ABSTRACT
A child or an adult tries to influence external events by magic only when he/she has no other way of acting on them. Similarly, a patient with an eating disorder feels quite unable to affect things around her by any other means. Frequently she feels that she has no ‘voice’ within her family and that she has little sense of self. Her potential for self-direction or for having an effect on others is diminished by her sense of being practically invisible. Her only power is a magical one, to control what no others can-her own body.
