Community Munchausen's by Internet (Malingerers, Munchies, Spoonies, etc) - Feigning Illnesses for Attention

[Sammies#1Fan]

I'm beginning to believe that this particular style of glasses is a tell that the wearer is a cow. Seriously, so many women of a particular Cluster B sort have them. It's fascinating.

Oh without a doubt.

 

[Ear]

Courtesy of the BBC: Nil-by-mouth foodie: the chef who will never eat again (link) (archive)

"Loretta Harmes hasn't eaten for six years, but she hasn't lost her passion for cooking. Even though she cannot taste her recipes, she has a growing following on Instagram, where she's known as the nil-by-mouth foodie."

*munchie-dar activates*

• 'recovered' anorexic
• high achiever (had place at top culinary college, cooking for entire family since childhood)
• sectioned for ED, dx 'delusional psychosis' (here presented as cruel HCPs not understanding her)
• hEDS
• Gastroparesis avec toob
• Barely constrained glee at having to shop in the children's section for clothes
• 'a racing heart when she stands up or sits down' (hinting at future POTS journey?)
• 'and a neck pain she will eventually need surgery for' (are we doing Chiari too for the full munchie spectrum?)
• Insta (the.nil.by.mouth.foodie) all about her illness, how 'rare' her diseases are and how inspirational she is

Spoiler: small PL about ana-chans who build their entire lives around food/cooking

I'm a bit reminded here of an anorexic I know IRL who is a pastry chef, makes food as unhealthy as possible and relishes staring at people as they eat it. Cries/gets her boyfriend to yell at people if they're full/dieting and don't want one of her truffles or cake creations.

 

[Reddit Refugee]

Courtesy of the BBC: Nil-by-mouth foodie: the chef who will never eat again (link) (archive)

I was just in the middle of making an account and writing something up about this one. Been lurking a good while but this one in particular really grinds my gears. On this note if I am doing something wrong or incorrectly please shame me.

"Loretta Harmes hasn't eaten for six years, but she hasn't lost her passion for cooking. Even though she cannot taste her recipes, she has a growing following on Instagram, where she's known as the nil-by-mouth foodie."

*munchie-dar activates*

View attachment 2097588

• 'recovered' anorexic
• high achiever (had place at top culinary college, cooking for entire family since childhood)
• sectioned for ED, dx 'delusional psychosis' (here presented as cruel HCPs not understanding her)
• hEDS
• Gastroparesis avec toob
• Barely constrained glee at having to shop in the children's section for clothes
• 'a racing heart when she stands up or sits down' (hinting at future POTS journey?)
• 'and a neck pain she will eventually need surgery for' (are we doing Chiari too for the full munchie spectrum?)
• Insta (the.nil.by.mouth.foodie) all about her illness, how 'rare' her diseases are and how inspirational she is

Spoiler: small PL about ana-chans who build their entire lives around food/cooking

I'm a bit reminded here of an anorexic I know IRL who is a pastry chef, makes food as unhealthy as possible and relishes staring at people as they eat it. Cries/gets her boyfriend to yell at people if they're full/dieting and don't want one of her truffles or cake creations.

Fully recovered eating disorder? Check (“but it was only for less than a year!”). Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos? Check. Gastroparesis? Check (but strangely, the article mentions this as a separate but linked condition and her nil-by-mouth-ness is a result of hEDS in her bowel wall). Several suicide attempts? Check. Sectioned? Check. Sepsis? Check x 9. And whilst not stated outright nor tagged in her hashtag soup on her health posts, descriptions for POTS and CCI/Chiari are dropped into a little corner of the article. Notably the article mentions a time when she developed stomach pains that put her back into eating disorder inpatient treatment and getting abuse from the other staff and patients for not finishing her dinners. Oh, and a dead sister.

She runs a recipe page on the gram since lockdown in England began and...it looks really good. Supposedly all she can do is sniff, no yums for our warrior here. Hence no surprise that the Beebs picked this tragic tale up, but getting into the news has been a badge of honour for our other munchies. It’s mostly recipes scattered with a few health posts but the posts and stories are very OTT. She’s not typical but coming across the munchie triad whilst minding my own business really made me raise my eyebrows. With hundreds of new followers and attenshuns pouring in from this morning’s article I’m hedging my bets that we are about to witness the birth of a beautiful baby calf.

Screenshots below for your reading displeasure. What got me in particular was one story post that has a box of Abstral (sublingual fentanyl) in the background which is meant to be only prescribed occasionally to cancer patients with opioid tolerance. All on top of a hospital blanket which means she’s either kept props for photos or they’re letting her take it herself. Unusual given that it’s not simple tramadol or codeine, it’s fentanyl.

 

[Nothing To See Here]

Melatonin isn't available OTC in the UK, and it isn't even really licensed for prescription - doctors can sometimes prescribe it, but it's off-label essentially, and it's really unusual (unlike, as I understand it, some other countries where taking it is pretty common). She's ordering that from the USA, and getting it shipped in (legally, since apparently as long as you don't try to resale you're fine). But that's for sure something she's picked up from some other, non-UK munchie Instagram account.

 

[Ear]

Courtesy of the BBC: Nil-by-mouth foodie: the chef who will never eat again (link) (archive)

I was just in the middle of making an account and writing something up about this one. Been lurking a good while but this one in particular really grinds my gears. On this note if I am doing something wrong or incorrectly please shame me.

Welcome, and that's a great write-up - thanks for going screenshotting in the insta where I couldn't be arsed, plus the detail of the NINE TIMES SEPSIS (yep, that sounds familiar).

Given how notoriously stingy the NHS are with painkillers, I'd guess the fent is a prop, but wouldn't completely rule it out. I think that given her ED history, she might well have legit serious stomach pains from the residual effects of starving herself down to 4 stone, and big-gun painkillers might be appropriate. It's just a shame she's jumped on the munchie-zebra train rather than 'cautionary tale kids, you don't just bounce back after anorexia'.

 

[FarmerKhourtney]

I’ve been reading all these posts for a couple months. Realized I might have a munchie friend from Instagram. Has CRPS, PTSD, horrible asthma but smokes a lot of weed. Constantly shares other “warrior” accounts and plays tagging games “take your meds warriors!” Etc. Owns a jacket with some chronic illness nonsense in the back.

 

[Nothing To See Here]

Given how notoriously stingy the NHS are with painkillers, I'd guess the fent is a prop, but wouldn't completely rule it out. I think that given her ED history, she might well have legit serious stomach pains from the residual effects of starving herself down to 4 stone, and big-gun painkillers might be appropriate.

NHS gives sublingual fentanyl for post-surgical pain (and I'm talking immediately post surgery, like, what they give you when you're still in recovery; back on the ward you get switched to morphine), cancer pain management, and acute flare-ups of chronic pain/conditions, according to the prescribing guidelines I've been able to find. So you might be on the money with the stomach pains.

It probably indicates that she's been on opiates a lot and is highly tolerant, though, given they've not used morphine or even codeine. That's a take-away prescription pack, not just a "I'm being given a dose at the hospital". Even if you're an inpatient and on morphine for e.g. post-surgical pain, you generally have to get each dose from a nurse, no self-dosing allowed. GPs or even hospital NHS doctors are usually extremely reluctant to do take-away prescriptions for anything stronger than codeine derivatives. (Stuff like kidney stones or gallstones might get you a take-away prescription for the top end of the codeine range, and that's widely considered to be worse-than-childbirth levels of agony during an episode.)

Also, hilarious she's worried about sleeping if she's on any dose of fentanyl at all. Unless you're tolerant to a degree, fentanyl knocks you out quickly and pretty aggressively - it's pretty easy to get to sleep on opiates unless you're actively fighting them, even the lighter stuff like codeine.

 

[PinkDancingDogs]

Courtesy of the BBC: Nil-by-mouth foodie: the chef who will never eat again (link) (archive)

"Loretta Harmes hasn't eaten for six years, but she hasn't lost her passion for cooking. Even though she cannot taste her recipes, she has a growing following on Instagram, where she's known as the nil-by-mouth foodie."

*munchie-dar activates*

View attachment 2097588

• 'recovered' anorexic
• high achiever (had place at top culinary college, cooking for entire family since childhood)
• sectioned for ED, dx 'delusional psychosis' (here presented as cruel HCPs not understanding her)
• hEDS
• Gastroparesis avec toob
• Barely constrained glee at having to shop in the children's section for clothes
• 'a racing heart when she stands up or sits down' (hinting at future POTS journey?)
• 'and a neck pain she will eventually need surgery for' (are we doing Chiari too for the full munchie spectrum?)
• Insta (the.nil.by.mouth.foodie) all about her illness, how 'rare' her diseases are and how inspirational she is

Spoiler: small PL about ana-chans who build their entire lives around food/cooking

I'm a bit reminded here of an anorexic I know IRL who is a pastry chef, makes food as unhealthy as possible and relishes staring at people as they eat it. Cries/gets her boyfriend to yell at people if they're full/dieting and don't want one of her truffles or cake creations.

She looks promising for sure. Just a reminder to archive instagram or whatever social media posts related to their cow-ness before naming on here. It's no fun when they dfe before everything is copied and archived.

 

[VagueMantis]

Annnd the big fish

the big fish?

 

[cuddle striker]

She looks promising for sure. Just a reminder to archive instagram or whatever social media posts related to their cow-ness before naming on here. It's no fun when they dfe before everything is copied and archived.

she's just had an attention injection from BBC, she's unlikely to duck down. but her older posting needs archived before she cleans it up

 

[Ear]

Bit of additional archiving on Loretta / Nil by Mouth (still learning)

She has a website under a previous name deadlyxdelish (insta defunct) - website (link) (archive) - possibly changed ahead of BBC involvement as, well, it does sound rather ominous.

Oddly written in plural (was bracing self for a plural system, but she actually has a photographer-partner accompanying her 'brand'): "DxD isn’t just a one-man band I also have Amy who takes all the snaps, tastes the food and subsequently demolishes it all! What started as a project to keep us occupied during lockdown, has now grown into something much more."

Confirms gastroparesis dx on website 'about' page - was implied but not explicitly stated in BBC piece.

YouTube (link) (archive of only video)

And a bonus hospital selfie w BBC article, from Insta.

On the critical analysis front - I think she actually has significant health issues, but they're mental health and ED rather than the rare and special 'zebra' conditions claimed.

 

[Sweetpeaa]

I got linked from an article to a blog about a lack of disability supports in Canada. There is a lack of support for people so I was very much interested in reading about peoples experience. The blog linked was called 'disability couple'. Now I was 100% thinking that this couple had pretty significant medical problem or physical disabilities based on how they reported their hardships and that they had to live on disability. Since there were no pictures of them I decided to read their blogs ''bio'' section and this shit popped up



Man. Not again. Munchies in the house.

I'm not here to complain about them getting disability money. I really don't care. The main issue I take is with this across the board mentality among them in the rest of the munchie community. They always present with the same old diagnosis combo, same victim complex. You have to wonder why? all this to live below the poverty line and waste your lives.

 

[Nigger faggot 2022]

Also, I just noticed that the dose of Seroquel she's on isn't even in the therapeutic range for bipolar disorder. She's not on a mood stabiliser either, which is highly unusual for bipolar 1.

And why would someone with lowish blood pressure be taking Minipress - a medication most commonly prescribed to as an antihypertensive?

VERY Late, but seroquel is considered a mood stabilizer at mid to high doses (also a decent antidepressant) and Minipress (prazosin) is used for nightmares in PTSD. I have seen doses up to 10 mg in military/veteran patients.

 

[a piece of trash]

Does anyone know if Kat was pregnant in the past? A picture posted by Kat to TikTok looks heavily pregnant

 

[Montage]

Does anyone know if Kat was pregnant in the past? A picture posted by Kat to TikTok looks heavily pregnant View attachment 2109571

Maybe she's just fat from all of that medication. Aka bloated.

 

[med_zepplin]

Jessi is on the grift again.

 

[Dammit Jim]

Lately I've been dealing with a personal munchy cow irl. She uploads videos to tiktok where she smugly shares everything wrong with her while pop music plays. I wouldn't want to post it since she'd know it was me. She claims to have a whole list of mental and physical issues and routinely complains about her docs not giving her the diagnoses she wants. I don't know if I can call her a true munchy since her issues are focused mostly on mental illnesses (please correct me if I'm wrong), but her escapades are pretty funny.

 

[JackDonaghysSecretLover]

Yet another beans yelling munchie on TikTok, complete with cooking videos. All these girls do is copy each other. It's bizarre.
Edit for autocorrect

 

[Sammies#1Fan]

How is Laura doing? Haven't heard anything about her in a minute.

 

[Bobsun Dugnutt]

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/hospital-wards-are-filling-up-again-with-fakers/

Potentially interesting article from an NHS hospital worker on the absence (and subsequent return) of munchies from hospitals during covid.

The bit about "seizures" was a bit infuriating though.