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Eating Disorder a Coping Mechanism

I was horrified to read the comments of your columnist Gail Walker

I am not arguing that the inclusion of these sizes do not act as 'thinspiration' to a certain vulnerable young market. However, as the sufferer of an eating disorder, my illness escalated from a much more severe and less vanity-based cause than trying to fit into a smaller size. Rather it was a coping mechanism for me which has since been described to me as a side-effect of my clinical depression.

Vomiting, or purging (to use a more adequate term for print) to me is a mechanism in which I express my grief or stress. It is uncontrollable and it is shameful to me, and therefore is a very private thing which in no way any sufferer would be making a public display of on the floor of a high street retailer.

This is not voluntary, in fact I have been searching for help for quite a while now and find none available to me in the province.