The Struggle: When Law School Gives You An Eating Disorder

By the end of her first semester in law school, she was wearing clothing from the children's section.

law school eating disorderWelcome to the latest installment of The Struggle, a series where we examine the mental-health issues that students encounter during the oftentimes grueling law school experience. We are posting these stories because sometimes what law students really need is to know that they’re not alone in their pain. Sometimes what law students need is to know that they’ve got a friend who is willing to share not just in their triumphs, but also in their struggles. These are real e-mails and messages we’ve received from real readers.

If these issues resonate with you, please reach out to us. Your stories need to be heard. You can email us, text us at (646) 820-8477, or tweet us @atlblog. We will share your stories anonymously. You may be able to help a law student who needs to know that someone else has been there before and survived.


I’d like to share my story about struggling with mental illness. I graduated in 2003, have been practicing since, and am now healthy and happy, but it took a long time to undo the damage I did to myself during law school. I still consider law school to be the worst three years of my life.

I worked as a paralegal for three years after college before deciding to go to law school. I went to a well-respected, top-tier private school in the South. I thought because I’d worked at a law firm and was a few years out of college, I’d be better able to handle law school than the average student.

I was diagnosed with depression when I was 15, and had taken medication on and off throughout college. Looking back, my biggest mistake was not immediately getting a therapist and psychiatrist as soon as I arrived at law school. By the end of the first semester, I was #11 in my class — and I was also suicidal, suffering panic attacks, and deep into an eating disorder. I was viewed by my professors and classmates as a shining star.

At my school, Biglaw was all we heard about. Success was getting a job at the biggest firm in the city. Other Biglaw firms in the city were acceptable, but still not as good as “the” firm. This firm supported the law school and had rooms and sections of the library named after it. No one talked about working for the government, or for legal aid, or as a solo practitioner, or being a lawyer in any of the million other ways you can be a lawyer.

My professors were stern. Law school was treated a bit like war. If you survived, you would go on to Biglaw and be a success. If you couldn’t survive, then you didn’t have what it took to make it as a lawyer. My classmates did not share notes. They cut cases out of books in the library so no one else could finish research projects. If you were sick and missed class, you’d have to beg for someone’s notes.

The hardest part for me was not knowing how I was doing. When you have a job, you get constant feedback about whether you’re meeting goals and expectations. In law school, all I could do was do the work and wait six months to find out if it was enough. I couldn’t handle it, so I studied 10 hours a day, ran miles, and didn’t eat. I thought my classmates all knew some secret to being a good law student that I didn’t know. They all seemed to be able to study 20 hours a day, breeze through assignments, and party all weekend. I found a psychiatrist who advised me to drop out of school because I was almost constantly suicidal. I refused, because that would have been weakness. I was desperately unhappy. I lost more and more weight because I didn’t eat. The more weight I lost, the more popular I became. My school was filled with women who had eating disorders. There was even a bathroom where we all hung out and talked about how much we loved exercising while we ate our one tiny meal of the day.

I was the best law student in the world for one semester. I had great grades and was viewed as an example of how to succeed in law school. However, I couldn’t maintain it. When I went home for winter break, friends and family were terrified by how thin I was and how much in denial I was about my mental health. I only made it two months into the second semester before my body couldn’t handle it anymore. I did the best thing I could for myself. I got a therapist and joined an eating disorder support group. I started to heal myself.

Unfortunately, being mentally and physically healthy took time away from studying. I couldn’t study 10 hours a day, seven days a week, because I had to allow myself to eat, sleep, and breathe. The pace I ran during my first semester burned me out for the rest of law school. I spent the rest of law school trying to fix the damage I’d done to myself.

I graduated in the middle of my class. None of the Biglaw firms wanted me. I got a clerkship, but felt like a failure for years. I’ve now been practicing for 13 years, and it’s really only been in the past five that I’ve realized that success looks different for different people. I’ll never be hired by a Biglaw firm. I’m now okay with that. I wouldn’t be a good fit for them.

I now realize several things: a lot of my law school classmates were using drugs to help them study for hours on end (I had no idea that many of my classmates were snorting Ritalin regularly); if I hadn’t burned myself out in my first semester, I would have graduated higher in my class; and if I had taken care of my mental health from the minute I started law school, I would have saved myself years of self-harm and self-hatred.

I love being a lawyer. I’m good at it. It makes me happy to meet challenges, find solutions, and win by being the most prepared. However, I don’t know if I would go through law school again. It’s only from this distance that I realize just how close I came to suicide, mental breakdown, and hospitalization.

Here’s what I wish someone had said to me: Your mental and physical health are more important than your GPA. No matter what your grades, you are a smart, capable person. There are a million different ways to practice law. Use law school to learn skills, and then go out and find what works for you. Success looks different for different people.

Also, I started my first semester at an average weight for my height. By the end of the semester, I was wearing clothes from the children’s section. I don’t know if I would have listened, but maybe if a teacher or administrator talked to me about my health, I might have sought help sooner.

Now that I’m older and healthier, I think of graduating law school as one of my biggest accomplishments. However, it’s not because I’m so proud of my degree. It’s because I chose to get myself help in an environment where being mentally and physically unhealthy was rewarded.


Most colleges and universities have counseling and psychological services resources that students can turn to if they are in crisis or would like counseling, even after hours. If these services are not available at your school, and if you’re depressed and in need help, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (1-800-273-8255) or a lawyer assistance program in your state. Remember that you are loved, so please reach out if you need assistance, before it’s too late.


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Staci Zaretsky is an editor at Above the Law. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments. Follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

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