A woman with anorexia said she was treated for up to six months while hundreds of miles away from her family were ‘horrific’.

Molly Leonard, 24, from Rhoose, Vale of Glamorgan, has spent time at units in London, Bristol and Glasgow.

There are currently no specialist living units for people with eating disorders in Wales.

The Welsh Government has said it is examining the feasibility of an eating disorders unit in Wales.

Molly estimates that she has spent around a quarter of the past 10 years in specialist living units.

She said there were times when the only contact she could have with loved ones was through video calls and text messages.

“They ship you miles away,” she said.

“You just need to be close to home, especially when you’re in such a fragile state.

“You’re just taken to a place you may never have been, with people you don’t know, and it’s very scary. »

She said being able to see loved ones has affected her recovery: “Sometimes you just need a hug from your mum and your mum just tells you it’s gonna be alright and you just can’t do it. obtain.

“It’s ridiculous because part of healing is getting back to normalcy and part of that is being able to spend time with family and friends. »

Jo Whitfield, Beat’s Country Manager for Wales, said: “There are no adult eating disorder treatment services in Wales. »

“If someone 18 or older needs to be hospitalized for an eating disorder, it will happen outside of the country. »

She said dealing with eating disorders away from home can be “very distressing and isolating”.

She added: “Families are often unable to visit regularly, which can be very difficult for both the sick person and their loved ones. »

She said patients are less likely to need hospital treatment if they can access eating disorder treatment in their area.

“While many people in Wales require hospital treatment for an eating disorder, it suggests they are not getting the support they need quickly enough,” she said.

Molly, who is one of an estimated 58,000 people in Wales with an eating disorder, said she started obsessing over calories and exercise when she was 15.

This coincided with her grandfather being ill and struggling at school.

“It completely engulfs you, everything you do, everything you think about food or how to lose weight, or just shaming you for how you look,” she said.

She started not eating and lying when asked about it.

But when she was 18 and left home to study at Oxford Brookes University, she said things were “really bad”.

When she was 19, she sought help from a GP for the first time and was immediately sent to the emergency room as her potassium levels were dangerously low.

Within months, she was severed and spent around six months in an eating disorder treatment unit in Oxford.

She said she wasn’t ready to commit to treatment at the time, but being hospitalized near her home helped: “I had my friends around me, which was really good “.

It was to be his first hospital stay among many others.

Less than a year after being released, she was again severed and sent to an eating disorder unit in London.

“The eating disorder was totally controlling me and I wasn’t at a point where I wanted to accept help.

“The only thing on my mind was that I wanted to lose weight,” she said.

Her illness caused her to quit university and move to Wales, just before the Covid pandemic hit.

She has been busy making face masks, raising over £600 for the Beat charity for eating disorders.

But it didn’t take long for her to start losing weight again.

She briefly left the family home in St Albans, Hertfordshire, and ended up in hospital, this time at a general hospital in London.

While there, she said she was told she was going to be moved to Glasgow because it was the only bed available in an eating disorder unit in the UK.

“I honestly thought they were joking when they told me that, but I was under section so I had no choice,” she said.

Covid restrictions meant she couldn’t have visitors.

While on the unit in Glasgow she met other patients from Wales who were “struggling as much as I was”.

Molly has run away from the hospital several times.

She was told she was at risk of Covid, so her father came from South Wales to pick her up and bring her home, she said.

Since returning from Glasgow he has been sectioned several times, initially spending six months in another specialist unit in London.

Last summer, Molly hit rock bottom. She was sent to Cardiff University Hospital in Wales.

“There is a week in my life that I have no memory of.

“Honestly, I don’t remember what happened. Apparently I was refusing the treatment, I was not eating or drinking, I was refusing everything, I was removing the cannulas,” she said.

She was sectioned and sent to the Hafan y Coed Mental Health Unit at Llandough University Hospital, Vale of Glamorgan.

His most recent residential treatment was for a few months in an eating disorder unit in Bristol earlier this year.

“Honestly, I was about to be placed in palliative care because things had gone so wrong.

“That was honestly the lowest point,” she said.

“My mother used to tell me that she was afraid to wake up every morning, just in case she found me not awake. »

Molly said that since then she has turned a corner. She attributes this change to her love of craftsmanship.

She has always loved crafts, from making candles or earrings to arranging flowers – and while in hospital in Bristol she started doing craft sessions for others patients.

Since returning from hospital in April, she’s been running introductory craft sessions at her local library and hopes to turn it into a business, with help from The Prince’s Trust and Big Ideas Wales.

“I really think from my experience that I can help people overcome their mental health through crafting because it has helped me a lot. It changed my life,” she said.

Molly is determined to get better.

“I’ve struggled with it since I was 15 and next year I’ll be 25. I just don’t want the eating disorder to dominate my life for 10 years, that’s too long,” she said.

“’I have ambitions and I have things I want to do and that stops me. »

A Welsh Government spokesperson said: “We are increasing investment in eating disorder services.

“Most people who need to access services, including hospital care, will receive that care in Wales and we are also working with NHS Wales to assess the feasibility of a specialist disorders unit. food in Wales.

“We expect all health boards to provide expert, multi-disciplinary support for people with eating disorders. »