Eating Disorders
By: Antonia Parker English 3
There are different types of eating disorders, Anorexia, Bulimia, Compulsive Overeating, and Binge Eating Disorder. There are also eating disorders that are not as well known. Eating disorders are not always just about food and weight. Usually they are just symptoms of something deeper going on inside. An eating disorder is much more than just being on a diet. It is an illness that has to do with each suffers’ life. These eating disorders are caused by a variety of emotional factors and influences.
There are many differences between dieting and eating disorders. Dieting is about losing a little weight in a healthy way; about doing something healthy for you. Dieting is a healthy way to lose some weight so the way you feel on the out side will be the same as how great you feel on the inside. Dieting in only about losing weight and has nothing to do with emotional problems.
Eating disorders are different. They are all about trying to make your whole life better through eating food. This illness is about trying to find approval and acceptance from everyone through negative attention, and trying to control your life and emotions through food or lack of food. Eating disorders are about being convinced that all your self-esteem is based on what you weight and how you look. They are also about everything going on in your life. Your stress, coping, pain, anger, acceptance, validation, confusion, and fear, cleverly or not so cleverly is hiding behind phrases. A popular one is “I’m just on a diet.” “…starvation fills a void inside when it’s approval from you I crave. The desire for food is gone and you are there again…yelling.. so negative. Times like this filled with the pounding urge to run far away and disappear…” (Anorexia Nervosa 1)
People who suffer from anorexia have low self-esteem and find it as a way to control their emotions and environment. They often feel a tremendous need to control their surroundings and emotions. This is a unique reaction to a variety of external and internal conflicts, such as stress, anxiety, unhappiness and feeling like life is out of control. Anorexia is a negative way to cope with these emotions. The person suffering with Anorexia may be abnormally sensitive about appearing fat, or have a giant fear of becoming fat, but not all people living with Anorexia have this fear. They may be afraid of losing control over the amount of food they eat, and the desire to control their emotions and reactions to their emotions. With a low self-esteem and need for acceptance they will turn to obsessive dieting and starvation as a way to control not only their weight, but also their feelings and actions about the emotions attached. Some also feel that they do not deserve pleasure out of life, and will deprive themselves of things offering pleasure including eating. Some symptoms are: obsessive exercise, calorie and fat gram counting, starvation and restriction of food, causing themselves to vomit, and the use of diet pills, laxatives or diuretics to try to control their weight, and have a constant concern with body image. (Anorexia Nervosa 1) Other signs are: loss of menstrual periods, withdrawal from regular activities and friends, and does not eat foods in public places, rather tends to eat in secret. (Types of Eating Disorders and Treatment 1)
Men and women with Bulimia will eat a large quantity of food in a relatively short period of time and then use behaviors such as taking laxatives or cause themselves
to vomit. They do this because they feel overwhelmed in coping with their emotions. Also, to punish themselves for something they feel, but they honestly shouldn’t blame themselves for. People suffering with Bulimia may look for episodes of binging and purging to avoid and let out feelings of anger, depression, stress or anxiety. According to Bulimia Nervosa, “men and women suffering Bulimia are usually aware they have an eating disorder. Fascinated by food they sometimes buy magazines and cook-books to read recipes, and enjoy discussing dieting issues.”(1) It is important to realize that what makes a person Bulimic is different to what makes someone Anorexic. It is not the purging, but the cycle of binging and purging. Purging may be using laxatives or selfcaused vomiting. There are Bulimics who use other ways such as compulsive exercise to attempt to burn off the calories of a binge, or fasting the day following a binge.
There are many similarities in both Bulimia and Anorexia. There seems to be frequent incidences of sexual and/or physical and emotional abuse in direct relation to eating disorders. Not all people living with Eating Disorders are survivors of abuse. There also seems to be a close connection in numerous people to clinical depression. The eating disorder sometimes causes the depression or the depression can lead to the eating disorder. Over all eating disorders are very complex emotional issues. (Bulimia Nervosa 2) According to the website Types of Disorders, “It is reported that in western countries like the UK, 4.8% of the population will at some point in their lives experience some form of eating disorder. There are two main eating disorders recognized by psychiatrists; anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa.” (1)
People suffering with Compulsive Overeating have what is known as an "addiction" to food. They use food and eating as a way to hide from their emotions, and to fill a void they feel inside. They also use it to cope with daily stresses and problems in their lives. (Compulsive Overeating 1) People suffering with this Eating Disorder are likely to be overweight. They usually are aware that their eating habits are unusual, but find little comfort because of society's tendency to stereotype the "overweight" person. Words like, "just go on a diet" are as emotionally upsetting to a person suffering Compulsive Overeating as "just eat" can be to a person suffering Anorexia. (Compulsive Overeating 1) A person suffering from Compulsive Overeater is at health risk for a heart attack, high blood-pressure and cholesterol, kidney disease and/or failure, arthritis and bone deterioration, and stroke. (Types of Eating Disorders 2) Men and Women who are Compulsive Overeaters will sometimes hide behind their physical appearance. They use it as a blockade against society. They feel guilty for not being "good enough," shame for being overweight, and generally have a very low self-esteem. They use food and eating to cope with these feelings. This only leads into the cycle of feeling them and then trying to find a way to cope again. With a low self esteem and often regular need for love and support they will turn to obsessive episodes of binging and eating as a way to forget the pain and the longing for affection. Joanne a sufferer of Compulsive Overeating says, “EVERY SINGLE DAY, I say I will get help tomorrow, stop bingeing tomorrow, stop stop stop." But it never stops. It keeps going on and I get bigger and my self esteem gets smaller and smaller. I just got done with a binge: half a box of cereal, cheese, a BIG cookie, a candy bar, grapes, some pineapple, a big oily chicken pasta salad. The thing is that I like healthy food. I would love nothing more than to eat fruits and vegetables and
lean protein. But the urge to binge is UNCONTROLLABLE. I don't know how to stop.” (Compulsive Overeating 2)
Men and women living with Binge Eating Disorder suffer a combination of symptoms similar to those of Compulsive Overeaters and Bulimia. The sufferer will regularly go on large binges, eating an unusually large amount of food in a short period of time and can’t control it. They eat until they are uncomfortably full. People with Binge Eating Disorder are usually known as above average or overweight. (Binge Eating Disorder 1) Sufferers tend to have a more difficult time losing weight and maintaining average healthy weights. Unlike people with Bulimia, they do not vomit following a Binge episode. Reasons for Binge Eating can be similar to those of Compulsive Overeating. Using Binges as a way to hide from their emotions. Also to fill a void they feel inside, and to cope with daily stresses and problems in their lives. Binging can be used as a way to keep people away. They do it to subconsciously maintain an overweight appearance to cater to society's sad stigma, "if I'm fat, no one will like me." (Types of Eating Disorders 2) Each person suffering may feel not good enough for love. As with Bulimia, Binging can also be used as self-punishment for doing "bad" things, or for feeling badly about themselves. Stephanie is a victim of Binge eating disorder and says, “I'd eat in secret, gorging myself with more food than necessary, way beyond the point of feeling full. Guilt, anxiety and fear would always ensue. Feelings of rage, hatred and loathing would follow; or severe depression with suicidal tendencies. You know it's ironic: I understand my disease enough to know that it all stems from issues of control (feeling out of control and abusing food to regain it). But I am so out of control when I
abuse food that it just becomes a vicious cycle day after day after day.” (Binge Eating Disorder 2)
There are a few uncommon eating disorders as well. Night Eating Syndrome is one which consists of morning anorexia, evening hyperplasia, and insomnia. (Other Types of Eating Disorders 2) Sleep Eating Disorder is another, which typically fall into the category of Sleep Disorders even though it is a combined sleep-eating problem. Sufferers tend to be overweight and have episodes of recurrent sleep walking. During the time they sleep walk they binge on usually large quantities of food, often high in sugar or fat. "People who exhibit NES don't eat a lot at one sitting, often skip breakfast, and don't start eating until noon. They will over eat the rest of the day, and eat frequently. They also have difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep." says psychiatrist Albert Stunkard, an obesity researcher at the University of Pennsylvania. (Other Types of Eating Disorders 2)
Eating Disorders are not to be taken lightly. As you have read they can be very dangerous. There are many other types of eating disorders that I didn’t mention. Many people are suffering from one of the many. Don’t be surprised if someone you know is. If you or anyone you know is, then get help!
Bibliography “Anorexia Nervosa” [http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:lpq1Po9jFxIJ:www.some thing-fishy.org/whatarethey/anorexia.php+anorexia&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd =9&gl=us] 1998-2007. “Binge Eating Disorder” [http://www.something-fishy.org/whatarethey/be.php] 19982007. “ Bulimia Nervosa” [http://www.something-fishy.org/whatarethey/bulimia.php] 19982007. “Compulsive Overeating” [http://www.something-fishy.org/whatarethey/coe.php] 19982007. “Other Types of Eating Disorders” [http://www.something-fishy.org/whatarethey/other. php] 1998-2007. “Types of eating disorders” [http://www.rethink.org/about_mental_illness/mental_ illnesses_and_disorders/eating_disorders/types_of_eating.html] April, 2006. “Types of Eating Disorders and Treatment” [http://www.nyu.edu/shc/medservices /types.treatment.html#binge].