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Joy Tapper in India, January 2020
As Joy Tapper drove up to the McDonald’s drive-thru window, she wasn’t feeling hunger, but deep shame. The mother of four, then in her mid-40s, was in a “semi-catatonic state” as she ordered several Big Macs, fries, and a large Coke. She ate in her car, then vomited into the empty containers before driving home.
For most of her life, food was Joy Tapper’s drug of choice, but this episode, which happened in the early ’80s, marked a particularly low point. Tapper had driven to McDonald’s straight from an eating disorder therapy session. She had been diagnosed with bulimia a few years prior, after a magazine article on the illness prompted her to seek treatment. But even before the doctor put a name to her illness, she knew she had an addictive relationship with food.