The girls of St Thinian’s

After the South American models Luisel Ramos and Carolina Reston starved themselves to death last year to try to reach size ‘zero’, the fashion world promised to be more responsible. It hung its head in shame, and even chivvied some size-12 girls on to the catwalk for London Fashion Week last month. So I imagine that most people think that the whole zero fad has finally faded away, and that teenage girls like me and my school-friends have developed healthier role models and a happier relationship with our food. Well, I’m sorry to disappoint any Spectator-reading parents, but in my experience it’s worse than ever.

My school is deeply ordinary — a fee-paying school but not one of the famous ones, not particularly posh or expensive. It contains 600 girls from 8 to 18 years old, a minority of them boarders, in a nice provincial town. The teaching is good and I think we’re generally the kind of sensible kids who work hard and do fairly well — but there’s no unusual pressure put on us to ‘achieve’.