Glow-Up Diaries: Entry Two — The Mirror Didn’t Lie That Day

I didn’t get sick overnight.

I didn’t lose myself in one bad decision.

It happened slowly, quietly—under the surface, when nobody was looking.

At my lowest, I wasn’t just tired. I was malnourished.

But not because I was starving myself on purpose.

It was because I had developed a problem with alcohol—one that crept into my life until it completely took hold.

Vodka became the way I silenced my feelings.

At first, it was just to take the edge off.

But then it became every moment I could.

And soon, the only calories I was taking in were from vodka and mixer.

I didn’t even realise how sick I was.

My hair was falling out, brittle like straw.

My skin was yellowing.

My body had lost so much muscle it looked like it had collapsed in on itself.

I couldn’t breathe properly, couldn’t walk far. I was exhausted. Broken.

And still—I kept going, pretending I was okay.

Until one day, the mirror stopped pretending too.

I saw myself.

Not the version I’d carefully filtered for the world.

But the one I’d been hiding.

And I couldn’t unsee her.

That moment was my breaking point—and my beginning.

What came next wasn’t a glow-up.

It was survival.

I was hospitalised for six weeks.

Yellow as Bart Simpson—no exaggeration.

Ten stone soaking wet, if that.

I had drips in both arms hydrating me, pumping B12 into my body like it was trying to restart a machine that had shut down.

Strong antibiotics for the pneumonia.

Breathing tubes in my nose.

And the kind of silence you only hear in a hospital when the air feels heavy with “we don’t know if she’s going to make it.”

The consultants weren’t sure I’d ever return home.

That’s how bad it got.

Critical condition.

From a life I thought I was managing.

How did I let it get this far?

I kept asking myself that, over and over.

But deep down, I already knew the answer.

I had stopped looking in the mirror long before my body gave up.

Because somewhere, I knew.

I knew it would tell me the truth I wasn’t ready to face.

Coming home felt like waking up in a new body—one that didn’t quite belong to me yet.

I could barely walk. I was completely exhausted.

But I was clean. I was sober.

My hair was brushed—what I had left of it. Still a light shade of yellow, but it was fading, day by day.

My mum stayed with me, cooking, caring, nursing me back to life.

And every morning, I made myself look in the mirror.

I’d put on a little makeup. Style my hair the best I could.

To anyone else, I probably looked like I was clinging on by a thread.

But to me? I looked like hope.

Death was no longer staring me in the face.

Still—my body had been ravaged.

I was skeletal.

The peachy bum I used to be proud of? Gone. Not even flat—just deflated.

My boobs? Let’s just say… think dog ears.

Every ounce of muscle and volume had vanished.

So, I started where I could.

Protein supplement drinks from the hospital. Real food—lots of protein, fibre, anything to rebuild.

Tiny walks to rebuild my strength, like I was learning to live all over again.

And I cut my hair off. Not just because it was dead—but because I needed a fresh start.

I didn’t want to carry the weight of what I’d done to myself.

I went to my first AA meeting.

Or at least, I tried to.

I stood frozen at the entrance, panic crashing through me. I had no confidence, no voice.

Just shame—and a shell of who I’d been.

But I went back.

And the second time, I walked through the door.

Now? It feels like home.

No shame. Just people like me, taking it one day at a time.

That’s when the healing started.

That’s when the magic began.