What Is Anorexia Really About? Hadley Freeman on Good Girls and the competition to be the “Illest.”

We sometimes think of anorexia as an “old school” disease, now eclipsed by disorders such as cutting and similar forms of self-harm. But as journalist Hadley Freeman reports in her new book, the illness has been around for centuries and is still very much with us. In Good Girls: A Story and Study of Anorexia, Hadley tells the story of her battle with severe anorexia as a teenager and also investigates the causes, treatments, social factors, and lasting effects of the disease. In this conversation, Hadley explains how even though there’s been a greater focus on self-harm practices such as cutting in recent years, anorexia rose sharply during and after the pandemic and has never been more relevant. She describes how at age 14 she suddenly stopped eating and, within months, lost a third of her body weight and landed in a hospital. It would take three years and nine hospitalizations before she began to get well. It’s often said that anorexia isn’t about being thin as much as it is about retaining control, but Hadley describes her own compulsion as a competitive desire to look ill, with the ultimate success being death itself. Other subjects covered include the connection between anorexia and gender dysphoria, including Meghan’s theory that social media star Dylan Mulvaney is less a gender influencer than an anorexia exhibitionist. 

If that’s not unspeakable enough, Hadley stays overtime to talk about Meghan’s favorite third rail, Woody Allen, whom she’s interviewed and written about. They also discuss a recent interview Hadley conducted with author Judy Blume, whose expression of support for JK Rowling got her in trouble on Twitter. To hear that portion, become a paying subscriber at https://meghandaum.substack.com/.

Guest Bio:

Hadley Freeman grew up in New York and London. She is a staff writer for The Sunday Times and previously spent 22 years at The Guardian. Her last book, House of Glass, was an international bestseller. Her new book is Good Girls: A Story and Study of Anorexia.