Why I became anorexic

I no longer remember what it feels like to weigh less than five stone; nor can any of my friends who did not know me at the time believe that I was once anorexic. And yet I have never really come to terms with what happened. That's why I decided to write a book about the subject - to see if I could work out why I had done it.

Anorexia nervosa is not about slimming, dieting or calorie-counting. It's a loss of appetite brought on by nervous revulsion, a phobia against food, against mastication and swallowing. As a child, I placed all my fears and disappointments about myself and my place in the world on to food. So, when life became difficult, I gave up on eating. It seemed unnecessary.

Anorexics hate the way they look because they hate themselves. It's about not wanting to grow up, not wanting to change into a woman, not allowing yourself to become available to life, for fear of what will happen if you allow your real self to emerge. Anorexics have hearts and minds of steel - how else would they deprive themselves of so much? - but at the same time they have very low self-esteem.

I began not eating simply by eating less. I was 20, a student in Edinburgh, and miserable. At the time I thought it was about becoming fitter, more energetic, more positive about life. Looking back, I can see that going to university had been a massive disappointment. I was too shy to make myself heard in tutorials, and terrified of going to parties. I had no idea what I was supposed to do if some unsuspecting male asked me out, and was too ashamed of my ignorance to talk about it with anyone.

By my second year I had begun to restrict how much I was eating, and to run everywhere. I got a kick out of it. Hunger induces a thrilling, endorphinous, addictive high - at least at first. I could walk for miles, sustained by nothing more than an apple and a bite of cheese, seeing everything around me with a startling clarity. I seemed to need less and less sleep, waking in the early hours with a raging desire for food that I would then spend the rest of the day struggling to negate. Gradually, not eating took me over, so that I could no longer have eaten a proper meal, even if I'd wanted to. I thought that at last I was in control of my body: my periods had stopped, my appetite (for anything, whether it be food or having fun) had disappeared, and my restless energy had been perverted into a war against food.

Of course, it could not last. At the age of 24, I ended up in a psychiatric ward, drugged, confined to bed, and fed huge amounts of NHS carbohydrate six times a day - white sliced bread, Smash potato, and bright yellow ice-cream. I was told, by various doctors, nurses and psychiatric social workers, that the reasons for my illness were that I was probably a lesbian, and must be angry with my parents - my father was a vicar, my mother a housewife.

It made no sense to me. I had left home years ago, and felt no anger towards my parents. Indeed, I felt nothing. I was dead to myself and to the world around me. In my head, I was consumed by my obsessional determination not to eat.

I did put on weight - two stone in seven weeks - but as soon as I was let out on weekend leave I lost five pounds. No one gave me any reason to eat again. So I didn't. I discharged myself from hospital and soon lost all the weight I had put on - and more. There no longer seemed any point in eating - not because I was suicidal; anorexics rarely are. Although their actions appear to be a death wish, and although anorexia has the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric illness, this is because of the physical complications of not eating, or of eating and then purging.

I was lucky to avoid the in-an-outofhospital life of many long-term anorexics. I spent another seven months in hospital - I could no longer manage the stairs in the Tube, and was relieved to be admitted again, but this time I was on a general ward, with no drugs, no sessions with psychiatrists and a much gentler eating regime. They gave me sherry before meals to tempt my appetite and sent me to physiotherapy to rebuild my muscles (once you have resisted food for a while, your body starts to break down muscle ).

When I discharged myself, I weighed little more than I had done when I was first admitted. I had grown accustomed to the idea of eating three meals a day, but was not convinced there was much point in doing so. For a few years I existed at barely seven stone, until I found a way out of anorexia's vice-like grip. I was travelling by train from Edinburgh to Reading on a bitter December day; no heating and no food. The train was late, I missed my connection, and I began crying in the middle of a crowded carriage.

THE shock of realising that I could not cope with something so minor forced me to face up to what I had become. And what I must do to survive. Eat. I am now 50 (I didn't get married or have children) and never weigh myself; and for years I insisted on being vegetarian. There were blips, but something always prevented me from allowing myself to get so low again. Alarm bells would start ringing in my head as soon as I became aware that I was taking pride in my increasingly concave stomach.

I'm not sure that you can ever get rid of the old relics of behaviour that once made you anorexic. But you can ensure that they no longer have power over you. Anorexia is cruel. It's ghastly to watch, impossible to live with, difficult to treat. But it's not all bad. That sounds like an odd thing to say, but without it I would not be the person I am today. It taught me not to be frightened, and to face up to myself and to what life has to offer.

? Hungry Hell: What it's Really Like to be Anorexic by Kate Chisholm is published today by Short Books, £5.99.