A MUM who says her toddler's skin looked like she had been burnt in an acid attack has revealed how a £4.50 moisturiser cleared her eczema in days. Leah West, 33, rushed 18-month-old Lilith to hospital when her neck broke out in a raging red rash - after her eczema became infected. Doctors prescribed antibiotics to treat the infection but Lilith was still plagued by red, itchy skin, which she developed at three months old. Speaking exclusively to Fabulous Digital, Leah, from Darfield, South Y

With her finances spiraling out of control Emma Oldfield was not blowing her student loan on clothes or nights out with friends. Instead she was spending £100 a day in budget supermarkets, filling bag after bag with as much junk food as possible. As soon as she was out the door, Emma would tear off the wrappers and start bingeing on the crisps, cakes and sweets she had bought. “I can overeat to the point where I am in pain,” explains Emma, 22. “At my lowest point, at the start of this year

India Gale was three-years-old when she was left with burns covering 40 percent of her body after her dress brushed against a gas fire in the living room of her family home. Now 18, she has had to grow up with imperfections in a world obsessed with appearance. "I've seen social media channels where girls just put themselves down all the time," says India, a student from Brighton. "Among some circles it's become this cool thing to hate yourself; it's really disturbing. "Beautiful girls say

She is a self-confessed exercise addict who works out six hours a day, six days a week, yet is so ill that she spends at least two months of the year in hospital. Fitness instructor Nicole Allen, 19, says her clients are stunned when they realise that she is waging a daily war against a crippling lung condition. Diagnosed with cystic fibrosis (CF) as a baby, the average life expectancy for people with the incurable disease is 28. She may be dependent on a daily cocktail of medication includin

Whether she is on the set of a top-secret music video or working on the latest big brand ad campaign, make-up artist to the stars Frances Shillito often has to pinch herself. For not only is the 27-year-old living her dream as she jets across the globe, but she has finally escaped the clutches of an eating disorder that once left her with just two weeks to live. Devastating her life for seven years, Frances would spend hours every day applying her make-up which included five layers of foundati

It was a route that she had walked hundreds of times before. As she chatted with friends on her way home from dance class, Lauren Spencer, then 13, could never have anticipated the horror that was about to unfold. For everything changed in a split second when she was shot in the head in a random attack just five minutes from her front door in Kensington, Liverpool. “I suddenly felt something really hot on the side of my head,” recalls Lauren, now 21. “I didn’t think anything that bad had happene

The saying goes that a woman's hair is her crowning glory but for 18-year-old Emma Simonsen those words are difficult to hear. Since her mid-teens, hiding her bald patches has been as much a part Emma's morning routine as brushing her teeth. It is a secret that she has been desperate to conceal for years as she is entirely responsible for her hair loss. Emma compulsively pulls out her hair, sometimes strand by strand and other times in clumps. "My hair is a constant source of concern for me," sh

Summer Garcia can't remember how many times she threatened to kill her mum when she was growing up. Shouting, swearing and kicking her mother became as normal a part of her morning routine as brushing her teeth and eating breakfast. One day she even pulled a knife on her. Yet once she had fended off her mum's desperate attempts to drag her to school Summer would go back to her usual sweet-natured self. It had been the same ever since she started senior school, aged 11. "On my first day of high s

Katie Brooks was bullied at school for having ginger hair[CHRIS NEILL] Carrot top. Battery head. Ginge. Whatever the nickname, Katie Brooks has heard them all. Bullied relentlessly at school for having red hair Katie developed a personality as feisty and fiery as her locks to fend off the playground taunts. As a child Katie, now 20, used to beg her mum to let her dye her hair but grew to love the flame-coloured tresses that defined her. Until they all fell out. At the age of 17 and over the

Spending up to ten hours staring into the mirror and taking hundreds of ‘selfies’ every day, Danny Bowman became so obsessed with his reflection that he didn’t leave the house for six months. He had dreamed of being a model for years, yet these strict daily rituals had nothing to do with vanity. Danny didn't realise it at the time, but he was suffering from a mental illness known as Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). The condition is an anxiety disorder that causes the sufferer to have a distorted

As Christian Aid launches its Christmas Appeal, SARAH JONES reports from Kenya, where a generation of young people are growing up robbed of their childhoods by HIV. She discovers first-hand why funds are needed so desperately this year. STRETCHING out his tiny hand to welcome us to his home, it is an unusual way to be greeted by a seven-year-old. But all the norms of family life have been turned upside-down in this child-headed household. And a solitary Fisher Price toy lying broken in the di

Taken hostage for almost five years, Terry Waite became one of the most recognisable faces of the 1980s. He speaks to SARAH JONES ahead of a lecture he is giving in Winchester on Tuesday. CHAINED to a wall and in darkness for 1,763 days, the fact that Terry Waite never lost hope is testament to his tremendous strength of character. Spending the first four years in total solitary confinement, he was allowed no books or news from the outside world for much of his imprisonment. Initially beaten