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| The following is an extract of an interview of princess diana about her battle with bulimia. Diana: I had bulimia for a number of years. And that's like a secret disease. You inflict it upon yourself because your self-esteem is at a low ebb, and you don't think you're worthy or valuable. You fill your stomach up four or five times a day - some do it more - and it gives you a feeling of comfort. It's like having a pair of arms around you, but it's temporarily, temporary. Then you're disgusted at the bloatedness of your stomach, and then you bring it all up again. And it's a repetitive pattern, which is very destructive to yourself. Reporter: How often would you do that on a daily basis? Diana: Depends on the pressures going on. If I'd been on what I call an “awayday,” or I'd been up part of the country all day, I'd come home feeling pretty empty, because my engagements at that time would be to do with people dying, people very sick, people's marriage problems, and I'd come home and it would be very difficult to know how to comfort myself having been comforting lots of other people, so it would be a regular pattern to jump into the fridge. It was a symptom of what was going on in my marriage. I was crying out for help, but giving the wrong signals, and people were using my bulimia as a coat on a hanger: they decided that was the problem - Diana was unstable. Reporter: What was the cause? Diana: The cause was the situation where my husband and I had to keep everything together because we didn't want to disappoint the public, and yet obviously there was a lot of anxiety going on within our four walls. Reporter: And so you subjected yourself to this phase of bingeing and vomiting? Diana: You could say the word subjected, but it was my escape mechanism, and it worked, for me, at that time. Reporter: Did you seek help from any other members of the Royal Family? |
Diana: No. You, you have to know that when you have bulimia you're very ashamed of yourself and you hate yourself, so - and people think you're wasting food - so you don't discuss it with people. And the thing about bulimia is your weight always stays the same, whereas with anorexia you visibly shrink. So you can pretend the whole way through. There's no proof. Reporter: How long did this bulimia go on for? Diana: A long time. But I'm free of it now. Reporter: Two years, three years? Diana: A little bit more than that. |