Woman beats anorexia to give birth ... three years after she was given 10 days to live

This story was posted on Daily Mail, which is a UK tabloid. There is a rather shocking photo of Ms. Wilde when she was severely anorexic at 16, which I have not reproduced here.

I normally wouldn't do tabloids. OK, I have to be honest, I might glance at the pictures of (ahem) attractive women. And therein lies the problem. Body image is a problem, and it is a driver of anorexia and other forms of disordered eating. I could write or post an essay about how images of models have distorted our perception of what the ideal female body should be.



Her frame was so skeletal that doctors warned Hayley Wilde she was just over a week away from death.

But three years on, after an eight-year battle against anorexia, she has bounced back in the most emphatic fashion by giving birth to a boy.

Her son Michael was born last month weighing a healthy 7lb 14oz, something that would have been unthinkable when she was at her lowest ebb.

Yesterday the 20-year-old and her mother Jane released a harrowing photo of Hayley when she weighed just over five stones to show the devastating effects of anorexia - and also to prove that however bleak things seem, there is always hope.

The picture was taken when Hayley was 16. She had been fighting the condition since she was 11. Her 5ft 7in frame was down to 5st 1oz, and doctors warned she could have ten days left to live if she did not start to put weight on.

She was hospitalised for months on end and fed through a tube. Her hair started to fall out and her periods stopped for four years. But expert medical help and the support of her parents saw her pull back from the brink, and last year she and her partner were thrilled to discover she was pregnant.

"Michael will never want for anything," Hayley said. "I will make sure that he eats well and has a healthy diet. And he will have lots of love."

As well as risking permanent damage to a woman's fertility, anorexia can cause other problems for sufferers who do become pregnant.

For someone who has spent years trying to be thin, the temptation to lose weight following the birth can provoke a relapse. But Hayley and her 50-year-old mother, who live together in Blackpool, are aware of the potential pitfalls and are confident that the need to put Michael first will see her avoid them.

"I had to eat a normal diet, for my baby," she said.

"I was eating healthily because of him. I like to be thin, thinner than I am now, but I don't want to go back into hospital. I don't want to be like that picture again."

Her problems began when she started secondary school and, lacking confidence, started skipping meals. "I thought being thinner would make me more popular," she said.

At home, she concealed what was happening from her parents . "I used to hide food in a napkin and put it in my pockets," she recalled. "I would hide it in a carrier bag in my wardrobe and when my mum and dad went out, threw it in the bin."

When her her mother eventually found out, she was devastated. "It was as if someone had battered me over the head with a bat," she said. "It was the worst shock of my life."

Hayley was diagnosed with anorexia, but in her mid-teens her weight continued to plummet and she had five spells as an in-patient at a specialist clinic in Manchester.

Despite her strong reservations, her mother took the photograph of her at her thinnest in 2005 to show how bad things had become. "I felt dreadful when I took it, but it was something I had to do," she said.

The following year, Hayley spent all but seven weeks on a ward. But all the support, combined with falling in love, helped her reach a more healthy weight, and last year came the news she was pregnant. Michael was born two weeks early on March 8 and is doing well.

"The birth of my grandson was something I had only dared to hope and pray for," said Mrs Wilde. "Michael is a miracle for us, and the wonderful thing is that having him has meant we've seen Hayley grow into a young woman for the first time as well."

Despite missing so much school, Hayley passed her A-levels and is training to become a teacher. Her mother, who has set up a support group, Fighting for Freedom with Anorexia Nervosa, said: "I hope by telling our story, other parents of anorexics will see there is hope."