Brave mum who dropped to just FOUR STONE while battling anorexia has since turned her eating disorder into a musical
WARNING GRAPHIC IMAGES: Charley Williams, 38, from London, began struggling with the illness at the age of 18 after being bullied at school
A BRAVE mum whose weight plummeted to just FOUR STONE as she battled anorexia has since beaten the illness - and turned her experience into a musical.
Charley Williams, from London, began suffering from the condition at the age of 18, after being bullied at school and dealing with undiagnosed attention deficit disorder.
The 38-year-old was plagued by the harrowing eating disorder until her thirties, when she finally began her road to recovery.
The turning point was falling pregnant with her daughter, Daisy, now two - and Charley is now a healthier 8st 7lbs and confident she has laid her demons to rest.
Charley told how she became depressed and struggled with her self-esteem as a teen.
She explained: "To cope with school I developed clinical perfectionism as a way to compensate and still achieve good grades, but the extra time and effort I had to spend to keep up with work took its toll.
"I found that my diet was the one thing I could control, and by 17 I had started to skip meals and vomit when I felt I'd eaten too much.
"I managed to get through my A Levels but as soon as they were over my weight started plummeting."
By the age of 18 Charley weighed just six stone.
She said her concerned family desperately tried to help, but there was an "overpowering voice" inside her head telling her not to eat.
"There was nothing they could do to change that," she admitted.
"I managed to complete a foundation course in fine art sculpture, despite hardly eating, and was offered places at three universities, but by age 19 my weight was becoming critical and I was unable to accept the offers."
The summer after her 20th birthday Charley's weight was down to five stone and she was threatened with sectioning.
To avoid that, she went into a private hospital funded by the NHS.
But Charley was unable to comply with the strict regime of weight gain and was discharged for "non-compliance".
Soon after she was sectioned and for the next five years she was admitted to three different eating disorder units and had numerous medical ward admissions for tube feeding.
She recalled: "By the age of 21 I weighed 4st 2 lbs and, despite my liver going into failure and many other physical complications, I would still look at myself in the mirror and see more fat on my body that I needed to lose.
"I was too weak to walk or dress myself, but that didn't change my mindset."
Charley admitted she would develop tricks to hide her food, flicking egg down her top and smearing Weetabix under the bowl.
She explained: "I pretended to gain weight by drinking litres of water and strapping Diet Coke cans and batteries to my legs under my nightie and in pockets before being weighed.
"How I managed to deceive the nurses when under this care is a blur, but I somehow managed it.
"When blood tests showed that my body was shutting down, on many occasions, I was rushed to hospital for emergency tube feeding.
"Eventually, with my weight remaining at around four stone and in a critical state, I was operated on and a stomach peg inserted to syringe feed directly into my stomach and save my life."
Charley was discharged at 26, by which point she had flipped into bulimia.
She told how she began writing songs about the predicament she was in.
"It was the one thing that gave me pleasure during my darkest of times," said Charley.
"I was re-admitted to hospital from self starvation at age 29."
By 31, Charley was finally starting to come out the other side.
She admitted: "I was so close to death, and I know that many people out there never recover, which is tragic.
"The point that really helped me finally beat the disease was falling pregnant with my daughter.
"I was shocked I could even have children, due to the stress I had put my body through and the warnings from the doctors."
In an attempt to help others, she teamed up with dad Simon, 71, to turn the songs she had written in a musical.
She began writing the script in 2010 - and earlier this year .
Charley said: "The musical is called When Strawberries Are Not Enough, named because at one stage I was only eating 100 grams of strawberries three times a day.
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"It is a fictional plot but is pulls from many of my experiences while suffering from my eating disorder."
She added: "I don’t think people understand it is an addiction and a phobia.
"Anorexia is like a phobia of food and weight gain, an addiction to weight loss.
"I hope the musical will penetrate people’s minds about what it’s like to be anorexic.
"Music is something people can relate to, and I hope it can tap into their emotions on a deep level so they really get what the character is going through.
"I hope there might be someone out there struggling with anorexia who sees this and thinks if I can get over it, so can they."
Earlier this week we told how an anorexic young woman whose weight plummeted to 5st 7lb after she became obsessed with "healthy" eating claims body building saved her life.
We also reported how a mum who made a "diet pact" with her son was left heartbroken after the 21-year-old died of an eating disorder seven years later.