♌ // ♏

me: bye

*parents leave the house*

Civil War Sickness (2015) dir. Isa Gueye

“A young woman examines her eating disorder recovery. She consciously resists the temptation to rely on visuals of starvation and specific body weights, instead seeking to articulate the deeper questions: why do eating disorders develop? Why do eating disorders persist? And how does healing happen?”

Artist Statement: I decided I could not make another eating disorder film that isn’t accessible to people with eating disorders because of their triggers. I did not focus on on my Anorexia Nervosa Diagnosis because it cognitively eliminates the mast majority of my target audience. I cannot create a film that will cause people with eating disorders or disordered eating to invalidate their own disorders or compare their disorders to mine, therefor I will not place any particular focus on weight loss or gain, hospitalization, amenorrhea, or any specific medical conditions I struggled with. I instead focused on not on specific behavior aspects of the disorder but rather how various behavioral aspects are used in the way that the disorder functions. I discussed how the disorder develops to cope with duo-diagnoses and the recovery process from the disorder. This film is not for neurotypical people to learn about eating disorders; this film is for people with eating disorders to learn about themselves and how their disorders operate in order to begin or further themselves in the recovery process. I am using myself as the subject not because of my diagnosis or the severity of my disorder but simple because putting a face to the subject and allowing people to see what the disorder has done to my psyche is the only way to get the message across about the dangers of eating disorders. That being said, I hope to use this film to spread eating disorder awareness overall.

Resources: http://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/