The smell of hot dogs fresh off the grill causes mouths to water. Homemade potato salad is at arm’s reach, and the smell of just-grilled burgers fills the air, making everyone’s stomachs grumble in anticipation. Almost everyone.
“First of all, I am not happy to be there,” Spencer Hansen said. “I’m not really partaking in the conversation, and if I am, it is at a superficial level. I am thinking about the calories and the fat in the food. How am I going to burn off these calories after dinner, or how am I going to throw it up?”
Hansen grew up in Mesa, Arizona. He served a full-time mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Rio de Janeiro North mission and met his wife at BYU. He completed his undergraduate work at BYU in history and attended medical school at the University of Arizona.
On paper, he may seem like a standard LDS man. But Hansen has been battling an eating disorder for 15 years.