Talking to your manager about your eating disorder

In December 2024, we launched a survey to help develop the theme for Eating Disorders Awareness Week 2025.

We asked those who responded whether they felt comfortable opening up at work about having an eating disorder.

2 in 3 respondents said they would not feel comfortable talking about their eating disorder to their line manager.

To understand this further, we asked those people to tell us why.

• 3 in 4 of those respondents were worried that they or others might make assumptions about them and their ability to do their job.
• 3 in 4 were worried that they might not understand that an eating disorder is a serious mental health condition.

Those who answered that question had space to say more if they wished to do so. Below are the top 5 themes, along with some example quotes

1.Fear of stigma, being judged or treated differently

• “There is a lot of stigma around an eating disorder and I often feel judged”
• “I do a high-powered job this would not look good and frown upon in my profession which is financial services. You can[‘t] show any sign of weakness”
• “I work in a predominantly male field, and I am lucky that there are some men that I am close with personally in my workplace that understand, I don't think I'd be comfortable going to my manager - it wouldn't be like going to them as a friend.”
• “worried they might judge me and say it's just a teenage thing”

2. Embarrassment/shame

• “Shame. It was hard to tell anybody. I’m 42 now. I only started talking about my issues with food at about age 40. I have told my manager now but I had to in the end as things got so bad.”
• “Possibly also because of the stigma, I was really ashamed of it for a while. I interestingly was able to say I suffered with anxiety and depression, but not an eating disorder. It took me a while before I was able to tell people.”
• “Was also embarrassed as I was in my forties.”
• “I think I just felt immense shame. When I left one job, it was easier to say I had depression than admit that anorexia was killing me.”

3. Didn't see it as relevant to mention to them

• “I'm a private person. If it's not effecting my work then why should I disclose personal information.”
• “Perhaps if work was affected, like for time off / appointments / illness then I would have talked to my line manager.”

4. Worried they wouldn't believe me/take it seriously (in some cases due to not being underweight)

• “They probably wouldn't take me seriously because I look healthy.”
• “Worried that they would think I must be fully recovered because I'm at the stage where I look (relatively) healthy and can eat in public etc.”
• “I only struggle mildly these days, often do eat well at work and a healthy weight so worried they'll think I'm lying even though I do struggle some weeks.”

Lacked insight into illness/denial

• “I also didn't say as I was very much in denial at stages and also didn't want people to know in case they would watch me /check up on me /make me eat.”
• “At the time I was in denial about the nature and severity of my eating disorder.”

What we heard:

There are several reasons why someone may not feel comfortable speaking to a manager or supervisor about their eating disorder. Worrying about people not knowing enough about eating disorders or that they might make assumptions can prevent people having that conversation. This shows how important it is that we raise awareness of eating disorders so that there is more understanding and less stigma surrounding having that conversation.

We also heard that some people didn’t mention it because they didn’t feel it was relevant and only would’ve done if they needed time-off related to their eating disorder. You can find more information about eating disorders in the workplace on the following pages.