Do you know anyone who sees him or herself as overweight even though this person is dangerously thin? Anorexia affects mostly girls, but boys can have it as well. They seem always to be weighing themselves, and for them, eating and not eating becomes an obsession. Do you notice people with really unusual eating habits - like avoiding food and meals, picking out a few foods and eating only a few foods, in small quantities, or carefully weighing and dividing portions?
You may also see them involved in intensive exercise, and they may also try to control weight by vomiting or using laxatives, enemas, and diuretics. Specialists recognize the following two types of anorexia nervosa:
Symptoms are both physical and emotional in nature. Anorexia is defined as "Refusal to maintain or achieve a body weight of 85 percent of the expected weight for the person's age and height." This means that if a normal weight would be 120, an unhealthy weight would be maintained at 102 or less. Note that this is "refusal" - not inability. Some young adults naturally become skinny as they grow quickly; others may try to gain weight but can't. People with anorexia actively won't add pounds, and often their weight gets progressively lower. One sign of unhealthily low weight or excessive exercise in women is amenorrhea - the absence of at least three consecutive menstrual cycles.
Those with this disorder suffer an intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat, even if considered underweight. They also commonly experience distortion of body image, excess focus on body shape, or denial of low-weight problem; low self-esteem; and fear of losing control in many areas of daily living.
You may have a harder time recognizing someone with bulimia than with anorexia, because bulimia doesn't usually cause a dramatic weight loss. You may think of bulimia as involving vomiting, but as we noted, sometimes anorexia does, too. Since binge eating is always present in bulimia, the purging, by vomiting or other means, is an attempt to counter the overeating and to maintain weight. Someone with bulimia wants to maintain or lose weight, but goes to great lengths to do that. You may notice someone who "disappears" after meals - or who seems to make a lot of visits to the bathroom. But you may also know someone who spends a lot more time at the gym, or maybe he begins to go on fasts.
Exercise and occasional fasting may be healthy, but they can serve as healthy fronts for people with an obsession to overeat and not gain weight. If you know someone who fasts for religious reasons or goes overboard at the gym briefly, that's probably not unusual: Specialists note that to qualify as a disorder, the weight-fighting activities must be practiced at least twice a week for at least three months. In sum, there are the following two types of bulimia, and neither type insists on being underweight:
Physical signs of bulimia include the eating of a larger amount of food in a shorter amount of time than do most people, followed by behavior to compensate for binges: vomiting, abuse of laxatives/ diuretics, fasting, and excessive exercise. People with bulimia maintain near-normal weight because they compensate for their overeating with overexercise or purging. But other physical symptoms include frequent, often serious, problems with teeth and the digestive system because of the disruptions caused by purging activities. Emotionally, people with bulimia feel a compulsion to overeat, a panicky sense that one cannot stop or control intake.
They suffer a distortion of their body image, caused by an excess critical focus on their body shape, which they always think is "too big" or "too ugly." They tend to fear losing control in many areas of daily living, and when they can't remain in control they feel fear and shame, which they turn to the eating disorder to ease. Their behavior may actually increase their sense of shame and depression, since most realize their disorder is unusual and dangerous. Overall, like most people with eating disorders, they may live with a low sense of self-esteem, which may lead to the disorder and may in turn increase their feelings of low self-esteem. It is also important to know that eating disorders can occur along a spectrum. Some teenagers may start with anorexia and have their disorder evolve or change to bulimia and have episodes of both disorders.
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1. Recover from an eating disorder by knowing your inner self
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