A woman from Rhoose who suffered with an eating disorder for years has beaten her illness and transformed her life.
When she was just 15 Molly Leonard developed the eating disorder Anorexia Nervosa.
Molly hid her disordered eating from friends and family, but it was in March 2019 that her illness first started having an impact on her future.
Molly now 26 explained: “It was a really big secret that not even my family knew, and I went away to university, and it got really bad because I wasn’t pretending for anyone.”
“My friends got me to go to the doctor, when I was about 19 and I ended up spending every week in A and E. My bloods were completely off, and I could have suffered from cardiac arrest.”
Molly continued: “I ended up in an eating disorder unit literally 2 months later under section and I dropped out of university, and I lost all motivation for life I thought I’d lost everything because I though school uni job was what I was meant to do.”
There was a period when her eating disorder was so bad she was unable to eat for a week. Molly said: “I ended up not eating for a week and only having ice and I went to A and E, I had to go by ambulance, and I was refusing treatment.”
Throughout her time in clinics and hospitals she developed a love of arts and crafts. Her skills for arts and crafts helped her turn things around.
She said: “I spent most part of 5 or 6 years in hospital in eating disorder units and I’d always take my crafts with me there was so much time and it was just something that wasn’t food related to occupy my mind.
“So, I did my crafts, and I would make things for the other patients, and they loved it how I was making these things and I started doing craft workshops for the other patients while I was in hospital, and it just made me feel better.”
Eventually, Molly decided she wanted to recover and started to document her journey via her online blog ‘Moving Molly’ where she shared emotional updates about her journey to health.
Her journey to recovery hasn’t been easy but her resilience and love of arts and crafts helped pull her through.
Finally in July 2022 she beat her illness and has since been running ‘Craft with me Molly Bee’ workshops in Rhoose and other areas in the Vale.
Since achieving this she’s also received a letter of praise from King Charles and attended the prestigious Kings Trust awards ceremony at Grosvenor House London, last Monday (October 21st) where she received the Young Achiever award.
Molly who is a young ambassador for the charity was nominated because of her craft workshops she runs alongside her fundraising for the charity.
Molly plans to take her crafts to the next level and set up her own community interest company cantered around crafts and mental health.
Barry and District news would like to congratulate Molly and wish her the best moving forward.
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