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Youth editor: Lauren Fraser

It's a Thursday evening. I've had a bad day. I retreat to my bathroom, lock the door, pull my hair back, stick my fingers down my throat and empty the contents of my stomach.

I feel sick, my mascara's bleeding and my throat's burning but none of this seems to matter. I'm back in control and I feel strangely powerful and comforted by what I've done. It's just a habit, I reassure myself as I run the tap. Just a habit.

My habit' started in Year Ten. I was changing mentally and physically and I couldn't cope with it all at once. I was no longer satisfied with my reflection. I didn't like my body and I felt that if I was just that little bit thinner, I'd be happy. I so desperately wanted to be one of those girls that society idolises so much. Tall and blonde, I was halfway there.

I'd read the horror stories, scanned a few pages on a book of an ex-bulimic and seen the pictures, but I didn't appreciate the grip that such a seemingly temporary tendency could have on me. Self-induced sickness almost thrilled me, and I was satisfied knowing that I couldn't gain any weight.

However, similar to so many cases, what started as a simple weight lost strategy soon extended to broader aspects of my life. It became a coping mechanism; something I'd do when I was stressed, angry or depressed. I didn't consider the consequences it was having on me or anyone else.

Fast forward a year. I'm not making myself sick regularly. Sometimes it'll be once a month - other times I'll succeed in doing it' multiple times a week. I'm sneaky. I'll go upstairs, put the music on, I'll lock both my bedroom and bathroom door to ensure that nobody finds out. After, I'll spray the bathroom, go downstairs and should anyone ask, lies roll off my tongue - I was up listening to music, doing homework or on the phone to a friend.

End of Year Eleven. It's exam season. I'm taking my IGCSEs and my sister's doing her finals in IB. I know I've got a lot to live up to and life is stressful. I deal with the stress in the only way I know how and manage to get through my exams alright. I've done well but my disorder has left me feeling depressed, guilty and inadequate.

One day I can't handle it anymore. My mother is on the sofa reading a magazine and the rest of the family are elsewhere. I walk in, guilty and ashamed, and confess to what I have been doing on/off for over a year and a half. I will never forget her reaction. She's crying, she's feeling guilty, she can't believe she never knew. I let the tears roll down my cheeks and trust her as she promises to help me.

Months pass and I experience a lot of change in my life. My sister leaves for university in the summer of 2006 and a few months later my parents inform me that after a decade in South East Asia, we'll be moving back to the UK. The idea of leaving leaves me sad, scared but excited.

The packers come in, boxes are taken away, goodbyes are said, tears are shed but my most poignant memory is of me wandering around my empty house. I remember standing in my bathroom, resting by the sink, looking down the plughole and thinking about all I've done. I leave the bathroom, shut the door and say goodbye.

Except it isn't that easy or simple to leave such a dangerous and complex disorder behind. I found moving hard and I didn't shut the door on my bulimia' entirely.

However, gradually I learnt to resist the temptation to make myself sick and soon it was this defiance that made me feel stronger, rather than succumbing to my demons. I'm aware that I deal with stress in an unhealthy way - mostly by food control or avoidance to eat, but I'm getting better. I don't know if the grip of my bulimia will ever fully let me go.

I'm still haunted by the memories of my past and I know I'll still be tempted in the future. I can't solemnly promise that I'll never revert to my old ways but I can promise I will do everything in my power at this moment to restrain myself. I thought I was going to have a brief stint' with bulimia. Bulimia is never a brief stint.

This Christmas and this New Year, I have new resolutions and promise to have a new outlook on life and embody better, healthier mechanisms to coping with change and unfamiliar situations. I feel that today, we are more than aware of the impacts such disorders have on our physical well-being.

I bear the emotional scars. I've written this not only to warn people of the mental and lasting impacts of such disorders, but also as a catharsis.

I wish each and every one of you a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

9:26am Monday 17th December 2007

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