I fear The Crown’s Princess Diana bulimia storyline will instruct as well as educate

Writers of The Crown are set to depict Princess Diana’s struggle with bulimia in forthcoming episodes due to air on Netflix this November.  

It’s rare that an accurate portrayal of an eating disorder is shown on screen, but it is written in collaboration with UK eating disorder charity Beat and is expected to be a “sensitive depiction”.

Eating disorders continue to be largely misunderstood – by individuals suffering them to health professionals, and particularly by the current government, who proclaim to be “tackling obesity”, as if it’s as simple as increasing VAT on a cream cake.  

The reality is ugly and painful, and the depiction needs to match this or run the risk of romanticising the illness. “Thinspiration” is not as straightforward as pictures of skinny people, any content can be a trigger – such as becoming aware that someone as beautiful and worshipped as Princess Diana medicated her demons with bulimia. Makers must be mindful to educate rather than instruct, and careful to conceal methods or anything that could be used as advice or guidance. Bulimia is not an art to be mastered.

The Crown runs the risk of creating triggering content for those already on a downward spiral. Done right, to an extent it could valuably educate – but the episodes are equally likely to be misused and could do more harm than good. People active in their eating disorder can search out storylines, with this one likely to be no exception, to spur on their condition and defer finding a solution. Any trigger warning at the start seems transparent box ticking, and if anything, this will negatively attract people to the content.  

TV producers and casting directors tend to resort to a bias in selecting smaller people to portray sufferers of eating disorders, when the reality is most people who suffer issues around eating are average weight or overweight. Princess Diana didn’t have the body of an average bulimic. Bulimia doesn’t typically leave you smaller and most sufferers wouldn’t present as underweight. The truth is, eating disorders look like everybody, yet only the skinny and beautiful tend to make it into soaps and dramas.  

Meanwhile, obesity remains the nation’s hidden eating disorder, the ugly sister of anorexia and bulimia. It’s just six years since Katie Hopkins was commissioned to make a TV show in which she “proved” tackling obesity is as simple as “eat less, move more”. “Sensitive portrayals” seem to end when it comes to obesity. The government is also sending out the wrong message, recently announcing it was fighting a “war on obesity”, that fat doesn’t deserve your sympathy like thin does.  

“You inflict it upon yourself because your self-esteem is at a low ebb, and you don't think you're worthy or valuable. You fill your stomach up four or five times a day – some do it more – and it gives you a feeling of comfort,” are the words that Princess Diana used in an interview in 1995 when describing her experiences with bulimia. The same words could be said by a problematic overeater, similarly suffering a loss of control over food. Just like cases of restriction or bingeing and purging, you are discussing a mental illness that won’t be dealt with by superficial efforts like cutting advertising of fast food or a sugar tax.

But solutions are available, and freely too. Most people have heard of AA, but OA is a similarly self supported fellowship for men and women who have become powerless over their eating habits. It stands for Overeaters Anonymous, but covers a vast spectrum of disordered eating. My hope is The Crown provides a platform, so that people suffering can then find a solution rather than an inspiration.

To contact Beat, you can call the charity’s helpline on 0808 801 0677, the studentline on 0808 801 0811 and the youthline on 0808 801 0711.  The helplines are open every day of the year, Monday to Friday from 9am to 8pm, and on the weekends and on bank holidays from 4pm to 8pm.