Source: Daily Telegraph
ALANA Goldsmith had the world at her feet.
A gorgeous, bubbly blonde, she was dux of her school, scored an ATAR of 95 and was fielding offers to work overseas for Google and Mattel.
But the 23-year-old, from Cammeray on Sydney‘s North Shore, hid a dark secret from her family and friends for almost a decade.
Alana suffered in silence until she took her life two months ago.
Now her family has called for an inquest to review patient care and has demanded answers as to how she was able to slip out of hospital twice the day she died.
Sister Simone, 21, said the family also wanted to raise awareness that anorexia was not a vain desire to be thin, but a devastating mental illness whose sufferers are 32 times more likely to commit suicide than their peers.
Read More: Dark illness ate up bubbly Alana from the inside
Related Article: “We live in an age where we are surrounded by an image of an ideal body shape, communicated by a constantly evolving media….Much of what we see is a fusion of reality and fantasy, with many of the images presented to us having been altered or enhanced in some way” (Sanger, 2007). Our media is full of body images that create in many cases very unattainable and distorted body ideals that are directed at gregarious women. More: Women’s Health – Body Image Issues
Cartoon by Bob Moran
