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‘Anorexia aged me by 20 years’

At the height of her anorexia, Terrie Walsh looked 20 years older than her real age. Yet despite beating the illness, she’s been left with the health problems of a woman far older than her 29 years.

Devastatingly, 5ft 6 Terrie, from Berkshire, may never have children, suffers joint pain and is at high risk of osteoporosis.

“There’s nothing glamorous about anorexia,” she says. “I’m always tired and I may never be able to have a family – all because I was obsessed with being skinny.”

Terrie reveals her battle with anorexia began in 2005 aged 23. At 11st and a size 10-12 she wanted to be a glamour model, but photographers said she was too big.

“I started going to the gym and eating fewer carbs to get down to 9st,” she recalls.

Within a month, Terrie was going to the gym up to five times a week and for 12 hours at weekends. The retail worker, who lives with her mum Marilyn, cut down to 800 calories a day – eating just cereal bars, fruit and soup. She says:

“In three months I dropped to 7∂st. Mum was pleased for me, but told me not to go too far.”

But Terrie started hiding her dieting. She says: “I’d say I was shopping after work, but really I was at the gym. I’d eat alone and I wore baggy clothes. When I wasn’t at the gym I’d go to bed – I was so weak.”

Soon she was eating only salad and an apple every day. The extent of her illness was brought home in April 2006 when she was taken to A&E after a seizure.
“My body went into meltdown, I was so low on energy,” Terrie explains.

That September, 6∂st Terrie saw a doctor and was diagnosed as anorexic.

“He referred me to the eating disorder team, but the appointment took ages to come through,” she says.

Meanwhile, Terrie refused dietary advice and a month later was 5st, with a BMI of 11.32 – the healthy range is 18.5-25. Terrie says: “My hair was falling out and I looked years older, but I didn’t care – I was obsessed with my weight.”

Terrie accepted she should go to hospital for two months, where her body started to digest itself because she was deprived of vitamins. Shockingly, her brain started to shut down and she was sectioned for 28 days. She says: “I lost my mind for a month – I can’t remember a thing. I’d scream when they tried to feed me, but then give in and eat fruit and soup.”

Her weight rose to 7st, but when she was discharged in December she dropped to 6st. She says: “I almost accepted I’d die, but when Mum tried force-feeding me, shouting at me to eat, I knew I had to get better. It was tearing my family apart.”

Terrie saw a counsellor and within a year, she was 7∂st. By 2009, she was 9∂st and a size 10. She’s managed to maintain a healthy diet – including lots of fruit and veg – ever since, spurred on by the thought of living a normal life.

But while she looks like a young woman again, her body has aged.

She says. “I don’t have my friends’ energy and I get joint pain.”

Single Terrie adds: “I’ll probably never have kids – my pelvis wouldn’t be able to carry them because my bones are weakened. But I have a second chance at life and I’m determined to take it. I just wish I hadn’t let anorexia take my youth.”

By Emily Retter