自白s of a middle-老年の anorexic

By Sadie Nicholas for MailOnline
Updated: 15:41 BST, 24 April 2008

犠牲者: Alison Alden

As dropped her young sons at the school gate, two other mothers glared at her empty 手渡すs then asked why, if she had any 利益／興味 in her children, she had failed to arrive laden with baking for the school 祝日，祝う that day.

Exhausted and weak, Alison choked 支援する 涙／ほころびs at their cruel jibe and tried to ignore the 圧倒的な feeling that she was 落ちるing short as a mum.

She leapt 支援する into the car to フェリー（で運ぶ） her daughter to another school five miles away, her thoughts frantically on the work to be done at the family haulage 商売／仕事 that day chasing debtors in a 企て，努力，提案 to fend off 財政上の 廃虚, and on the 家事 that 猛烈に needed doing before the afternoon school run.

支援する home? -? which also 二塁打d as an office? -? Alison stopped to 星／主役にする at the skeletal reflection of her five-石／投石する 団体／死体 in the bedroom mirror and could barely comprehend that it was her own. She 推論する／理由d that, at 42, this couldn't be anorexia. Surely she was too old to be in the 支配する of an illness that t ypically 影響する／感情d teenage girls desperate to emulate the likes of Victoria Beckham and Nicole Ritchie?

'I was a grown woman, and before I 攻撃する，衝突する 40 was a healthy size and had never been on a diet in my life,' she 解任するs. 'I wasn't a young girl desperate to be thin, but here I was 事実上 on death's door with an eating disorder.'

Alison's 降下／家系 into anorexia had begun two years earlier in February 1999, when she turned 40 and stopped to scrutinise herself in the same bedroom mirror. 'Never mind 40, I looked and felt more like 60,' she says. 'Everything had got on 最高の，を越す of me, I had no life of my own and I felt like I was 絶えず fighting a losing 戦う／戦い in every part of my life.

'My husband Graham and I ran our own 商売／仕事 from our large family home. We were saddled with a 抱擁する 商業の 貸付金 and debtors who weren't 支払う／賃金ing up, so 財政／金融s were a constant worry.

Health lecturer Rosemary ローマ法王 died this week after a 30-year 戦う／戦い with anorexia

'Graham was working 事実上 24 hours a day to keep us afloat, leaving me to を取り引きする the office 味方する of the 商売／仕事 while also running the home. My sons were at one school and my daughter another, so I had two separate school runs and three lots of after-school activities.

'My life was a blur of 財政上の worries, career, 家事 and running around after other people. On one occasion, I went to 選ぶ up the kids from school and when the headmistress told me I looked 粉々にするd, I realised I hadn't had a cup of tea or a drink of anything since breakfast, because I'd been too busy.

'I remember thinking that perhaps if I looked better, then maybe I'd feel better. So I bought hair dye, tweezers to 形態／調整 my eyebrows and a teeth-whitening 道具.

'I also thought it would help to lose a few 続けざまに猛撃するs, so I swapped 十分な fat milk for skimmed, cheese for cottage cheese and butter for low-fat spread. Within weeks I'd lost half a 石／投石する and people commented on how 井戸／弁護士席 I looked.

'For the first time in years I didn't feel invisible, so I 解決するd to lose more 負わせる, started eating smaller meals, then skipping the 半端物 one, until it became a daily habit and the 続けざまに猛撃するs fell off.'

Like countless other 40-something women under the 巨大な 圧力 of juggling work, family and home, Alison had sought solace in the one thing over which she felt she had any 支配（する）／統制する? -? her 負わせる.

And, surprisingly, Alison's story is far from unique. Susan Ringwood, 長，指導者 (n)役員／(a)執行力のある of （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域, the 国家の eating disorders 協会, 報告（する）／憶測s that 増加するing numbers of middleaged women are 捜し出すing help for anorexia.

'It's partly 予定 to what we call the Desperate Housewives syndrome,' she says. 'Women used to disappear from the pages of magazines when they 攻撃する，衝突する 40, but now there are celebrities like Madonna, Sharon 石／投石する and Teri Hatcher looking flawless, fabu lous and with seemingly perfect lives. Ordinary women compare themselves and feel that they've failed.

Desperate Housewives syndrome: Women in their 40s are suddenly everywhere - and flaunting the 団体／死体s of 20-year-olds

Some women are 特に 攻撃を受けやすい because they are so driven to be the perfect wife, mother and career girl. The only thing they feel in 支配（する）／統制する of is their eating, and that's how problems can start.'

It's a シナリオ to which Alison can relate.

'I'd go to bed each night fighting a losing 戦う／戦い with each of the hats I wore? -? mum, wife, businesswoman? -? yet somewhere の中で all that I was supposed to be a homemaker, too.

'Graham was working 一連の会議、交渉／完成する the clock with 事実上 no sleep, so I was worried about him. He'd commented on my 負わせる loss but neither of us had the time to do anything practical to help the other. We had to keep going or we could lose everything.

Losing that first half a 石／投石する was a wonderful feeling. Yet my feelings took a strange 新たな展開 and the 負わせる loss began to 支配（する）／統制する me. It wasn 't long before the more 負わせる I lost, the fatter my reflection looked in the mirror.'

By Christmas 2001, いっそう少なく than two years after 公約するing to 'shed a few 続けざまに猛撃するs' Alison had dropped to just six and a half 石／投石する by skipping meals and 生き残るing on tiny 部分s.

By then they'd sold the family home and the troubled haulage 会社／堅い and bought a 栄えるing seaside 迎賓館. Suddenly, Alison had to find another excuse for her obsession.

'When Graham or the kids commented that I was too thin, I'd shrug my shoulders and say it was 負かす／撃墜する to too much 急ぐing around,' she says. 'But one night Graham put his 武器 around me and said: "You poor thing, you 急ぐ around after everyone else all the time, now I'm going to do something for you."

'My favourite 時折の 扱う／治療する used to be a fried egg on a piece of fried bread, but I hadn't had one in years so Graham surprised me by making one.

I was horrified, leapt out of my seat, grabbed some kitchen roll and frantically started dabbing the fat from the egg. 'No, no, I can't eat it,' I said. It was the first time we were both 軍隊d to 認める that I had a serious problem.

'Two days later, as I sat before my doctor in his 協議するing room, I began to cry. He didn't give me chance to explain about my eating problems and 簡単に said: "You're terribly depressed, I'll give you some pills that will help."

'With that, I was despatched to a 化学者／薬剤師 with a prescription for anti-depressants and the thought in my 長，率いる that even my GP didn't think I was 価値（がある） listening to. The only thing for it was to carry on doing the one thing I was good at? -? losing 負わせる.

'My parents were dreadfully 関心d as I'd confided in them how unhappy and run ragged I was, but even they couldn't 説得する me to eat. Then several things happened in の近くに succession that really 脅すd me.

'In December 2004 I nicked my finger with a knife while slicing some cheese for the kids. It was a tiny 削減（する） but two months later it was still bleeding, as though my 団体／死体 had lost the ability to 傷をいやす／和解させる.

'I also 設立する I was unable to wake up 自然に? -? each morning Graham had to make a 一致した 成果／努力 to rouse me. I began to get cripplingly 冷淡な 手渡すs and feet, too, and felt like I was dying? -? when I 重さを計るd myself I was just five 石／投石する, so I probably was.

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'So Graham and I did the only sensible thing, sold the guest house and bought a manageable three bedroom home instead. My parents, who'd been self- 雇うd as a florist and horticulturalist, seeing how 猛烈に ill I was, 主張するd on giving us their £30,000 life 貯金 to 支払う／賃金 off our new mortgage and help relieve the 財政上の 緊張する. Reluctantly I 受託するd.

'Amazingly, with the 抱擁する 財政上の 重荷（を負わせる）s gone, I started to feel a little better and began eating more 定期的に, until my 負わせる rose to seven 石／投石する six 続けざまに猛撃するs, which was reasonable for my 5ft 4in 高さ.

'People commented that I looked 井戸／弁護士席 and it was wonderful having a home that was 純粋に that, a home, and not a through road for lorry drivers or 夜通し guests.

'I even got a 職業 in a college teaching adults basic literacy. But eating disorders don't just disappear, and one morning as I drove to work I felt unwell and had to leap out of the car to be sick at the 味方する of the road.

'I felt much better, almost good, afterwards and it 誘発する／引き起こすd all sorts of new feelings of 支配（する）／統制する within me. It sounds crazy, but my 拒絶する／低下する 支援する into anorexia was as simple as that.

'Bit by bit I got into a 決まりきった仕事 of making myself sick? -? on the way to work, after elevenses, after lunch, 中央の-afternoon. I couldn't be sick at home because the family would hear and I had to have a small evening meal to make them think I was eating. But I didn't want to digest any of the calories, so I started taking laxatives, quickly going from the recommended dose of two a day to 24. I dropped to below seven 石／投石する, but it went unnoticed as people were used to me 存在 thin.'

Anorexia is rife の中で younger women - but now it is 影響する／感情ing older women too