^ I know, it should have been obvious for me, too.
Just to explain myself in case I seem like an idiot...

Thing is, my grades and my 'intellectual functioning' (pssh, as if that can even be quantified) actually -supposedly- went up when I was starving, thus nurturing my delusion that anorexia was a performance enhancing mechanism.
In reality, I think anorexia just heightened my obsessiveness/perfectionism and made me willing to isolate and devote myself a little too whole-heartedly to school work – as opposed to truly making me 'smarter'.
(...it would have damaged my brain instead...)

*** The greatest challenge I faced in deciding to recover was letting go of the -false- belief that anorexia would make me a better and smarter person.
Sorry, I felt I needed to clarify the significance of this to me, in case it seems I was flippantly believing in some pro-ana mantra (not that anyone suggested I was )

Yes it is. So glad I'm eating properly these days....

My grades went up at first but then plummeted as I grew more and more obsessed with my intake and output and got more severely depressed.

I used to equate restriction with 'drive' and 'motivation' too...only the more I starved the harder it became to study, to concentrate and to get things to sink in. I remember either learning stuff, but being unable to do the understanding behind it, or sitting for hours longer trying to revise than I had needed to previously. And stuff like people's names, conversations, even past events, became increasingly difficult to remember. The whole time there was this fuzz of non-focus behind my thoughts, which only started to disappear about half a year ago.

So yeah, yet more evidence that starvation really works wonders for your mental performance...

I was waiting in my psychritists office today and there was a story on Somilia. There was a doctor talking about the starvation of children and how it effected their brains. They said that starvation that extreem, especially at such a young age, often left permanent effects..

They also mentioned that they are at risk of loosing an entire generation due to starvation.

I know this thread is about the brain, but I thought of it when I was watching the incredibly heartbreaking story.

at first my grades went up and i was producing awesome work but it took its toll and now if i restrict, even if its not intentional ie i just havent gotten a break at work yet and im hungry, i just cant do anything useful

There is definitely truth in this. My treatment team wouldn't even attempt any therapy with me until I was in a nutritionally and weight-restored state as my brain function was very limited...It is so frustrating but I can see their point because the anorexic part of my mind is still very much in play and will be until I reach a point where I am nutritionally and weight-restored.

Same here.

.....
speaking of which, i am having a brain scan tomorrow, how lovely :3

The energy that the brain requires is 40% of the daily intake (as in, 40% of a healthy intake, not 40% of whatever very low intake you chuck at your body.) If you're not eating, then your brain is of course going to starve...

I'm sure there are oranges with a much higher qualification in Biology than I have, but the neurons in the brain (the pathways for communication) are surrounded and protected by a sheath made of fatty acids. It's this sheath that (I'm guessing) essentially protects your brain from shortwiring and electrocuting itself, as well as keeping the communication good so that you keep functioning like a human being. A pretty good reason not to burn off the fat that's in your brain...