disorders write about the conditions. Primarily, she says, it helps fill in the gaps of coverage, which can be repetitive and sensationalized. It can also help broaden the idea of what eating disorders “look like” by including people who don’t necessarily fit the popular ideas perpetuated by media.
“The media really wants the body: pictures of ribs and collar bones and those salacious stories,” she says. “But for me, I know it was more about what was going on in my head rather than my body.” With a history and experience, she says, “We’re more equipped to dive into people’s brains and help them tell their stories.”
Wood agreed, adding that tapping into one’s own personal history and vulnerability can invite an interviewee to lean into their own vulnerability, leading to an altogether more honest and sincere portrayal.
“Any time I have the opportunity to share my story, I heal a little bit more, and I hope that those around me who are listening get that same sense of healing when they open up and share their story,” he says. “Having an eating disorder is something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, but at least because it’s happened, I’ve been able to connect to some wonderful folks around the world and learned there is some power to sharing our stories and speaking up.”
All panelists agreed that advocating for honest and accurate eating disorder representation was a crucial part of spreading awareness.
For her part, Tait says she noticed a much different reaction to the stories she wrote from a more personal perspective, with readers relating more and feeling happier about seeing representation.
Wood had a particularly personal reason for getting involved in advocacy: His own struggle with disordered eating wasn’t represented anywhere, even in the medical textbooks. Wood struggled with a tricky condition called other specified feeding and eating disorders (OSFED)—a largely undefined “catch-all” category of disordered eating that can look like a wide range of behaviors and thoughts.
As a man with an eating disorder, there were even fewer examples for Wood to learn from, he says. Not seeing his story represented anywhere is part of what contributed to the length of his undiagnosed struggle, something he hopes to reduce for others by speaking out.
While Duff agreed that realistic representations of hurdles and change were important, he also cautioned, from a clinical point of view, about advocates who may mean well but wind up pushing misinformation. Tait agreed, noting that social media platforms could do more to help weed out bad information, even on posts intended to be helpful.
“I don’t think the onus should be on the individual; people perhaps don’t have the best perspective on themselves and what they’re putting out there, so social media platforms could do more,” she says. “If you’re going to use a hashtag like ‘eating disorder recovery,’ I don’t see why TikTok couldn’t put a little checklist asking, ‘Are you sure this won’t be triggering?’ or to offer a regional helpline or link in videos with that tag.”
All panelists also agreed on the power of becoming an advocate—especially for those who have personal experience with eating disorders. Reaching out through social media, support groups, or simply sharing your story with friends and family can all be ways to start raising awareness about eating disorders and social justice.
However, all panelists also cautioned that one’s motivations aligned with helping others and that one's mental health was solid enough to share one's story.
“A lot of journalists and writers ask me about how to share their experience, and I always tell them to make sure they’re ready,” Tait says. “This story will still be valid three years from now, and it might be better for you to start sharing it later than sooner.”
Wood agreed.
“You have to prioritize yourself at the end of the day because you can’t help other people if you don’t help yourself first,” he says. “Also, try not to get frustrated, and remember, you can’t change the whole world. I know, you get into advocacy to make a difference, but you have to stay patient and remind yourself that even if you only reach one person, you won't change the whole world, but you’ll change their whole world, and that’s just as important.”