Reviews with content warning for Mental illness - The Opposite of Butterfly Hunting: The Tragedy and The Glory of Growing Up

tldr: beautifully written, far too explicit regarding anorexia, triggering, not a good portrayal of recovery

i think it's brave any time someone chooses to speak out about their experience with mental illness, so i do want to commend Evanna Lynch for that.
however, writing a memoir about your eating disorder is undoubtedly going to attract readers who also have eating disorders, and so i think authors have to be very careful with how they discuss their experience. anorexia especially often involves competitiveness, so anything mentioning behaviours or body size/shape is always going to cause comparison.
at the very beginning, Evanna says she doesn't want to trigger anyone and won't include any numbers or anything that glamorises her eating disorder in any way. however, less than halfway through the book, one particular eating disorder behaviour is portrayed in quite a lot of detail. then, in the section where Evanna is in an ED specific facility, the other patients' thoughts and behaviours are also portrayed in a lot of detail. the calories of several foods the patients have to eat while in treatment are also stated. even though this isn't in a restrictive context, the calories are still there, and readers (especially those with eating disorders) don't need to know the calories of those foods.
i personally think that aspects of this book are very harmful, and could trigger strong eating disorder thoughts and potentially relapses. by the end of the book, it's clear Evanna hasn't fully recovered from anorexia, as she still has recurring thoughts around food and her body.
i think this memoir had so much potential, but got bogged down in triggering details about Evanna's experience. the thing is, many people with eating disorders will glamorise any symptom, regardless of someone's intention to not glamorise them. so you just can't include behaviours in detail. this could have been an impactful memoir without being so incredibly triggering.

Content Warnings