I USED TO THINK my anorexia was idiosyncratic. That it grew out of my early fear of ingesting anything. Or that it was unconscious, even: My mother’s contaminated milk had primed my body against future incursions. But fear of poisoning can be a symptom of an eating disorder. I was typical in this way and so many others. One of scores of girls lingering over celebrity eating-disorder stories in magazines. There was nothing special about what I did.
