Mazelit Airaksinen: Remembering Danielle Conlon’s Fight with Anorexia: First Yahrzeit — a Friend to Many, a Friend to All

A photo of her taken after one of her inpatient stays. Danielle’s mom fought relentlessly to get her help, schlepping Dani to dozens of treatment centers and programs that never seemed to help enough.

When I joined my first anorexia recovery group, Danielle Conlon (Daniella) was the first to welcome me, make friends with me, and ultimately, give me the sense of camaraderie that I so badly needed at the time.

I had just been diagnosed with early heart failure after two echocardiograms and a failed stress test. Daniella was the first to message me after I made a frantic post about it, and a friendship blossomed.

One day, years later, Daniella posted that she didn’t think she was “going to make it.”

She talked about that often, but she spooked me. I booked the very next flight to Westchester from DC, dashed to the airport, and made arrangements to watch her cat for a few weeks.

Even on her hospital bed, she was still full of life. She was helping a friend of ours with her poetry. Another night, she lent an ear to a frantic mom whose daughter was diagnosed with anorexia. She was spunky and spry, even offering to help me find a new boyfriend and be my “wingwoman” if I wanted to move to the Westchester area.

She couldn’t leave her house much, but she volunteered relentlessly in the recovery community.

She waltzed around eating disorder recovery forums — a delicate dance of helping women in crisis. Some of my friends even credited her for saving their life.

When people were in acute crisis, nearly off the edge, Danielle would talk them down from making the Irreversible Decision. I saw it in action one time, as she goaded one girl for hours in a forum, pleading with her not to end her life. Others have their own stories.

Even as she was dying, she had hope. She wanted to get better. She frantically called eating disorder rehabs, begging to be let in. I watched her cry as she grew frustrated: she finally realized that she was likely too far gone to be saved. Unfortunately, her organs were failing, her heart was weak, and she couldn’t even stand without a walker.

These details are hard to write. But Danielle made it known that she wanted to be remembered for her struggle.

She wanted other people to how bad anorexia and bulimia could get. People say EDs are about “control” — in reality, she suffered a betrayal of both mind and body.

And she wanted people to know it’s not about calories and fat: that’s just the outward projection of a mind chronically damaged by things like CPTSD, trauma, and OCD.

She loved butterflies, the beach, and hummingbirds. Before I met her in the hospital, she had taken a trip from the Westchester area to New Jersey’s beach, one last pilgrimage to the waters she loved so much.

One of her dreams was to start a nonprofit to provide trained peer-to-peer support for people with eating disorders, PTSD, and suicidal thoughts. When I was beside her at the hospital, she talked about it at length… when we weren’t gossiping about the latest celebrity gossip or which doctor was the hottest, of course.

It was quite peculiar. Even as she knew her organs were failing, she still held on hope. Like the sudden rush of energy a person in hospice gets before their soul finally finds a resting place.

Today marks a year since Danielle departed from this world, leaving behind a quilted tapestry of bittersweet memories, photos and conversation threads that still haunt corners of Facebook and recovery forums.

But amidst the chaos, there were fleeting moments of clarity — whispers of truth and fears amidst the cacophony of anorexia’s lies, like when she realized that being in the telemetry unit meant her heart might actually fail — for good this time. In the quiet hours of the night, Dani fought the specter of an ED with a courage born of the inescapable battle against a disease that claims the life of so many.

Dear Daniella, we all loved you so much. We miss you so much. We have not forgotten about you and we will never forget. Rest in peace, our friend.

This essay was written by Mazelit Airaksinen, and published with the permission of Danielle’s family due to the sensitive nature of the content and her untimely passing. If you are struggling with an eating disorder, advice and local support groups can be found through NEDA’s helpline and resource pages.