The reality of eating disorders
Eating disorders affect people you wouldn’t usually consider
Eating disorders are something that most people are used to reading about. Magazines, TV programmes and even the news quite regularly feature this issue. A lot of people think of eating disorders as things that affect other people, usually teenage girls, models or dancers. But did you know that eating disorders actually can affect almost anyone – the type of people you hang out with – your friends, family or colleagues?
Where it all starts
Most eating disorders come from the same basic root belief. Someone who is struggling with difficult thoughts, experiences, feelings or memories comes to believe that things would be different if they were thinner. They start to place their hopes and aims on that one thing: in order to change their life they need to be thinner. An eating disorder develops because someone believes that losing weight will help them to cope with whatever life is throwing at them. Now that feeling that things would be better if we were thinner is something a lot of us have felt at some time. In fact about ¼ of those aged 16-35 say that they hate their body and want to be thinner. The pressure to be thin is so great that about ¼ of adults admit they are effectively on a permanent diet – that’s about 13 million people in this country.
Millions of us are struggling everyday
Of course for people who develop full blown eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa or binge eating disorder, dieting starts to get out of control.
Their eating becomes chaotic and starts to really affect their health. But many millions of us are struggling every day with eating patterns that are unhealthy and often really upset us. And that’s why eating disorders can actually touch almost anyone. Most eating disorders do start in teenage years, but it is increasingly common for them to start later on – in 20s or 30s. Eating disorders are often thought of as women’s problems but actually the rates in men are increasing and men now make up ¼ of sufferers.
Real healthy eating
Its easy to see why so many of us feel under pressure about what we do – or don’t – eat. Some days you can hardly turn on the TV without finding a show about dieting, healthy or unhealthy eating. But maybe the real healthy eating we should be striving for is to change the relationship we have with food, to understand the way we are using our eating to try to cope with other things in our life, and to stop feeling under pressure to try to change the person we are.
Psychologist Dr. Kate Middleton is the Director of Anorexia & Bulimia Care, the national UK Christian eating disorders charity, which is holding a campaign in Eating Disorders Awareness Week (25th Feb-2nd March) to raise awareness of eating disorders – and the people who are affected by them.
If you would like more information, or help and advice, contact ABC on help@anorexiabulimiacare.co.uk or see any of the links below.
Helpful Links
http://www.anorexiabulimiacare.co.uk/
http://www.disordered-eating.co.uk/
Related article: The road to recovery
Have you, or has someone you know, been affected by an eating disorder? Feel free to discuss this article in the forum.
Written by Kate Middleton.
Digg it
Reddit
Delicious
Stumble It!
Furl it
