I HAVE lived with anorexia for six years, although I harboured disordered attitudes towards food from the age of eight or nine.

Neither my parents nor I registered these signs as an issue because, like most people, we knew very little about eating disorders.

As my eating disorder became severe, I didn’t believe I could actually be anorexic because I wasn’t losing weight to be pretty.

This is a massive misconception about eating disorders; this self-inflicted damage is not a quest for model looks.

Eating disorders are frequently misconstrued as weight disorders or synonymous with skinny. In fact, eating disorders are a broad spectrum of destructive, dangerous illnesses which affect the lives of one in ten – people at a variety of weights, ages and gender identities.

Approximately 10 per cent of eating disorder sufferers fit the diagnostic criteria for anorexia, an illness defined by a restricted food intake and subsequent weight loss, however not necessarily to what would be considered medically underweight.

Bulimia and binge eating disorder accounts for 40 per cent of eating disorder diagnoses.

Bulimia is primarily characterised by episodes of uncontrollable excessive eating known as binges, followed by compensatory measures also seen in anorexia, laxative abuse, fasting and exercise – behaviours which are known as purging.

The other 50 per cent would be categorized as EDNOS – Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified. This is, in fact, the most deadly, combining symptoms of anorexia and bulimia and affecting people in any weight range.

Each of these disorders often come hand-in-hand with a warped body image, fear of weight gain, an unwillingness to maintain a healthy weight, and an extreme fear of the inability to stop eating.

Eating disorders are a means of self-harm. They are a coping mechanism for severe underlying issues as they give the sufferers an illusion of control.

After two long-term admissions to psychiatric units, three trips to accident and emergency, and three stints in intensive outpatient treatment over the years, I am taking on recovery individually this time.

Last summer, my boyfriend left me saying he didn’t know who I was anymore, as I was living and breathing anorexia.

I realised this had to stop.

What I had not previously realised was that spending months on an eating disorder ward wasn’t going to fix me.

Hospital life isn’t real life.

Upon discharge it is very easy to resort to old dangerous habits, which is exactly what I did. An enormous part of my current recovery process is volunteering at local market cafe, Go4.

The enterprise takes on young people with troubled pasts to provide work experience and integration into society.

Working for the first time in my life has helped me discover I am a person away from anorexia, and givenme a taste of what life has to offer if I leave my eating disorder behind.

As part of Eating Disorders Awareness Week, with the support of Go4’s directors, I am taking a break from the barista life to run a fundraising stall in the market today, Saturday 28.

To raise money for the UK’s eating disorder charity Beat, I am going to be selling handdecorated tableware, as well as giving out information leaflets on eating disorders.

I want to turn my difficult past into something positive.

I encourage people to visit the cafe and talk openly with me and join me fora cake and a coffee.

Let’s eradicate the notion of good and bad food.