Colman Noctor: An eating disorder is all-consuming 

An eating disorder is not about food and weight control. It's about the young person's desperate need to communicate painful emotions 

Picture; iStock 

When we hear of terms like ‘eating disorder’, ‘anorexia’ or ‘bulimia’ many immediately think of a headline in a glossy magazine with a cover image of an emaciated model. 

The common belief is that eating disorders must be part of a pursuit of the ideal body, or the result of a fad diet that has gone wrong. Sometimes these behaviours are seen as deliberate, suggesting that the young person with the eating disorder ‘has done this to herself’. Sadly, our empathy with the sufferer can be short in supply.