What is Anorexia Nervosa and Who Might be affected?
Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder defined by a refusal to maintain minimal body weight
within 15 percent of an individuals normal weight. Other symptoms of this disorder include:
An intense fear of gaining weight;
A distorted body
image;
Amenorrhea (absence of at least three consecutive menstrual cycles when they are otherwise expected to occur).
The classic pattern of
restrictive eating is often accompanied by recurrent binge eating and purging episodes. Subsequent related medical complications are:
Starvation;
Weight loss;
Related serious medical complications that can result in death.
If you are or someone know has an ongoing
preoccupation with food and weight would benefit from exploring these thoughts and relationships with a professional therapist.
Anorexia literally means loss
of appetite. People with anorexia nervosa ignore hunger to control their desire to eat. They may frequently cook for others or hide food that they will not eat in their
personal space. Obsessive exercise may accompany the starving behavior.
Eating disorders tend to occur in pre- or post-puberty, but can develop at any
major life change. Anorexia nervosa predominately affects adolescent girls and young adult women. The condition also occurs but is less common in men and older
women. The reason behind most younger women develop anorexia nervosa is to achieve an ideal figure. Society pressures younger women to be thin in
advertising and the media.
Others at risk for anorexia nervosa may include:
Athletes;
Actors;
Dancers;
Models;
TV personalities.
For this latter group thinness becomes a professional requirement.
People with lives that are chaotic and
emotionally painful may find great satisfaction in the control achieved over weight and food. Common signs of anorexia nervosa:
The main sign is a
preoccupation with food and a refusal to maintain minimally normal body weight. People with anorexia nervosa think they look fat even when they are bone-thin.
They look in the mirror and instead of seeing the frail thin person they are, they see a very fat image starring back at them from the mirror;
Nails and
hair become brittle;
Skin may become dry and yellow;
Depression is common;
They often complain of feeling cold because the body
temperature drops;
They may develop lanugo (a term used to describe fine hair on a newborn) on their body;
They may develop strange
eating habits such as cutting their food in tiny pieces, refusing to eat in front of others, or fixing elaborate meals for others in which they do not eat;
Food and
weight become obsessions;
The causes of anorexia nervosa are inconclusive and varied. Scientists study the personalities, genetics, environments and
biochemistry of people with these illnesses to try and understand and uncover the origins of eating disorders.
There are certain personality traits common in
persons with anorexia nervosa which are:
Low self-esteem;
Social isolation (which usually occurs after the behavior associated with anorexia
nervosa begins);
Perfectionism.
Persons affected with anorexia nervosa tend to be good students and excellent athletes. It seems clear that
these people ignore problems that are too painful or irresolvable by focusing on weight loss and food.
Eating disorders also tend to run in families. Female
relatives are most often the ones affected. It has been found that a girl has a 10 to 20 times higher risk of developing anorexia nervous if she has a sibling with the
disease. This finding suggests that genetic factors may cause some people to develop eating disorders. Stressful events are likely to increase the risk.
In
general if a you or a person you know fear they have anorexia nervosa, a doctor knowledgeable about eating disorders should be consulted to make a definitive and
accurate diagnosis. Other psychiatric disorders can occur together with anorexia nervosa such as depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder.
This
article is FREE to publish with the resource box.
