A blog post by Pepetoe.

Eating Disorder Awareness Week appears once a year, neatly packaged into seven days of statistics, infographics, and pastel-coloured posts telling us to “raise awareness.” And while awareness matters, for me, this week has never been abstract. It isn’t a marketing moment or a calendar reminder. It’s personal. It’s lived. It’s tangled up in some of the hardest years of my life.

When I was unwell, awareness didn’t reach me in the way campaigns promise it will. I didn’t look at posters and suddenly recognise myself. I didn’t see neat symptom lists and think, that’s me. What I felt instead was confusion, shame, and the overwhelming belief that I wasn’t “sick enough” to deserve help. That’s one of the quiet dangers of awareness without nuance: it can still leave people invisible.

For a long time, my eating disorder thrived in misunderstanding. In people assuming I was “just disciplined”. In compliments that reinforced restriction. In the lack of language around what eating disorders actually feel like from the inside: obsessive, exhausting, isolating, all-consuming. Awareness that doesn’t include lived experience often misses the point entirely.

Recovery, too, is rarely represented honestly. It’s shown as a straight line, a before-and-after photo, a triumphant ending. But recovery is slow. It’s repetitive. It’s choosing to eat on days when nothing feels worth it. It’s relapsing and still choosing to come back. It’s learning how to exist in a body you once tried to erase. That kind of recovery doesn’t fit neatly into a week-long campaign.

Eating Disorder Awareness Week matters to me because it’s a chance, if done properly, to tell the truth. To centre voices that aren’t polished or palatable. To talk about the grey areas, the setbacks, the fear of weight gain, the grief, the identity loss, and the quiet courage it takes to keep going. It’s a chance to remind people that eating disorders don’t have a look, a weight, or a stereotype.

It also matters because recovery doesn’t happen in isolation. I didn’t get better alone. I got better because people listened, believed me, sat with me, and stayed when things were uncomfortable. Awareness should extend beyond recognition. It should move people towards compassion, patience, and action.

That action doesn’t have to be dramatic. Sometimes it looks like not commenting on someone’s body. Sometimes it looks like sitting with a friend during a difficult meal. Sometimes it looks like donating to organisations doing the slow, unglamorous work of support. Sometimes it’s simply amplifying voices that know this terrain firsthand.

For me, Eating Disorder Awareness Week is about honouring the version of myself who didn’t know how to ask for help yet. It’s about making the path a little clearer for someone else. It’s about refusing to reduce complex illnesses into shareable soundbites.

This week isn’t just a campaign.
It’s a reminder.
A responsibility.
And, for many of us, a survival story.

Join me throughout 23rd February – 1st March to mark a time in the year where we should talk about eating disorders, where was have a space to do exactly that. If you want to share your hope and make a better world for everyone, especially the younger generations, read more about BEAT and their charity here: https://edaw.beateatingdisorders.org.uk/

Alternatively, you can donate to my JustGiving here, where I will be raising money for BEAT through a fundraiser in my local pub, and running the Edinburgh Half Marathon in May with a dear friend. All proceeds go directly to BEAT: https://www.justgiving.com/page/elena-overfield-edinburgh-half-mara-2026?utm_medium=FR&utm_source=CL