Anorexia
What is anorexia? Anorexia is a eating disorder that is characterized as a loss of weight. This can be caused by a mental disorder or a physical illness that makes a person lose appetite. An increasing number of adults and children are being diagnosed with anorexia. It is considered an emotional disorder where the subject refuses to eat food in order to lose weight. People have such a strong desire to become skinny that they boy cot food all together. Anorexia normally develops during puberty. Nine out of ten people with anorexia are women.
There are different ways that people approach eating food. Some people with anorexia only eat a specific number of calories a day and stick to a very restricted diet. Others workout excessively, use laxatives, or even make themselves vomit. They can’t stand the idea of themselves being seen as fat. All of these are different techniques are used to support a life of anorexia.
One surprising fact about anorexia is that nine out of ten people with anorexia are women. They are also normally between 10 and 25. Why could this be? There are a few different reasons that this could be, however the main one is that women believe they should be seen as skinny and beautiful. Younger women are way more concerned with their appearance than men. Also, young women with a family member with a eating disorder are more likely to develop anorexia.
Anorexia is an emotional issue as well as a behavioral one. The subjects emotions make them think that they are fat or obese. As a result of this, they behave as if they are extremely overweight even if they aren’t. This causes weight loss in people who don’t need to lose weight. There are a few symptoms that most people with anorexia exhibit such as dramatic weight loss, denying feeling hungry, and seeming to not eat infront of others. These symptoms can be a sign that someone is developing or already is anorexic.
People with anorexia have very strict diets. They count their calorie intake and make sure they consume a specific number of calories for each meal. This is called calorie counting. It’s an obsession where people can’t help but calculate the number of calories they are taking in. People who count calories typically believe they can eat no more than 2,000 calories a day and if they do they will compensate for it by exercising, eating less the next day, and even forcing themselves to throw up. People who force themselves to throw up are called bulimic.
Bulimia is a disorder that many people with anorexia seem to develop. The dictionary defines bulimia as “an emotional disorder involving distortion of body image and an obsessive desire to lose weight, in which bouts of extreme overeating are followed by depression and self-induced vomiting, purging, or fasting.” As you can see, that is very similar to the effects of anorexia. In addition, people with bulimia often eat large amounts of food in a very short period of time, which they regret doing so as a result, they self induce vomit. They feel that this is the best way to compensate for overeating.
If anorexia was to be described in a few words, it would be described as “loss of appetite”. And with this description, that means that anorexia can be caused by many other things, not just a choice to do it for body image or calorie intake. People can be anorexic because of cancer, aids, mental disorders, or any other disease that results in the loss of appetite. Anorexia is caused by anything that makes a person not feel the need to or want to eat food. The people who don’t eat because of they worry about weight gain or being too “fat” are diagnosed with “Anorexia Nervosa”. Anorexia nervosa is where a person is anorexic because they are nervous about being overweight and seen as fat or they have a medical condition which makes them not want to eat.
Some things about anorexia that might surprise you are that about twenty percent of people with anorexia that don’t get treatment will end up dying because of it. Also, about half of girls aged thirteen to fifteen believe that they are overweight and up to sixty percent of high school girls have dieted to lose weight. That could be part of the explanation why nine out of ten people with anorexia are women. That could also be why anorexia is far more common in adolescents than adults. Adolescents are more impressionable than adults as well so they want to be more like the super models they see and idolize. This causes them to want to be a skinny model too. That’s why young girls are more prone to having anorexia.
Knowing all of this you can probably think of someone you know who is or could be considered anorexic. If you wonder what to do for them, there are a few simple things such as taking them to see a doctor. Hearing something from a doctor can make it a lot more convincing and meaningful than just hearing it from a worried friend. Another thing that can be done is to have a plan ready for them. Let them know that you are thinking about them and want them to get better. There are a number of different phone numbers that can be called to help with this. All in all, just let them know you are there for them and will help in any way possible.
Anorexia is a disease that affects many people in the world today, especially young women. It causes the person to lose their appetite for one of many reasons such as a mental disorder or a physical disease such as cancer. It causes the patient to become abnormally skinny and carries along with it many health issues, and in extreme cases death. Anorexia is a dangerous disease and without awareness and some proper was to go about fixing the problem, it will continue to take the lives of far too many people.
By: Blake Peterson
Byers, Allie. “Anorexia.” 7 March 2019.
“Anorexia Nervosa.” National Eating Disorders Association, 28 Feb. 2018, www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/learn/by-eating-disorder/anorexia
“Anorexia: What Causes People to Become Anorexic?” WebMD, WebMD, www.webmd.com/mental-health/eating-disorders/anorexia-nervosa/understanding-anorexia-basics.
“Anorexia: What Causes People to Become Anorexic?” WebMD, WebMD, www.webmd.com/mental-health/eating-disorders/anorexia-nervosa/understanding-anorexia-basics.
“Home.” ….Effects on Physical and Mental Health, www.mirror-mirror.org/anorexia-statistics.htm
