But A Princess Has No Tears
- Shiven Jain
- Sep 3, 2023
- 6 min read
Updated: Oct 20, 2023
By: Shiven Jain
Illustration By: Devyani Pandey
TRIGGER WARNING: Explicit Bulimia Mentions
The camera lingers, fixated on the body of a visibly worn out woman. Her face is draped across the toilet bowl. Her heaves are inaudible, and yet, entirely evident. She is stuck in an arduous cycle: binging and purging. Binging and purging. Binging and purging...
In the show’s fourth season, Peter Morgan, creator of The Crown, doesn’t just imply the struggle of the show’s newfound leading lady — Princess Diana. He shows her battle with bulimia nervosa, and the portrayal of the disorder is almost unrelenting in its brutality. She is a woman trapped: within the confines of a faulty wedding engagement, a palace in which the walls are caving in (quite literally), and most importantly, the cyclical pattern of an eating disorder which has emerged as a result of the former two.
The Crown may not be the best source of information if one is wholly unaware of the tumultuous history of the British royal family, but in its portrayal of the former Princess of Wales’ struggling with bulimia, it gets several things right. In a “confessional tape” that Diana sent to her biographer Andrew Morton back in 1992, she said, “the bulimia started the week after we got engaged and would take nearly a decade to overcome.”
Those close to her former husband and now-king have held Diana’s struggles with Bulimia as a key reason to why the marriage between her and Charles, then Prince of Wales, went awry. However, as Anthony Holden wrote in a 1993 issue of Vanity Fair, “bulimia nervosa, the eating disorder Diana developed within a year of becoming Princess of Wales, was not an illness which made a marriage go sour, it was an illness caused by a sour marriage.”
Holden’s piece in Vanity Fair is significant because it was a watershed moment in acknowledging the relationship between unhealthy relationships and the development of eating disorders. Diana herself acknowledged that it was her husband’s comments on her “chub” that perpetuated her decade-long fight with bulimia, calling the disorder a “symptom” of her unhappy marriage. And yet, despite the personal horrors that this entailed for one of the world’s most beloved celebrities, it also took a disorder that was largely unspoken about to the mainstream.
In 1995, three years after her separation with Charles, Diana went on air to give one of the most influential interviews in history. The segment recorded a staggering 22.8 million views in the UK itself. “You fill your stomach up four or five times a day—some do it more—and it gives you a feeling of comfort. It's like having a pair of arms around you, but it's temporarily, temporary. Then you're disgusted at the bloatedness of your stomach, and then you bring it all up again,” she said.
And yet, Diana’s campaign to raise awareness about the disorder didn’t end just there. Through the 90s, the Princess of Wales emerged as a champion for those struggling with bulimia and other eating disorders. Much of it included raising awareness through the keynote addresses that her job required her to do. In a speech made in 1993, she said:
“On a recent visit to The Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children, I met some young
people who were suffering from eating disorders. With the help of some very dedicated staff, they and their parents were bravely learning to face together the deeper problems, which had been expressed through their disease. With time and patience and a considerable amount of specialist support, many of these young people will get well. They and their families will learn to become whole again. Sadly, for others, it will all be too late. Yes, people are dying through eating disorders.”
The princess demonstrated a remarkable sense of courage by addressing her personal battles with bulimia, particularly considering the challenging circumstances she faced. As a trailblazing figure in the public eye, she embarked on a journey that not only cut through societal taboos but also shed light on an issue that was largely unfamiliar and, at the time, not widely understood. In doing so, she increased awareness and understanding surrounding eating disorders, which were not only deeply stigmatized but also shrouded in a veil of silence. It is important to consider the context in which she found herself — being the Princess of Wales and a representative of the royal family in the 90s. Her position did influence
her approach, as she had to tread a fine line between personal revelation and her public role. However, this is precisely why her initiative to spark a conversation about such a perplexing situation within the constraints of the time and place she found herself in was even more groundbreaking than most people realize. The impact that she made was driven not in spite of, but because of, the position she found herself in.
Yet, it is impossible to wholly assess her impact on the subject without examining the
conversations she served as a catalyst for, and the changes that occurred as an aftermath of her speaking out. After opening up about her battle with bulimia, the UK saw an increased number of reports coming in from people who had experienced similar symptoms. As an article in The Times Magazine puts it,
“Remarkably, in the years during which Diana spoke publicly about her bulimia, rates of women seeking treatment for bulimia in Great Britain more than doubled. The press dubbed this phenomenon the ‘Diana effect.’ Mental health practitioners credited this shift to greater public awareness and dialogue about bulimia, as well as women identifying with Diana. If a princess could be bulimic, so could they.”
In an interview with Elle Magazine, Lauren Smolar, The Senior Director of Programs at the
National Eating Disorders Association, said that “When high-profile figures speak up about their own struggles, it really helps people who are suffering feel less alone.”8 While one cannot entirely accredit Diana for every subsequent celebrity’s attempt at continuing this conversation, today, several other actors and singers have spoken up about their battles — whether it be Charli D’Amelio or Lady Gaga.
While The Crown covers Diana’s struggles with Bulimia, popular culture has not documented her recovery with as much detail. The show, especially, has been criticized for not depicting her recovery process. An article in The Rolling Stone reads, “more troublingly, though, [The Crown] doesn’t go into detail regarding her recovery from the illness, which began in the late 1980s. By the end of the fourth season, as she and Charles begin to dissolve, she appears to have gained some control over her behaviors, hunching over the toilet to vomit only to suddenly stop herself. But the show doesn’t follow the treatment that got her to that point.”
Unlike the pieces of 21st-century media that have portrayed her thus far, Diana herself had been more vocal about her recovery process. “I suddenly realized what I was going to lose if I let go, and what was worth losing,”10 she says in her autobiography-of-sorts, addressing how she reached out for help eventually. The criticism towards The Crown — and even Spencer — is fair because of an argument Evelyn Attia, professor of psychiatry at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, makes in an interview with The Rolling Stone. “I would always recommend that the impact of treatment be part of what is included in any portrayal of eating disorders,” says Attia. “We want to show recovery is possible. We want to show those types of outcomes. They’re important, they inspire people, and they educate people.”
But for what the aforementioned pieces of pop-culture portray, they must be given credit. These modern depictions of a princess in pieces are a reminder of how her life served as a catalyst for a mental health revolution that followed. However, at their heart, they’re still sensitive, and eventually, devastating. Diana’s life may have sown several seeds of inspiration, but her struggle with bulimia coupled with the title she occupied made for a tragic life that ended on a tragic note. And so, perhaps tweaking a quote by Hans Christian Andersen and alluding to The Little Mermaid is the best way to capture the essence of her tragedy, one that serves as a metaphor for an illness that was largely bred because of what her personal
life and public image consisted of — “but a princess has no tears, and therefore she suffers so much more.”
Bibliography:
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/10/31/princess-diana-interview-among-most-watched-tv-programmes-of-the.
4 Nicolaou, Elena. “Princess Diana Called Her Bulimia a ‘Symptom’ of Her Unhappy Marriage.” Oprah Daily, 16
Nov. 2020, www.oprahdaily.com/entertainment/a34386217/princess-diana-bulimia-eating-disorder.
3 Mann, Tanveer. “Princess Diana’s Bulimia Began When Charles Called Her ‘chubby’, Tapes Reveal.” Metro, 10
June 2017,
metro.co.uk/2017/06/10/princess-dianas-bulimia-began-when-charles-called-her-chubby-tapes-reveal-6699846.
2 Holden, Anthony. “DIANA’S REVENGE | Vanity Fair.” Vanity Fair | The Complete Archive, Feb. 1993,
archive.vanityfair.com/article/1993/2/dianas-revenge.
1 Taylor
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7 Mendle, Jane. “How Princess Diana Changed Lives by Discussing Her Mental Health.” Time, 30 Aug. 2017,
time.com/4918729/princess-diana-mental-health-legacy.
6 Princess of Wales, Diana. “Diana Speeches.” Eating Disorders, 27 Apr. 1993,
8 Weaver, Hilary. “How Princess Diana Raised Crucial Awareness Around Eating Disorders.” ELLE, 1 Jan. 2021,
9 Dickson, Ej. “Princess Diana Struggled With Bulimia. Does ‘The Crown’ Do Her Justice?” Rolling Stone, 24 Nov.
“Princess Diana Struggled With Bulimia. Does ‘The Crown’ Do Her Justice?” Rolling Stone, 24 Nov. 2020,
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