For the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA), this week marks the period to spread awareness about Eating Disorders. February 27th to March 5th is Eating Disorders Awareness week. The goal of this week is to encourage open discussion, spark awareness, and to help end the stigma behind disordered eating.
At what point, did being healthy become associated with being skinny? The standard of beauty is associated with the idea of being healthy. “Beauty is pain” is not a quote that I would ever wish anyone to live by. It may have all started with an advertisement on T.V, your favourite celebrity endorsing a diet product, or maybe it started out as “clean eating”, weight-loss due to activities such as ballet, or envying your naturally slim figured peer that walked the hallways. Until you learn that she’s suffering too.
A mental illness easily goes unnoticed, until the symptoms start to physically wear the person down. Maybe it was the harsh, disgusting reality of body-shaming that is too present in society today. No matter what the cause is, I strongly believe that it’s time to not just take steps, but huge jumps towards ending the stigma behind mental illness, which encompasses eating disorders.
Society needs to do a better job of emphasizing that mental illness is a harsh reality that many individuals face. Furthermore, industries need to realize that all body types are just as beautiful so that they can project that message to communities and everyone in them.
What is an Eating Disorder?
The term eating disorder is most commonly associated with anorexia nervosa, the condition of restricting food intake and often suffering from the fear of gaining weight, and bulimia nervosa, a cycle of overeating followed by some method of purging, whether by vomiting, overexercising, or laxative use. They’re the most known types of eating disorders, but the term refers to any type of unhealthy behavior with food, body type, and weight. The poor relationship between food and individual often spills over to affect everyday parts of life, such as school or work.
Apart from the two mentioned, there are multiple types of Eating Disorders:
• Orthorexia – the obsession with eating “clean foods”
• Emotional Eating Disorder – are several conditions that result in eating as a response to emotions.
• Binge Eating Disorder – the extreme, uncontrollable overconsumption of food in short periods of time.
• Purging Disorder – purging without binge eating.
Other Eating Disorders are generally put under the label “Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (ENDOS) include:
• Rumination Disorder (aka chewing and spitting) – the continued pattern of regurgitating food.
• Atypical Anorexia – Anorexia nervosa where weight is not below “healthy BMI”.
• Pica – the habit of eating objects that are not supposed to be consumed (e.g. chalk, paint, feathers).
• Night Eating Syndrome – the consumption of excessive amounts of food at night time.
Eating disorders come in many forms, affecting people of all shapes and sizes. It may be easier for people to point out an underweight person as potentially having an ED, however, the mental illness is not reserved for those with a low BMI. In fact, It’s extremely common for people to have no obvious symptoms at all. Eating disorders often go beyond aiming for a lower number on the scales.
Vanity may appear to be the primary motivation, but the behaviors are often an expression of an underlying issue. It’s both a psychological and physical illness. The physiological factors are what manifests into the physical actions and behaviour of limiting or overconsuming food, or exercise. These factors could include: low self-esteem, negative body image, stress, anxiety, and environmental factors, to name just a few. The point is there is no one reason why someone develops an eating disorder and that the conditions and treatment are very subjective. Additionally, there is no specific type of person that develops an eating disorder. They affect men, women, children, and adults alike.
Symptoms of Eating Disorders:
There are many symptoms of eating disorders, some easier to spot than others. As mentioned, physical signs of eating disorders are normally the easiest to spot, yet they reveal themselves late. Some include:
• Dramatic weight loss.
• Refusal to eat amongst others, avoiding meal times
• Excessive behaviors with counting calories, measuring food, and constant dieting
• Excessive exercise.
• Comments about being “fat” or remarks about un-satisfaction with appearance and body image.
• Complaints about stomach pains.
• Jaundice.
• Annehmorea (stop of menstruation)
• Complaints about being cold.
• Refusing to recognize fast weight loss as an issue.
• Avoiding or refusing to eat foods.
There’s no need to suffer in silence.
Eating disorders have often been glamorized. “Thinspo” and “thinspiration” Instagram photos, Twitter accounts, and blogs are completely toxic and encourage eating disorders in odd fashions.
It’s presented as an achievement, a goal to work towards. Out of all mental Illnesses, anorexia nervosa is the leading cause of death. This chilling fact is not something that should be glamorized or strived towards. The National Eating Disorders Information Centre (NEDIC) states that roughly 10 percent of individuals who suffer from the illness and are left untreated will die within the next 10 years. To put it bluntly, there is nothing unhealthier than fetishizing an illness that can kill.
It’s an awful battle that is usually fought behind closed doors where people allow themselves to suffer in silence. EDs are a slow form of self-destruction. It’s a battle, that you can never win because the result of the mental illness is to always drop more weight. What you can do is defeat the voices in your head or manage the stressors that allow you to be driven to these behaviors.
It’s a constant cloud that is worn over your head. Every day, every hour; it consumes your thoughts at every point in the day; so no, it’s not a choice but rather, a trap. What’s relieving to know is that it is possible to recover. It does not have to be a downward spiral. Help is always available as soon as you’re ready to accept it. For resources on where to get help or start a discussion on campus, visits the Health and Counseling Services across all three campuses.
If there is one thing that I hope everyone takes away from this piece, it’s that… eating disorders are not a choice. If one could wake up and decide that they want to have an ED, then they could wake up and simply decide that they want to be free of it. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple; it doesn’t work that way and it is nothing but a myth.
Beauty is not defined by a number on the scale. It is not defined by excessive exercise, or being able to resist food. Beauty comes from understanding that you’re valuable in any shape and size, and being confident in that.
Reference link: https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/