Anorexic who weighed six stone four switched to high carb diet after ‘learning to love herself’ – and is now a muscular 10 stone
AN ANOREXIC who weighed 6st 4 at her lowest has shared her incredible transformation from malnourished to muscular after learning to love her body.
Erika Jennings, 25, struggled with eating disorders for seven years, battling the urge to starve her skeletal body and purging whenever she ate.
After being rejected by boys and fearing she was “fat” due to her muscular legs, she started dieting at 15.
Her fixation with becoming smaller left her shrinking food portion sizes continuously and reducing the calories she allowed herself to consume, until it dropped below 300 a day.
But in 2013, at a dangerously low 6st 4 while lying depressed on the floor she had an epiphany that she must become her "body's friend" and start loving herself.
She switched to a high-carb vegan diet, started treating herself with bubble baths and repeatedly told herself that she was “beautiful, strong and capable”.
Now a healthy 10st 10, she's focusing on building a more muscular physique, working out three-times-a-week to forge thicker legs and a bigger butt.
Erika, from West Virginia, USA, said: "At my worst, some days I was eating a maximum of 300 calories a day, other times I wasn't eating at all, within a year it was a full-blown eating disorder.
"I kept starving myself as I hated my muscles, I wanted to get rid of them, it got to the point where I was really tiny with no shape or body definition.
"It's really shocking to look at now, I never realised how I was because whenever I looked in the mirror I saw a monster that was big and disgusting.
"On one of my worst days, I was so depressed I was lying on the floor, suddenly I heard god say to me 'you are your best friend' and that experience really changed me.”
What is anorexia nervosa?
- Anorexia nervosa, often known as just anorexia, is a very serious mental health condition which causes the person to restrict the amount they eat.
- The sufferer of the eating disorder aims to keep their body weight as low as possible by avoiding food, vomiting or exercising excessively.
- The condition usually affects girls and women, however, more recently it has started affecting more boys and usually it develops at around 16 or 17 years old.
- Despite being less common than some other conditions, anorexia is one of the leading causes of mental health-related deaths - as a result of malnutrition or suicide.
Erika had been blinded to how dangerously underweight she was, at her worst she had a body mass index of 14.5 - a healthy range lies between 18 and 25.
On top of her extremely restricted diet, she would exercise excessively – some days cycling up to 30 miles in a bid to work off any remaining “fat” on her body.
Erika said: "It was terrible for my malnourished heart and I didn't even care, thinking about that now hurts.
"I was so determined to get skinny that even if it killed me recovery wasn't something I was trying to do, I was just focusing on being skinny at all costs."
But after her epiphany and deciding to start appreciating her body in 2013, Erika began the long road back to health.
She stopped weighing herself, calorie counting and avoided potential triggers as she battled to undo all of the negative habits she'd built up over her seven year struggle with eating disorders.
Supported by her family and husband, Wayne, 30, she was able to gain nearly four stone and has now built an impressively chiselled yet curvaceous physique.
What are the signs of anorexia nervosa?
But if you suspect someone is battling the condition there are a few signs to look out for, . These include:
- Missing meals, eating very little or avoiding eating any fatty foods
- Obsessively counting calories in food
- Leaving the table immediately after eating so they can vomit
- Taking appetite suppressants, laxatives, or diuretics (a type of medication that helps remove fluid from the body)
- Repeatedly weighing themselves or checking their body in the mirror
- Physical problems, such as feeling lightheaded or dizzy, hair loss, or dry skin
Erika said: "My life is 100 per cent different and better, before, I was so lost in my head, always wondering how I could burn more calories, how I was going to eat less, how much cardio I could do.
"I have gained a lot of muscle and I'm proud of the person I'm becoming, some people see self-love as vain but it's about appreciating yourself so you are more free to live a full life.
"I make the joke that I went from having a body like Gollum to Aragorn because Lord of the Rings is one of my favourite films.
"I love my whole body, becoming more strong and growing my butt, I hope that by seeing my transformation it encourages others to recover too."
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Erika said that focusing on fitness has transformed her life.
She said: "I switched my emphasis from burning calories to becoming fit and building muscle, I started working out at home doing exercise and gaining more weight.
"I fell in love with my thicker, bigger body, I used to hate my thighs and wanted to be smaller but now I love my body and having a fuller curvier figure."
We previously shared how an anorexic teen was given two weeks to live and only ate 120 calories a day following her mum’s tragic death, but is now on a similar road to recovery.
This week ASOS has told super-skinny models to fatten up if they want more work.