The nurse of 20 years wasn’t in a great space and wondered what she could do to “change myself”.

Natasha found her answer in over-exercising and under-eating and almost before she knew it, her weight slipped from 52 kilograms to 40 kilograms.

Looking back, what strikes her most now is the comments people didn’t make about her emaciated appearance.

“I think I was only asked twice if I was okay and a couple of people in my family commented that I was really skinny,” she recalls.

“Towards the end of 2012, I dropped a lot of weight, I was obsessive about exercising and unknowingly restricting my food.”

At her lowest point, Natasha was 36 kilograms.

“As a nurse, I had enough insight to think, ‘This isn’t good, it’s not normal’, but I was trying to punish myself,” she explains.

Even with a growing awareness that something wasn’t right inside her, it wasn’t an easy road to get help.

“I rang community mental health centres and got the duck shove,” says Natasha, now 41.

“They told me they were at capacity and were unsure if it sounded like I was really unwell.

“I tried to get in with a dietitician; even my GP dismissed it.

“But I recognised that at 36 kilograms this thing was consuming me and I needed help.”

In 2013, the Wahgunyah mum got an appointment with a dietitian at Wangaratta and began seeing a psychologist.

The dietitian told Natasha she had anorexia and was really unwell.

“I didn’t want to hear it – the illness had taken over my life,” she admits.

She was at “rock bottom”.

“I was told if I didn’t admit myself to an inpatient facility, they would be forced to admit me,” she says.

“So in 2014 I checked myself in to a Melbourne clinic – it was a short stay; I didn’t want to get better.

“When I returned home I continued to see the dietitian and psychologist but with no other supports in place, I was making no inroads into my illness.

“It consumes you, you don’t know who you are and you turn into another person.”

Family life suffered; the children had a stranger in place of their mum.

In 2015, as her 17-year marriage ended, Natasha fell off her pushbike and broke her shoulder.

That was to prove the critical turning point.

“I realised I have these little people to look after and that I just didn’t want to be like this,” Natasha says.

“The impact my illness had on my children … I still feel guilty about it every day.

“Their safe person – the person they loved – had changed into someone they didn’t know.”

Natasha is the first to admit the road to recovery is a gruelling process.

It’s after you are discharged from an acute facility, that the “hard yards” begin.

The fight with food is a layer cake of complexity, wrapped in emotional issues that also need addressing.

“It’s all about control – food is just the tool you use,” Natasha says.

“It’s the tool you use to hurt yourself and the tool you need to get yourself better.

“It took a long time of eating normally for my brain to switch back.”

Hope for recovery is the message Natasha wants to share when she addresses groups such as the North East Eating Disorders Support group (NEEDS) on November 18 in Wodonga.

“It’s a lifetime thing,” she says frankly.

“But I want families and people living with an eating disorder to know they can become well.

“And you know what? There is a great life on the other side of your illness.”

That’s the other point Natasha says is not common knowledge in the community.

“People still do not understand this is a mental illness – we have to break the stigma and get it out there to help others,” she says.

“With depression, you can hide it to a certain extent but anorexia is such a visible mental illness.”

It can also be devastatingly fatal.

In May 2017, the Butterfly Foundation revealed people with an eating disorder are 31 times more likely to die by suicide.

It has the highest rate of suicide of any mental illness.

At the same time the rate of eating disorders in the Australian population is rising with one in 10 people reportedly affected.

The need for greater awareness and education drives Natasha’s passion to help others.

It’s why she has been open with her children about her struggles.

The Butterfly Foundation’s Raise A Hand campaign in the lead-up to Christmas speaks to her bravery.

It’s calling for everyone to lend a hand to help individuals and families access more support in their community when they need it most.

Where they are most likely to find the strength and help to continue with recovery.

Natasha’s story is testament to that.

“I want to tell people there is hope – they can be well and happy,” she says.

“Yes it’s scary but there is a world out there that’s absolutely worth it.”

RELATED CONTENT: Illness holds you captive – the very personal struggle of families living with an eating disorder.