Megan Jayne Crabbe was diagnosed with anorexia at 14. When she hit her ‘goal weight’ and still didn’t feel happy, a supportive online community showed her a new way to live
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egan Jayne Crabbe’s transformation goes beyond the physical. “My ‘before’ was trying to make myself as small as possible in every conceivable way: my body, voice, emotions, opinions,” she says. “My ‘after’ is allowing myself to be my biggest self, however that looks.”
Crabbe, 31, became aware of diets before she turned 10. As she entered puberty that intensified and she became fixated on magazine articles about how to change her body, eating as little as possible as a way to manage anxiety about school and growing up.
At 14 Crabbe was diagnosed with anorexia nervosa and body dysmorphia: “I was convinced I was fat and disgusting and needed to lose more weight.” For years she concealed how unwell she was, until the physical symptoms became impossible to ignore. Her body began shutting down – severe fatigue, low blood pressure, hearing loss and dizziness: “There’s hair that grows all over your body, because it’s trying to keep itself warm.”
