(£2k - £4k) Hi. Please be nice. I’m an Irish bride going through anorexia largely alone.

Yes, I have been to the doctor. I have been listed on my country’s emergent mental health waiting list for over a year and still not even been triaged. Mental health services here are awful.

This is not about goal or current weight. This is entirely undesirable and I’m not asking for medical advice, just some support from fellow planners and brides/former brides who are going through/did go through the same thing, or who can understand it at least a little. It’s not wedding stress, I’m actually a pretty chill bride by most standards, it’s just… everything.

When I was at Oxford, 17 years ago, I had a terrible bout of anorexia I managed to get free of. All the stress l have been under has brought it back. I cannot get rid of it as the only people who know are my Ma (350 miles away), fiancé (transatlantic), and seamstress, who guessed today and called me out, and I’m just getting more and more gaunt and need some support from others. My fiancé is doing his absolute best (I’ve included a screenshot of a recent conversation I had with him about it) but he’s so far away and I miss him terribly.

I’ve just gone totally NC for good with my sperm donor because despite all the things I listed in my email that I was giving him a last chance to apologise for (amounted to psychological and emotional abuse since three) his response was “I’m not going to apologise for something I’m not sorry for.” Nice. Needless to say he has been uninvited to both ceremonies and thoroughly warned of consequences if he does show up.

The anorexia sub is not helpful on this. Like I said, I’ve been on the emergent mental health waiting list in my home country for over a year and it’s nearing the point of just presenting at A&E and telling them, which means I’ll immediately be sectioned, and I definitely DON’T want that.

However, I also don’t want to show up in a month at my US wedding like a walking skeleton (and, stupid as it sounds, look like that in the photos) or to die before my Irish wedding. I don’t have ANY support network at all barring my Ma and fiancé (who no, can’t live here until his visa etc is fully processed, current ETA start of April) and just want to hear from others going through this, or who maybe understand.

Sorry to bother you.