I had no idea where to find help for my eating disorder. Then Australia's new e-clinic changed everything
Up until that point, I'd had some variation of one for years. It all started when I decided to go on my first diet, aged 21. What followed was a half decade of cycling through maddening patterns of restriction. From bingeing to purging, starving to hardcore exercising, my mind was constantly overrun by thoughts of food. How much I was eating, how much I wasn't eating, how great of a person I was for resisting food, how much of a loser I was for not being able to control myself. My self-esteem went down the toilet, along with my ability to feel joy.
By the time I was ready to seek treatment, none was available. Despite having the time and financial means to see a therapist, I couldn't get into one. Waitlists were months long. Inpatient treatment wasn't an option either – by that stage, my eating disorder wasn't considered 'severe' enough to warrant a stay. And even if it had been, I had rent to pay and a career to build. Pressing pause on all that wasn't feasible.
That's when a psychologist – who didn't have space for me herself – reached out. She sent me a link to a study being run by the University of Sydney and the InsideOut Institute. They were testing an online therapy program for bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder. She said I'd be a good candidate.
I had no idea what to expect. And whatever expectations I had were low. I wasn't convinced that an online program could make a dent in what I felt was, at that stage, a personality flaw. But I had nothing to lose. So I signed up.
It was a 12-week program. Every day, I logged my meals, my thoughts and any compensatory behaviours. While that might sound like a lot, I was already constantly thinking about food and my body. Now, I was just putting it down somewhere other than my brain. At first, tracking seemed counterintuitive. Counting meals was something I did when I was deep in restriction mode. But the point was separation. I wasn't the food I did or didn't eat. My behaviour was just that: behaviour. Something that could be unlearned. Meanwhile, I had weekly check-ins with a counsellor. She was kind of like the site manager for my emotional excavation. I was slowly dismantling the scaffolding I'd built around myself, and she helped me name each bit as it fell away.
The program changed my life. It kickstarted my recovery and set me on the path back to my child self – the girl who didn't obsess over what she ate. The girl who thought of food as just that. Food. Something to enjoy, to share with friends, to enrich life – not interrupt it.
Last week the federal government announced it is rolling this program out to the general public. After 10 years of research, the InsideOut eClinic is now available to Australians aged 16 and over who are struggling with food or body image concerns. It's a free, online clinic that anyone can access at any time. You don't need a diagnosis. You don't need a referral. You can just go to the website and have a poke around. The eClinic includes tailored programs like BEeT (for binge eating and bulimia), SkillED (for broader symptoms) and SupportED (for carers). There's a health professional hub for clinicians.
When I was unwell, I had absolutely no idea where to start looking for help. This eClinic is a much-needed safety net. You can complete the programs at your own pace, from wherever you are. It's not suitable for people in a medical emergency or psychological crisis – they'll still need face-to-face care – but for many people, this will be a lifeline.
Research has already shown how effective online therapy through the eClinic can be. And it's a gamechanger for people who live regionally or can't afford private treatment.
Eating disorder research in this country is sorely lacking and deeply underfunded. It's a dire reality, considering eating disorders have one of the highest mortality rates of any mental illness in Australia. More than a million Australians are now living with one. In 2023 alone, more than 1,200 people died from an eating disorder, according to the Butterfly Foundation.
Hundreds of thousands are still stuck in silence, still waiting, still falling through the cracks. The fact that the government has seen the merit in this treatment is significant. It's time we moved the dial.
Lucinda Price is an author and comedian known online as Froomes. She is an InsideOut Institute eClinic ambassador
In Australia, the Butterfly Foundation is at 1800 33 4673. In the UK, Beat can be contacted on 0808-801-0677. In the US, help is available at nationaleatingdisorders.org or by calling ANAD's eating disorders hotline at 800-375-7767. Other international helplines can be found at Eating Disorder Hope
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The Guardian
11 hours ago
- The Guardian
I had no idea where to find help for my eating disorder. Then Australia's new e-clinic changed everything
In 2020, I decided to get help for an eating disorder. Up until that point, I'd had some variation of one for years. It all started when I decided to go on my first diet, aged 21. What followed was a half decade of cycling through maddening patterns of restriction. From bingeing to purging, starving to hardcore exercising, my mind was constantly overrun by thoughts of food. How much I was eating, how much I wasn't eating, how great of a person I was for resisting food, how much of a loser I was for not being able to control myself. My self-esteem went down the toilet, along with my ability to feel joy. By the time I was ready to seek treatment, none was available. Despite having the time and financial means to see a therapist, I couldn't get into one. Waitlists were months long. Inpatient treatment wasn't an option either – by that stage, my eating disorder wasn't considered 'severe' enough to warrant a stay. And even if it had been, I had rent to pay and a career to build. Pressing pause on all that wasn't feasible. That's when a psychologist – who didn't have space for me herself – reached out. She sent me a link to a study being run by the University of Sydney and the InsideOut Institute. They were testing an online therapy program for bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder. She said I'd be a good candidate. I had no idea what to expect. And whatever expectations I had were low. I wasn't convinced that an online program could make a dent in what I felt was, at that stage, a personality flaw. But I had nothing to lose. So I signed up. It was a 12-week program. Every day, I logged my meals, my thoughts and any compensatory behaviours. While that might sound like a lot, I was already constantly thinking about food and my body. Now, I was just putting it down somewhere other than my brain. At first, tracking seemed counterintuitive. Counting meals was something I did when I was deep in restriction mode. But the point was separation. I wasn't the food I did or didn't eat. My behaviour was just that: behaviour. Something that could be unlearned. Meanwhile, I had weekly check-ins with a counsellor. She was kind of like the site manager for my emotional excavation. I was slowly dismantling the scaffolding I'd built around myself, and she helped me name each bit as it fell away. The program changed my life. It kickstarted my recovery and set me on the path back to my child self – the girl who didn't obsess over what she ate. The girl who thought of food as just that. Food. Something to enjoy, to share with friends, to enrich life – not interrupt it. Last week the federal government announced it is rolling this program out to the general public. After 10 years of research, the InsideOut eClinic is now available to Australians aged 16 and over who are struggling with food or body image concerns. It's a free, online clinic that anyone can access at any time. You don't need a diagnosis. You don't need a referral. You can just go to the website and have a poke around. The eClinic includes tailored programs like BEeT (for binge eating and bulimia), SkillED (for broader symptoms) and SupportED (for carers). There's a health professional hub for clinicians. When I was unwell, I had absolutely no idea where to start looking for help. This eClinic is a much-needed safety net. You can complete the programs at your own pace, from wherever you are. It's not suitable for people in a medical emergency or psychological crisis – they'll still need face-to-face care – but for many people, this will be a lifeline. Research has already shown how effective online therapy through the eClinic can be. And it's a gamechanger for people who live regionally or can't afford private treatment. Eating disorder research in this country is sorely lacking and deeply underfunded. It's a dire reality, considering eating disorders have one of the highest mortality rates of any mental illness in Australia. More than a million Australians are now living with one. In 2023 alone, more than 1,200 people died from an eating disorder, according to the Butterfly Foundation. Hundreds of thousands are still stuck in silence, still waiting, still falling through the cracks. The fact that the government has seen the merit in this treatment is significant. It's time we moved the dial. Lucinda Price is an author and comedian known online as Froomes. She is an InsideOut Institute eClinic ambassador In Australia, the Butterfly Foundation is at 1800 33 4673. In the UK, Beat can be contacted on 0808-801-0677. In the US, help is available at or by calling ANAD's eating disorders hotline at 800-375-7767. Other international helplines can be found at Eating Disorder Hope
The Guardian
12 hours ago
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Inquest into Aboriginal woman Heather Calgaret's death in custody urges overhaul of Victoria's prison healthcare
A Victorian coroner has recommended wide-ranging improvements to healthcare provided in prisons after an inquest into the death of a 30-year-old Yamatji, Pitjantjatjara, Noongar and Wongi woman. Heather Calgaret died in November 2021 after being found unresponsive in her cell at Dame Phyllis Frost prison by her sister Suzzane, who was also incarcerated at the time. Coroner Sarah Gebert found that Calgaret had inappropriately been prescribed an opiate replacement treatment by prison health workers and that it likely triggered a respiratory failure which led to her death. Calgaret was remanded in custody in 2019 while she was six months pregnant with her fourth child, and she had an application for parole denied the month before she died, though the parole system was beyond the scope of the inquest. Sign up: AU Breaking News email Gebert found, however, that while this decision did not directly cause Calgaret's death, it was important to consider issues related to determining parole applications. There were 'numerous issues of concern' identified with the management of Calgaret's application, she found. Calgaret was denied parole because her housing was deemed unsuitable and there was insufficient time for her to find alternate accommodation. This was despite her having placed her mother's address on her parole application in May 2020, and Community Correctional Services not raising any concerns about this or raising any alternatives until September 2021, when it was deemed inappropriate. 'Whether and how a parole application progresses has the potential to impact on a person's continuing incarceration and all that flows from being in the custody of the state,' Gebert found on Monday. 'I further noted that the continuing over-representation of Aboriginal people in custody also heightens the need for and significance of examining the issues that were included [in the inquest].' Speaking outside court on Monday, Suzzane Calgaret welcomed the findings but said it should not have taken her sister's death for changes to be made. 'I hope they just have learned from this because it's taken my sister's life, my mum's daughter's life,' she said. 'There's a reason now for her passing and that reason has been justified by the outcome but it doesn't bring her back.' Gebert also noted that another Aboriginal woman, Veronica Nelson, died at the prison while Calgaret was in custody. On 4 May 2020, Calgaret was sentenced to two years and three months' imprisonment for armed robbery and six months' imprisonment for 'make threat to inflict serious injury' with a non-parole period of 14 months. Gebert found that when Calgaret was admitted to prison, she weighed 95kg (though was six months pregnant) and was relatively healthy. Within the next two years, she gained 70kg, was classified as morbidly obese, had poorly controlled type 2 diabetes, sustained 'liver function derangement' and had likely obstructive sleep apnoea. Gebert found that court experts identified that the removal of Calgaret's daughter was a pivotal moment in her overall decline in health. Calgaret had an application to care for her baby in custody, under the Living with Mum Program, denied. There were no Aboriginal health workers at the prison at the time, the coroner heard, but there were frameworks and policies in place which should have meant she was provided better care. 'I can only conclude therefore, that whilst there were robust health policies and commitments in place, it was apparent that the delivery of health services to Heather did not meet those aspirations in the crucial areas which have been highlighted,' Gebert found. The Covid-19 pandemic affected the delivery of services and required prisoners to be locked down while Calgaret was imprisoned, the coroner found. There were five primary areas of focus during the inquest, including the provision of healthcare, the management of Calgaret's parole application, the prescription of opiate replacement therapy, the emergency care after her collapse and the cause of her death. Gebert made 16 recommendations, including that Justice Health establish measures to ensure adequate screening and monitoring for postnatal mental health symptoms in women who give birth in custody or 'proximate to their remand' and that they support women who are refused access to the Living with Mum program. She also recommended that Justice Health better monitor prisoner weight gain, improve access to psychological services at Dame Phyllis, and work with providers to ensure regular pharmacological reviews, proper documentation of chronic healthcare plans and explore models for Aboriginal community health organisations to provide services to Aboriginal people in custody. The Department of Justice and Community Safety should investigate how its parole application process is consistent with its commitment to reduce the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in custody, Gebert recommended.
Daily Mail
13 hours ago
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On a trip to the beach, a sting from a KILLER SNAIL put me in a coma. A medicine cabinet staple saved me from death
Tina Petway was working on a remote island when one of the most toxic creatures on the planet stung her three times. Alone with no way to call for help, she began to lose consciousness on the way back to her research hut where she wrote a dying letter to her husband and got into bed hoping to survive. Then 24, Petway had been stung by a cone snail. It is among the world's deadliest snails and is armed with venom-tipped stingers capable of stopping a human's breathing within minutes. Ranging from 0.5 to 8.5 inches long and shaped like an ice cream cone, the shells of cone snails often appear harmless, and their vibrant designs attract beachgoers. But those who accidentally collect shells that are still occupied by the gastropod could suffer a nasty sting, which have been linked to 36 deaths in medical literature - and experts say the number is likely higher. They are found in the Solomon Islands, where Petway was working, and along the coasts of Indonesia and Australia. Petway was stung in August 1972 but is now revealing the encounter 53 years later to warn others of the seaside dangers, as experts suggest the snails are coming to the US and are present around San Diego, California and Mexico's Pacific coast. 'I could see the tiny barbs sticking out of my finger - they looked like fish bones, and I tried to pull them out but couldn't,' Petway, an associate curator of mollusks at the Houston Museum of Natural Sciences in Texas, told the Daily Mail. Tina Petway (pictured), from Houston, Texas, narrowly escaped death after being stung by a cone snail three times while on a trip to the Solomon Islands Your browser does not support iframes. 'I realized I was in danger, I already was having a hard time breathing, I was having difficulty seeing.' Through her work, Petway was aware of the dangers of cone snails, which are predators and use their toxin to immobilize fish. While they do not hunt humans, they may deliver a sting if someone picks up their shell or accidentally steps on them. She recalled coming across the creature while in the water. It was in the sand, and she picked it up carefully, making sure to position the shell between her thumb and forefinger in a way that wouldn't allow the stinger to reach her hand. However, she noticed another cone snail was making its way toward her foot. As she bent down to also pick up that shell, the one already in her hand twisted in her grip and stung her three times. 'I realized that my hand was burning. I looked over and realized my hand had actually turned and the shell had moved, and now I had three tiny barbs in this finger right here,' she said, pointing to her left forefinger. Petway quickly pocketed the snail in her research bag and attempted to walk back to her beach hut, but quickly began feeling dizzy and developed blurred vision. As she walked, she began to lose consciousness. Once inside, she took antihistamines - typically used for allergic reactions - in a bid to stop her airway from closing. She also put papaya on the wound, a supposed remedy for drawing out the cone snail's toxin. Before falling unconscious from the venom, Petway wrote a note to her husband, who was elsewhere on the island, recounting exactly what had happened and how she had tried to treat herself. Pictured above is the shell of the cone snail that stung Petway in 1972. She kept it after her ordeal and it is displayed in the museum where she works She then crawled into bed to wait it out in hopes she would survive. It was three days before she woke up again. Because of the limited documentation on cone snail bites, mortality rates from a sting widely vary, with research estimating a mortality rate of anywhere from 15 to 75 percent. Eventually, Petway's husband returned to their hut where he sat by his wife's bedside, later admitting that he was terrified she was going to die. The recently married couple were on an extremely remote four-mile island with no hospital or advanced medical facility anywhere nearby. During the three days Petway was in bed, she would occasionally open her eyes and respond 'yes' or 'no' to questions, her husband later told her - though she has no recollection of it. When she finally regained full consciousness, she suffered from crippling head pain. After another few days in the hut recovering, she was able to get transportation by boat to an airstrip from where she caught a plane to a hospital. Petway finally saw a doctor more than a week after her sting - and the physician could not believe she was still alive. She credits her survival to her quick thinking: 'I think it was the antihistamines.' 'I took handfuls, I just swallowed handfuls of these drugs, along with some water. That was the only thing I could think of at that time, and it saved my life.' Pictured above is a deadly cone snail extending its harpoon-like stinger from its shell She suffered from severe headaches for months after the sting, and it took her two years to regain use of her left forefinger. The stiffness in her hand left her dropping items and struggling to hold onto things. Petway survived, but the snail that stung her did not. While the creature died in her bag due to a lack of water, its shell, is on display at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. While the experience may put many off cone snails for life, Petway said it just made her more fascinated with them - though she has learned not to pick up the toxic creatures with her bare hands. 'It just made me excited to learn more about the snail and the toxin itself,' she said.
