The woman addicted to eating sofas

When Adele Edwards is hungry, she doesn’t bother with the kitchen. She just heads straight for the furniture. Her bizarre diet is killing her but she says she just can’t stop.

Adele Edwards, the mum-of-five isn’t hooked on junk food; she has a much more unusual addiction. She can’t stop eating household items, such as rubbers and elastic bands. But her favourite snack is the ¬polyester filling from sofa cushions.

To her, man-made foam is more delicious than biscuits or cakes.

It sounds bizarre but Adele, 30, is suffering from a recognised medical condition Pica.

Pica is seen in all people of all ages but is particularly common in pregnant ¬women, small children, and those with developmental disabilities. Sufferers feel compelled to eat non-food items ranging from clay, dirt and sand to hairballs, ice or paint.

Despite the ¬unusual symptoms, Pica is relatively common in people like Adele who suffer from ¬anaemia.

The craving for non-food items is a response to extreme iron deficiency.

Having munched her way through eight sofas and five chairs, she ¬estimates that she’s digested nearly 16st of synthetic foam in her ¬lifetime.

She simply can’t stop and now she’s terrified of eating ¬herself into an early grave. In recent months, she’s had¬ ¬emergency treatment for intestinal obstruction after eating chunks of polyester foam which she refers to simply as “cushion”.

Doctors have warned that she will leave her children motherless if she doesn’t give up, but she says she’s powerless to stop.

“I was 10 years old when I was first introduced to cushion,” explains Adele. “I was playing with my cousin when he peeled apart the sofa, picked off a piece of sponge and popped it into his mouth like it was bubble gum.

“At first, I thought it was strange but, after sucking it for a while, I came to like the texture..

The doctors told Adele, from Florida, that there was no cure for the disorder but arranged for her to have therapy. Unfortunately, it didn’t have much of an effect on her.

“My ¬therapist suggested I was ¬eating cushion as a reaction to my ¬parents’ divorce but I knew I just liked the way it tasted,” she says.

More about this bizarre addiction.