AFTER years of battling a deadly eating disorder, a personal trainer from Colchester is now working to help young people and families navigate the same minefield which risked blowing her own life apart.

Emma Carpenter did not have an easy ride in her early years at school, and her battle with anorexia started when she was bullied by her peers at Gosbecks Primary School in Colchester in the early 2000s.

Things then spiralled out of control during her teenage years, when the bullying continued at Philip Morant School; it led to Miss Carpenter going into hospital just two weeks before Christmas, and she went on to spend Christmas Day there at the age of 12.

When she describes the psychology of her eating disorder, however, Miss Carpenter, now 29, speaks with an eloquence and clarity which could only come from someone who has had to battle through the challenge of anorexia themselves.

Eating disorders, she explained, are all about control – something you can cling on to.

Although she couldn’t control the bullying she was suffering from, what she could manage was what she put into her body.

She said: “Eating disorders are a control thing – I could control what I could put in my body, so I cut out crisps and chocolate, but it spiralled into a full-blown eating disorder.”

It took years for Miss Carpenter to recover, and there were doctors who thought she would never have a healthy relationship with food again.

“People with eating disorders are good at talking the talk – you say you will do something but you don’t do it.”

Candidly, she admits to having been what she describes as a pathological liar – everyone who has an eating disorder is, she said.

“People with eating disorders are compulsive liars… you believe those irrational thoughts and they become rational to you – you believe your own lies.

“My mum knew when she was talking to her daughter and knew when she was talking to the person with an eating disorder.”

Miss Carpenter saw numerous therapists in her teenage years, and there was one who made a life-changing difference – the name of her mental health therapist was Joast.

“I met him after one of my hospitalisations,” she explained.

“I wouldn’t listen to any of the people in the hospital, but he knew when to talk and when to push me.

“I allowed him into my world and that allowed him to help me.”

One of the other turning points which was part of Miss Carpenter’s was recovery was learning to be a teenager, and realising that, as she was recovering, she could do what people her age started doing.

“I started going out, and I started doing what teenagers are supposed to be doing.

“I thought being really thin then was the body to have, but it brought me into a bit of a flashback – it wasn’t the look that was desirable.

“That made me think I need to be me, the happy-go-lucky Emma.”

When asked why more people are likely to listen to her, Miss Carpenter’s response is simple: she’s been through it all herself; she knows the temptations and she knows the false dawns.

It is the “lived experience” as she refers to it, which was the crux of her setting up her business, Muscle Mind Wellness, in September 2020 – it this business which allows Miss Carpenter to help people survive what she endured and see the light at the end of the tunnel.

“A lot of people with eating disorders listen to people like me because we are lived experience – we know what they are thinking because we have been there, and that’s the stem of why I set this all up.”

Not only does she run workshops about how to approach eating disorders, but she even runs fitness sessions tailored for those who are suffering from body dysmorphia.

“My personal training studio is for people who don’t feel comfortable going into the gym environment – but I also stride for the mental health side of things.

“I work with people who are at their worst and have nowhere to turn to – it’s not working for them because they are like I was.”

Not only is Miss Carpenter trying to help those with eating disorders, she is equally looking not make a difference by trying to prevent there being a need for people like herself.

The earlier a potential eating disorder is identified, she said, the less pressure there is going to be on the National Health Service to treat the causes of the problem.

“There needs to be earlier intervention.

“If teachers [and others in the education system] can detect the early signs of eating disorders then they can help students [understand what they are].

“Slowly, you can get back to real life and gradually distance yourself from the eating disorder inside your head.”