A Hunger Artist

Winning the Battle Against Anorexia

Emily Troscianko is completing a doctorate in German at Oxford University, England. See full bio

November 16, 2009

This autumn and last: from student to tutor

The difference between the autumn term of this academic year and that of last year seems to embody my recovery more fully and vividly than anything else. But my thesis still remains an insidious thread connecting the two. Read More

November 3, 2009

Bumps in the road to recovery

A friend came to dinner, and her comments about food plunged me back into old emotions, old anorexic insecurities and competitive instincts; but she didn't notice, or think twice, and why should she? Read More

October 19, 2009

Having the strength to cope with what life throws at you

It's easy - when you're still suffering from anorexia yourself, or when you never have done - to imagine that such an illness affects only the food-related parts of one's existence. But although that's where it starts, and is the most obvious sphere of sickness, in the end it is no more than the epicentre to deeper patterns of turmoil. Read More

October 5, 2009

In my father's house: a weekend of food and memories

This weekend I've been staying at my father's house in Bristol. We've just come back from a country walk and he's finishing off a beef stew for a Sunday afternoon meal before my boyfriend and I drive back home to Oxford. All weekend I've been struck by comparisons between now and a year ago, or five or ten. Read More

September 28, 2009

Eating, continued.

Looking back over my diary entries from the first week of eating, I'm amazed, as always when I look back like this, at how different everything is from now: the solitude, the late late nights - and, above all, the obsession with food and the ripples it spreads out over the rest of life. I describe a three-day academic conference I attended, and the many food adventures I had there.

September 21, 2009

How it feels to eat again

Saturday 19th July 2008: ‘11 pm, 39 kg. I am terrified. Not least by my great hunger. Why eat more if it just makes you hungrier? But I'm calm too. I've done, so far, just what I'm meant to. For the first time in years, I ate a ‘meal' outside and in the daylight.'

September 13, 2009

Defying my own conventions: the day I started eating again

Friday 19th July 2008 is a date that I will never forget: it was the day I decided I had to start to eat again. Read More

September 6, 2009

Escaping from Anorexia

The reasons why I couldn't keep on with my nocturnal life of starvation, and why I won't ever go back to it.

August 30, 2009

Facts and fictions: stories of a hunger artist, and lettuce

Back from a weekend away with my boyfriend, I'm struck by how different my life is now from the one I wrote about in a story about an anorexic girl, her cat, and her lettuce... Read More

August 23, 2009

Five Anorexia Myths Exploded

So many people just don't get what it means, to want and need to starve yourself. Why on earth should they? I explain and explode five major myths about anorexia, for the benefit of those who can't understand, and those who wish they were better understood. Read More

Eating Disorders Basics

Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder that is prevalent especially among young women and, increasingly, among young men. Marked by a distorted sense of body image and extreme voluntary starvation, and closely associated with perfectionism and depression, it is the most deadly psychiatric disorder.

Go to the Anorexia Nervosa Basics page for more on Anorexia Nervosa including:

Disordered eating is widespread in the American population, but frank eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa, which is also called bing

Go to the Eating Disorders Basics page for more on Eating Disorders including:

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