A 23-year-old British woman seems to have set a dubious record in anorexia. By relentlessly starving herself, she has managed to retain the body of a 12-year-old.
She has not had her periods so far. Doctors and her family are worried about her future, but she has no regrets.
Anorexia Nervosa - Types Complications Causes Treatment FAQs
Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder most commonly found among teenage girls. Anorexia nervosa is characterized by a very low body weight, generally defined as 15% below the Body Mass Index.
Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder most commonly found among teenage girls. Anorexia nervosa is characterized by a very low body weight, generally defined as 15% below the Body Mass Index.
Miss Hensley, from East Croydon in Surrey, began to starve herself at the age of 12 when she was bullied for being a swot.
'I found if I looked younger and took on a more fragile appearance it frightened off the bullies,' said Miss Hensley, the daughter of an optician and a legal secretary.
Anorexia or Bulimia Screening Test
Do you binge-eat secretly most of the time? Or do you feel so guilty after eating that you badly want to self-induce vomiting and get the food out. Check out if you are a victim of eating disorder.
Do you binge-eat secretly most of the time? Or do you feel so guilty after eating that you badly want to self-induce vomiting and get the food out. Check out if you are a victim of eating disorder.
'Now, I can't imagine what it would be like to be a curvy woman.'
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'Doctors told my shocked parents I was so ill, I could die of heart failure,' she said.
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Notwithstanding the experience and the dangers she is courting, Hensley is still on a starvation diet. Only she is maintaining her weight at a constant 5st 7lb, Alison Smith Squire reports for Daily Mail.
'I don't eat at regular times. Instead I nibble throughout the day on bags of raw vegetables, cooked swede, tiny portions of tuna, occasionally eating a square of chocolate,' she said.
'I wanted to achieve my dream of going to university and knew I had to be well enough to study.'
She seems to have done well academically – she has a first-class degree in biomedical science from King's College London.
She now intends to study for a PhD, her ambition being to find ways of curing cancer.
But doctors have warned her that if she continues with her extreme diet she could seriously harm her liver and kidneys. She may have also damaged her fertility.
Yet she is still not ready to become a woman.
'Looking younger and having a child's body does give me an odd buzz and a sense of achievement,' she said.
'Also, while I have never had a proper boyfriend or even felt sexy, I wouldn't want to develop curves because I wouldn't feel comfortable attracting men's attention.'
Her parents have 'begged and cajoled' her to eat more, she said, but to no avail.
Miss Hensley added: 'While in some ways I long to break out of the bubble I've created for myself and be like any other 23-year-old woman, I am also terrified of taking that step.'
Experts warn more and more young women are controlling their weight to a dangerous extent.
Deanne Jade, a psychologist at the National Centre for Eating Disorders, said: 'Women, particularly young women, are these days under such pressures to have the perfect body that we are seeing a new trend in eating disorders emerging.
'….. in their bid to stay so slim they take terrible risks with their health - ironically ending up suffering from diseases usually associated with the elderly such as osteoporosis and crumbling teeth.'
Source-Medindia
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