I recently lasted four days at a festival and didn't really miss it, but if I have it with me I'm always checking Facebook on it.

Not wearing many clothes :P seriously, I love feeling the sun on my shoulders! Not TOO much sun though, because I burn so easily. Humph.

Me :P It would be a fried egg and mushroom sandwich on wholemeal gluten free bread with pumpkin or poppy seeds baked into it. Yep.

Matching underwear and good hair days help :P but I think it's a confidence thing really, it's impossible to feel sexy if you're too busy worrying about what other people are thinking about you.

Dough in Manchester. Dairy/gluten free pizza FTW! I am going there next week, I can't wait!

I giggled at this question to start off with because I'm a complete chocoholic, but it's actually quite complicated. Anorexics do eat, and some of them eat chocolate and other desserts even when they are extremely unwell - they just don't eat much of them, or they purge it afterwards. But enjoying food...well, when you're malnourished you obsess about food, and there is a sort of savage relief when you do eat something, so I guess that could be classed as enjoyment. But by the time a person is that unwell they are usually terrified of food, and so it is impossible to enjoy it in the same way that a healthy person would.

I enjoy it now, if that helps ;)

Aww! Thank you :)

Actually my turning point was almost the opposite of realising that I had to get better - I realised that I didn't have to, that in the UK it would be entirely possible for me to stay at a BMI of 14-15ish for decades without anyone interfering. I could continue exactly as I was and no one would care. When you're in the child and adolescent services it's different, people are much more concerned and more ready to help you out with treatment. As an adult the mental health services are woefully inadequate, and once you've relapsed once or twice they label you as chronic and decide you can stay as you are, as long as you're not in immediate medical danger.

I guess I just did a Marya Hornbacher and decided quite rebelliously that I didn't want that to be my life. Recovery is scary and weird, but the longer you stick with it the better it gets. I could never have held down a relationship when I was ill, or lived independently 400 miles away from home. I couldn't concentrate on anything other than food and numbers, I couldn't find any interest or pleasure in music or current events or friendships. I couldn't do anything other than starve myself. I might be less emotionally stable and calm now I'm healthy, but it's a trade off I'm prepared to make for the fact that my life is also a hundred times less boring.

I'd also say that regular eating patterns, good nutrition and a genuinely healthy weight for your body (not sticking at very low end healthy) are really important for getting rid of the ED thoughts. The thoughts won't go unless you're free of behaviours. If I get a couple of weeks when I am ill and can't eat properly I start wanting to restrict again, and it's because of the biological effects of undereating and malnutrition. Unfortunately your body needs to have been healthy for a while before your brain can follow. When I got to a healthy weight last year I had some truly epic mood swings :P and they only died down after months of maintaining. It can take a good couple of years for your body and brain to get back to where they should be after weight restoration, so don't give up until you've given it every chance.

No, but if I do I'll share the prize money with you ;)

One. Katies are very practical types and can change lightbulbs without having to get anyone else involved.

Because if I did the novelty of my feet would wear off and you wouldn't be so interested in them any more. Also, my hands would feel weird. I have to wear socks or the world will end.

You'll just have to cross your fingers that I get my house so I'm living within walking distance of a Morrisons. Otherwise, get your own! I'm not getting you any soup either, before you ask...

Well...to be totally honest I still have pretty IBS, My digestive problems HAVE improved in some ways since I've been at a healthy weight. For example, when I was first gaining I had to sleep sitting up because I had really bad reflux. I would guess that it was something to do with muscle wastage, since I have never purged. That disappeared entirely when I got to a healthy weight, I can sleep lying down now with no problem ;) But my IBS hasn't gone anywhere, it still likes to make my life difficult at every opportunity! That doesn't mean that you will have the same experience though. For one thing, I've had IBS since I was little, before my ED started, and most of my other family members have it to some degree too. I think it runs in the family, and my ED just made it a lot worse for me. Also, I was eating disordered for a long time, so there was a lot of time for the damage to be done. I don't know what my digestive system will be up to in five or ten years - it might just take longer than a year at a healthy weight to improve. I do know that relapsing would make it worse though, so the only thing I CAN do is deal with the symptoms I have now and try to stay healthy. I hope yours improves as you get closer to a healthy weight :)

Thank you :)

I'm not even going to try to answer that, because I would never be able to decide. I think too much about the consequences of such things - I mean, I could wish to get rid of some big societal ill, but a lot of people use injustice, disability or some other pain to motivate themselves to change things for the better, so what would happen if the world was pain-free? I don't know if there would be much to live for if everything was easy, it sounds rather boring. I guess I could always be really shallow and wish for ten bars of chocolate. The only consequences of that would be possible weight gain, and I wouldn't complain about that ;)

I'm sorry you're going through this. I really wish I could help, but I don't know anything about your situation. If you'd said you were at a higher BMI then maybe some generic advice would be helpful, but at 12.5 you really need to be under medical supervision. If you are and you just wanted to talk to someone else in recovery alongside all the medical stuff then you are welcome to email me, it's katie_cullinane@hotmail.com. But please don't take advice from the internet, as well intentioned as us bloggers are, we're not experts and we don't know what's going on for you personally. I really hope you can find some support, and I would be happy to talk to you if you wanted to email <3

Thank you :) random compliments are always nice!

Aw thank you :) that's really sweet of you! I am curious about who this is now...

I don't know if there is such a thing anymore, I'm quite erratic and unplanned about eating now (in a good way!). I'll go by what I can remember of Thursday because I got up late yesterday and ended up getting more calories through snacks than meals!

8.30am: chocolate polenta made with coconut milk
11am: a nectarine
1pm: two boiled eggs, two pieces of gluten free toast with vegan margarine (I would say a boiled egg sandwich but my eggs didn't fit in my bread :P ), microwaved banana with chocolate chips (random but yum)
4pm: about 70g fruit and nuts
6pm: veggie burger, baked beans, sweetcorn, gluten free chocolate muffin
9pm: porridge with peanut butter

It varies. I don't tend to make a point of standing in front of the mirror naked, because that's just asking for trouble, but I have no problem wearing fitted clothes or getting my kit off in front of my boyfriend! My body image was dreadful during my teens but it hasn't been much of an issue for the last five years. The last few years of anorexia were more of an addiction/coping mechanism thing than a body image thing.

There are parts of my body that I like and parts I'm not keen on, but I don't think that losing weight would change that. On the contrary, I don't think that being emaciated is attractive, I know that other people find me more attractive when I am healthy, and I much prefer my face at a healthy weight. If you have a tendency towards eating disorders you will never be happy with your body while you are engaging in ED behaviours - that's like an alcoholic trying to cure their cravings by drinking more! It will relieve the anxiety temporarily but only make it worse in the long run. The only way out of it all is to get better. I've also found that I felt much bigger while I was gaining weight - once I started maintaining my perception of myself became far more accurate very quickly.