Does my girlfriend have a eating problem or just typical student behaviour?

I mean I rarely see her eating junk food and if she eats some, she'll say she feels all guilty. Once we had a conversation where she told me her whole family lecture her on the importance of eating and she's sick of it because they have very poor diets themselves so this puts me off saying anything to her about it.

Regardless of how busy someone is, they can't sacrifice a balanced diet. It's her choice, but its hardly likely to help with worth ethic anyway.. she'll end up losing energy and become fatigued.

She refuses to eat a lot of the time. She's also a terrible liar which she has told me in the past so when I ask her what she ate in the morning, she won't even try lying but will just say she skipped it, I'll ask her about lunch, she skipped it again. She just uses the excuse 'no time', I kind of believe her because she catches really early buses in the morning and is always running back to the bus stop after a lecture so she doesn't miss it. I asked her why she couldn't just take something on the go, but she says she can't be bothered eating on the go.

She tells me she just eats one balanced meal at night and survives on coffee during the day, she's quite healthy otherwise as she says she just eats spinach/cauliflower or whatever, then an apple after. Anyway, I'm not that concerned because lots of students skip meals to get to places right? It's just she started to slowly start looking thinner although she denies it. I think she's going to get even thinner.

Sounds like the start of an eating disorder. The horrible thoughts and feelings of guilt usually come as you lose more and more weight because you're brain doesn't process info in the same way. There's like a chemical screw up. Confront her.

This is not good at all even if what she is eating is good. To eat one meal and an apple a day even allowing for sugar in coffee probably means she's struggling to reach 1000 calories. As a girl she needs to be eating in the 1500-1800 range if she wants to lose weight without losing muscle (assuming average height).

You need to be firm and make her eat.

Her parents are already trying to be firm with her. Her dad lectures her a lot on how bad it is to skip meals but she says he skips breakfast himself so it's a bit hypocritical. I think her mum just buys her favourite types of junk food to tempt her into eating. I feel like I'm the only one not judging her at the moment so if I start doing the same, it's just going to annoy her and she'll just deny having any problem anyway.

She refuses to eat a lot of the time. She's also a terrible liar which she has told me in the past so when I ask her what she ate in the morning, she won't even try lying but will just say she skipped it, I'll ask her about lunch, she skipped it again. She just uses the excuse 'no time', I kind of believe her because she catches really early buses in the morning and is always running back to the bus stop after a lecture so she doesn't miss it. I asked her why she couldn't just take something on the go, but she says she can't be bothered eating on the go.

She tells me she just eats one balanced meal at night and survives on coffee during the day, she's quite healthy otherwise as she says she just eats spinach/cauliflower or whatever, then an apple after. Anyway, I'm not that concerned because lots of students skip meals to get to places right? It's just she started to slowly start looking thinner although she denies it. I think she's going to get even thinner.

Yes most definitely signs of an eating disorder. I did exactly the same thing. I would miss breakfast( I still do now sometimes though because I really don't have the time) I would miss lunch and then I would have a few spinach leaves for dinner. It felt like a normal diet at the time and I couldn't understand how people ate anymore than that but yes it was an eating disorder. I would love to say talking to her might help but a lot of the time that ends up fuelling it even more. It makes the person think you want them to stop and your forcing them out of something that they want to. The fact that you mention she is reading books on it and she finds it interesting suggests she has some sort of liking towards it, I used to have the same thing. I was so fascinated by it and I started to love it. I read books,watched documentaries,articles and pro ana websites(the most poisionous things you could ever come across) What got me out of it was a shock, once I was running and everything started to faze away and I got scared and after that I became quite ill. I then got quite depressed....but sob story over I'm better now , it just took a shock to realise what reality was again. I hope it doesn't get that far for her but I wish I could say talking to her may help...maybe suggest therapy as its a different source. I hope she gets better! but yes to answer you question I really do think it's an eating disorder, pay attention to her behaviour these next few days. I wish you the very best on however you chose to address this problem. I really hope she gets better!!

Thank you, I agree with you. When I met her, she ate so much more as in she actually had a healthy intake, I think she was eating 3 big balanced meals a day, eating her 5 a day, drinking loads of water, exercising.. all of that, then I don't know what happened, she eats like a quarter of what she used to eat. I pointed this out to her too and she just says she can't believe how she even managed to eat that much in the first place and can't imagine eating anywhere near it now as she's used to eating her way now. It's just I think she genuinely believes that what she's doing is fine so it doesn't seem to bother her in the slightest.

Yeah it's true, we sit together in lectures and everytime I look at her, she looks like she's about to fall asleep (not sure if that's just boredom or due to the lack of energy), I can literally hear her stomach rumbling about 4 times in every lecture everyday, but she'll just get embarrassed and start coughing to hide it, so all this collectively makes me worry a bit but I might just be reading too much into it.

You have every right to worry, right?
There's only so much you can do so don't let it be too much of a burden for you, but you're clearly concerned and I don't think there would be any harm in talking to her about it. Sometimes people need a tough reality check.

It doesn't work like that...you have to understand that the person is in a very vulnerable state of mind at this point. They are their own reality check,some people are hospitalised and still carry on(wouldn't you say hospitalisation is a tough reality check??) The person with the disorder needs to snap out of themselves and a lot of people do slowly when they realise how loved they are by everyone around them(amongst other reasons) , they really don't need somebody screaming down their ear telling them to "eat and stop being riduculous". Thats the worst way to go about it.

I never said that OP should tell his partner to eat and stop being ridiculous. I didnt mean that he should be aggressive and hostile in his approach, but obviously the concerns need to be addressed.

On the other hand, we don't know for sure that she has an eating disorder!! Yes, she's skipping meals etc, ive done that in the past( not intentionally, due to similar reasons such as work etc) but that doesn't mean I have an eating disorder. This is the worst case scenario.

No I understand I just gave that as an example because I would call that a tough reality check. I honestly think taking into account everything OP has mentioned sounds like the beginning of an eating disorder. I don't think a tough reality check is the way to go about it but thats just me.