Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/287250
48 brava magazine | april 2014 T hey were just kind of keeping me around…those years for me are kind of a blur," says Rachel Wer- ner. "I was really sick." Back then Werner didn't know she was struggling with an eating disorder. To- day, she does. Werner's eating disorder began when she was a young teen, after her mother died. Werner, who was 14, returned to school the next week without even see- ing a counselor and then began bouncing from home to home, a pattern that would continue through her adolescence. She started displaying disordered eating patterns, including skipping meals and counting how many of her bones she could see. Werner says she would occa- sionally recognize that her behavior was out of control but was not in a place emo- tionally to do anything about it. By 18, she was diagnosed with anorexia nervosa and within two years was admit- ted unwillingly to an in-patient treatment facility because she was severely under- weight by about 20 pounds, needed to be medically rehydrated twice and would skip classes to workout for up to three hours at a time. On top of everything, she was dealing with chronic depression. After years of intense team treatment coordinated by her doctor, psycholo- gist and social worker that involved both medication and keeping a food journal (which she hates doing to this day), Wer- ner was in control of her disease for about seven years—but she relapsed after her daughter was born in 2010. To be diagnosed with an eating dis- order, a person must meet the full criteria as documented in the DSM-V, the official manual of mental disorders. Disordered eating, on the other hand, can refer to everything in-between. PercePtions & reflections not just a teen struggle: an inside look at women, mothers and their own eating disorders by CandiCe wagener | photographed by sarah rose smiley | mirrors Courtesy of a la Crate vintage rentals "