Mental Health 101: Eating Disorders

Everyone has at some point in their life said to his/herself "I need to lose or gain a couple of pounds"and may adjust their diet accordingly.  However there are those who take it to extremes.  Eating disorders are abnormal eating habits that are harmful to one's health.  Eating disorders affect both men and women.  In the United States, eating disorders are more common than Alzheimer's disease.  In addition to abnormal eating habits, people with eating disorders engage in unhealthy behaviors such as  skipping meals, fasting, smoking cigarettes, vomiting and taking laxatives. 

There are three eating disorders in the DSM-IV-TR:  Anorexia, Bulimia, and Binge Eating Disorder. 

Symptoms of Anorexia include

• Refusal to maintain body weight at or above a minimally normal weight for age and height.
• Intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat, even though underweight.
• Disturbance in the way one's body weight or shape is experienced, undue influence of body weight or shape on self evaluation, or denial of the seriousness of the current low body weight.
• Amenorrhea, i.e., the absence of at least 3 consecutive menstrual cycles. 

Symptoms of Bulimia include:

• Recurrent episodes of binge eating characterized by both eating, in a discrete period of time an amount of food that is definitely larger than most people would eat during the same time frame and a sense of lack of control over eating during the episode.
• Recurrent inappropriate compensatory behavior to prevent weight gain, such as self-induced vomiting, misuse of laxatives, diuretics, enemas, or other medications, fasting, or excessive exercise.
• The binge eating and inappropriate compensatory behavior both occur, on average, at least twice a week for 3 months.
• Self evaluation is unduly influenced by body shape and weight.

Symptoms of Binge Eating Disorder include:

• Loss of control over amount of eating
• Marked distress over binge episode
• Occurs at least 1x per week for 3 months
• Eating more rapidly than normal (i.e. 2 hr period)
• Eating until feeling uncomfortably full
• Eating large amounts of food when not feeling physically hungry
• Eating alone because of being embarrassed by how much one is eating
• Feeling disgusted with oneself, depressed or very guilty over after overeating

Treatment for eating disorders include adequate nutrition, reducing excessive exercise, and stopping purging behaviors. Specific forms of psychotherapy, or talk therapy, and medication are effective for many eating disorders.  However treating eating disorders can be expensive. For example, a residential program for anorexia can cost upwards of $30,000 a month.

If you think that you or someone you know may have a eating disorder, seek help from a doctor or mental health professional as soon as you can.  That's their job.  Here is some online resources.

www.nationaleatingdisorders.org
www.anad.org

Take care,
-Kimmy