Anorexia NervosaYou can't get Anorexia Nervosa unless you go on diet. By its very definition, it's just a protracted and over-the-top diet. So....100% of anorexia sufferers started their road to anorexia with a restrictive diet. Isn't that another great reason to ditch diets and live light?
Anorexia... ?
Basically anorexia nervosa is a psychological disorder more commonly referred to as anorexia - and you can die from it. You may know about the Brazilian model, Ana Carolia Resto who died in 2007 at age 21 weighing 88 pounds!I personally know of two people who died from it and one was a medical doctor! So in case you didn't 'get' this - anorexia is not fun - it's just downright dangerous. And the key, once again, is that it all starts with a dieting with the aim being to lose weight. Dieting is dangerous. When I became anorexic, my degree of willpower (I ate only gelatine and diet cold drink for about 8 months) as well as my diminishing size were sources of great pride and feelings of superiority. I felt in control. I (the great I) had mastered my eating and my body unlike other weak-willed individuals who hadn't. Ha! Ha! Little did I know what a big fat anorexic lie that was. In common with other anorexics, underneath my desire to get thinner my insecurity and control issues and my fears about my worthiness and acceptability were running rampant. I hadn't mastered anything - anorexia nervosa had grown into a monster that had mastered me! Anorexia becomes obsessive - it can literally eat up your entire life. For example I was always working with food. Eat it? Heck no... I'd just be feeding everyone else up. I even volunteered to work in the school kitchen. It was a good foil so people didn't notice I wasn't eating. And the sense of control I had (which I didn't normally have around food or in a kitchen) put me on a high. It made me feel like I could conquer Everest! I never refused food - no I had a giant cardboard box at the bottom of my cupboard where everything landed. And the high I got from everyone when I started losing the weight only fueled the problem. The message I kept 'hearing' (even if that wasn't exactly what people were saying) was: you're getting prettier and more acceptable and more worthy. Now know that was just the baloney voice of anorexia - I was doing nothing of the sort. Anorexia Nervosa was closing my life down, not expanding it and making it better. I had to become worthy in my head - not my body for any lasting change to come about. Can you get Anorexia?
The overwhelming majority of Anorexia Nervosa victims are women. I guess my profile fits almost perfectly: I'm a Westernized Caucasian, from a (relatively-speaking) high socio-economic group. I also had perfectionistic tendencies and a huge need for approval and to please.I've had to grow my inner rebel in order to heal. And one way I've done that is to take back my power when it comes to deciding what kind of body makes me worthy of love! My brush with anorexia started when I was 15 - in the vulnerable period of adolescence which is pretty typical. But here's what scares me. Nowadays therapists are treating younger and younger children and older women as well. I recently read of a Dr. Emily Major who'd treated a 4-year old (!) for Anorexia Nervosa at Van der Bilt University. And I've personally worked with a woman who was almost 70 with anorexia. But even though this is shocking - there are no surprises about it. Here's why: Girls are dieting at progressively younger ages and women keep dieting to much later ages. Males can also develop the disorder but it's much more rare. And again there's a pretty logical reason for that. Traditionally mens' worth has not been judged by their appearance but more by their status, position and earnings power. But that's changing! So I want to make a prediction and say that we're going to see more and more men dieting and as a result more anorexia and other eating disorders. And there's no mystery as to why men are starting to diet? Just take a peek at magazine racks - what do you notice? A rash of men's glossies and many of the covers are graced by semi-naked male images. For the first time research shows we are seeing more semi-naked male images than women. Body beautiful for men has become BIG business for the fashion and beauty industries. Suddenly we have the birth of the metra-sexual male who uses skincare products and takes pride in his appearance. As men become more appearance-orientated (even though the trend is more likely to be towards being muscular than towards being skinny), dieting is inevitably playing a part in it as you'll see when we talk about Bigorexia. Anorexia Nervosa is especially prevalent amongst athletes, dancers, models and actors. We don't have to look far to see how celebrity diets lead to Anorexia and plenty of other eating problems. According to the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), an estimated 0.5% to 3.7% of women will suffer from this disorder at some point in their lives. What causes anorexia?Well no-one really wants to say for sure. There are theories from dysfunction of the hypothalamus, or neurotransmitter imbalances, to genes to family dysfunction. And all of those may have some truth to them.But, for what it's worth, here's my two cents worth. I believe that the most central component of Anorexia Nervosa is the enormous social pressure to be thin and attractive and plenty of messages that outward appearance is what makes your worthy of love. We also live in a very competitive culture where it's easy to feel as if you're 'not good enough.' Because here's part of the solution to the anorexic riddle: • You don't find Anorexia in cultures where larger bodies are honored and revered. • You don't find Anorexia in naturalist villages where the emphasis is feeling comfortable in your own skin rather than great emphasis on how it looks. • You don’t find Anorexia where you don’t have Westernized TV or the glossies – but as the Fijians will attest, as soon as those arrive, so do previously unheard of eating disorders. • You don’t find Anorexia where food is in short supply and people can’t afford to use food to ‘say’ what I and other anorexics perhaps weren't/aren't able to verbalize. Those are rather telling factors. How do you know if someone has Anorexia?Well that's the problem - it can be extremely difficult to know for sure. Here's why:Firstly weight loss is so sought after in our culture that often people can't even begin to consider that losing weight might be a problem until it's too late. Secondly, it's very common for the latent anorexic to start their diet voicing their newfound 'healthy choices' which can lull people into a false sense of security. And many people who anorexic are actually suffering from orthorexia which is when their genuine attempts to eat healthily have gone awry. Additionally, one of the characteristics of Anorexia nervosa is that sufferers go to great lengths to disguise it. Look at me...always working with food in the kitchen, hiding food in my cupboard and wearing big and baggy clothing. I was pretty sneaky! And by the way... did you know that dieting is every bit as dangerous for dogs as it is for humans? Did you know that dogs can get anorexia too? Click here to read this fascinating article by Pam Whyte - it's a real eye-opener. For more information about anorexia nervosa and other eating disorders, please
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