Customer Reviews

Anorexia: A Stranger in the Family

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Eating Disorders is a subject that is close, close to my heart. I am always in huge awe of anyone who has the courage to fight this disease and then to go on and share this heart-stopping experience with someone else and Katie Metcalfe has done just that in her excellent memoir Anorexia. As a addict, you discover a few realities pretty quickly - denial is huge and the other thing is that in order to survive and recover - you must give it away (or give back) to others so that you may stay in recovery.

Metcalfe has written touchingly about both subjects in her memoir and as I was reading Anorexia, I could see the progression (albeit slow at times) that Katie was making in discovering her inner truths and in keeping herself honest and on the path of recovery. Katie writes about her struggles with a touching hand and heart and does not shy away from sharing with us just harrowing and difficult her life was during her disease and yet, at the same time, she does not make useless excuses about how she got there or why she got there. Katie honestly opens up about "the voices" that she had to live with and how, at first, she let the voices "win" - but she soon discovers that there may another way - one that would permit her to be herself and to be at a happier place.

I could not read this book in only a few sittings as her entries are thought provoking and made me relive some of my own experiences - this book is to be read slowly - to be savored, analyzed and enjoyed.

Congratulations Katie! you are wonderful and my thoughts are always with you - to a fellow traveller as a friend of mine once called it.