Eating Disorders Explained

Unhealthy eating patterns lead to an eating disorder. This is very common among teenage girls who are obsessed about becoming thin, and start harming their body by not eating. Poor nutrition harms their body organs. This is a very serious problem as it affects them mentally as well, and leads to depression and anxiety. An eating disorder can be overeating as well.

When a person finds refuge in food to cover their mental disturbance, then they are suffering from an eating disorder.

The three most common types of eating disorder are:

• Anorexia
• Bulimia
• Compulsive eating

Anorexia:

This is a psychological disorder, mostly seen in teenage girls, as a result of low self esteem or emotional or physical abuse. Obsession to become thin is the main reason for these people to start over dieting. The more they lose weight, the more they have the drive to push further. They stop worrying about their body, and they become only interested in losing weight. They starve so as to take control over the body. They start neglecting their health, which can sometimes even lead to death. This disorder is also a type of addiction.

They develop psychological fear of food and fatness, which leads them to the extent of vomiting out anything and everything that they eat. Some people also start using laxatives to reduce weight. No matter how thin they grow, they are never satisfied.

Bulimia:

This is also similar to anorexia, where the person becomes obsessed with growing thin. Here the person may binge on food, then throw up everything she/he just ate. They may first eat a large amount of food, and even indulge in rich food in a short period of time, then later force themselves to vomit. They may also start exercising excessively, use laxatives, or fast to make up for the food they had, as they start to feel guilty about having eaten food. Bulimia is most common in adolescent and young adult women.

Unlike anorexia where the person stops eating, bulimic people do eat food, but they either force themselves to vomit or use laxatives.

Health problems related to Anorexia/Bulimia

They are:

• Poor circulation of blood
• Irregular menstrual cycle
• Brittle bones
• Infertility
• Fainting and dizziness
• Dehydration leading to kidney damage
• Slowed heartbeat
• Low blood pressure
• Reduced body temperature
• Hair loss

Compulsive eating:

When a person starts binging, leading to a feeling of guilt and shame, she/he is said to be a compulsive eater. This is not like bulimia where the person involves purging. This leads to weight gain and depression. Here the person has an uncontrolled urge to eat all the time. 40 percent of people who are obese are binge eaters.

How would you know if you are a compulsive eater?

These are common signs of a compulsive eater:

• Eating uncontrollably
• Depression
• Dieting frequently
• Preoccupied about their weight
• Vigorous exercise or vomiting to lose weight
• Health problems like heartburn, dental problems, fatigue, weight gain, insomnia and high BP.

Treatments:

Recovery from these disorders is possible. The person must undergo certain lifestyle changes with the help of the people around him/her. There are different kinds of psychological therapy available to treat these problems. For a person suffering from anorexia, hospitalization may be necessary in extreme cases; when due to severe weight loss different parts of the body get affected. Intravenous feeding may be required, and the focus would be on gaining weight. Family support and assistance is very important. The person is given nutritional education for a healthy alternative to weight management. A lot of counseling is given, and therapy to boost up one's self esteem. Everyone has the right to love his own body.

So with the help of medical, psychological and nutritional assistance, people with eating disorders can be healed.

Eating Disorders And How To Treat Them

Many people are having problems with their weight. These weight problems are the results of a person’s eating habits. In the United States, there are about 50 million of Americans are enroll weight loss programs. However, there are also people who wishes that they would have a lesser weight and resulted to suffering from eating disorders.

Eating disorders may be categorized as a psychiatric problem. Although many experts say that obesity is not truly a psychiatric problem, they consider that the state of being obese is also a form of eating disorders. Some people who are trying to lose weight may lead to the improper obsession of thinking of a person that his dieting becomes abnormal.

Another form of eating disorder is the anorexia nervosa. This form of eating disorder may happen to those people who may have a normal or a little above the average weight. These people think that their body is always overweight. This illness may begin to those who that have continuous diet regimens and eventually led to restraining the person’s balanced eating.

Anorexia nervosa can be identified to most women that are teenagers and are in their early adult stages. Although it is not common to males and to older adults, it can also occur to these types of people. The known classic dieters do not eat any food in a day which lead them to starvation. The self-starvation of a person is the point where he suppresses hunger sensations, which may lead an individual to become skeletal in appearance. These individuals are considered anorexic by type because they suffer from phobia on gaining weight.

Bulimia can be truly associated to many dieters especially to those individuals aged 17 to 25 years old. The process of bingeing and purging of most bulimics can make an individual addicted on what he has started in his diet regimen. Most of the time a person can no longer control the binge and spurge cycle that and led a person to be underweight and or even obese. However, most bulimics appear to be normal and have a normal body weight. Most of the time, the process in which they do their dieting is kept to themselves because most bulimics are shameful of their activities of bingeing and purging.

There are side effects an individual may suffer from for being bulimic especially for women that are actively in this process of dieting. An irregular menstrual cycle may occur to some women and the decrease of sexual interest may be experienced. Most bulimics have disturbing behavior on whatever things they would like to do. There are instances where bulimics have tendencies to be drug addicts and alcoholic. Some of which have records of shoplifting and other cases that are associated in such acts.

There are some different approaches on how to treat these forms of disorders. These ways may help bring back the proper eating and correct way to have a balanced diet. A well-known stage for bulimics could return the right eating pattern by not practicing the activity of bingeing and purging. They are able to control the incorrect dieting behavior on the diet regimen.

A consultative approach that would be advisable to those bulimics and anorexic is the therapy program. Many of the patients have been found to cooperate well and let themselves to be educated in psycho educational programs that will give them the information on the illness.