Eating Disorders and Side Effects - You are at a Health Risk

Defining Eating Disorders & Side Effects

Eating Disorders affect a person's psyche, health and functioning level. They pose serious threats to psychological and physical health, ranging from dental problems, cardiac and gastrointestinal problems to death. Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of all psychiatric disorders.

Anorexia and bulimia are classified as mental disorders, criteria for the diagnoses are made up of specific symptoms and behaviors (e.g. excessive exercising, refusal to maintain "average" body weight, as well as loss of monthly periods, for the diagnosis of anorexia). Treatment for the disorders usually involve therapy and at times medication in addition to therapy. Eating disorders can be understood as having multiple roots, such as depression, low self-esteem, dysfunctional family dynamics, sexual/physical abuse history and other psychological problems. These components are important to consider, yet the cultural component also needs to be recognized as one of the possible constituent in conceptualizing etiology of eating disorders.

The classic view of eating disorders fails to recognize the pathology inherent in the culture, the pressure for women to be thin, to diet. Many women in this society do not fit neatly into the categories of anorexia or bulimia, but fall on a continuum of eating disordered behaviors. In fact, one of the medical criteria of anorexia nervosa: body weight 15% below a weight that is considered "normal", would be met by the majority of models and beauty contestants.
Indeed, the fear of fat is widely spread in this society, so that many women resort to self-destructive or painful behavior, plastic surgery and dieting being two examples. The unrelenting pursuit of thinness, which is the hallmark of the eating disorder anorexia nervosa, seems in part to have its origins in the culture's transitions toward a thin beauty ideal. Self-destructive dieting behavior is culturally supported.

Eating disorders are one of the key health issues facing young women. Studies in the last decade show that eating disorders and disordered eating behaviors are related to other health risk behaviors, including tobacco use, alcohol use, marijuana use, delinquency, unprotected sexual activity, and suicide attempts. Currently, 1-4% of all young women in the United States are affected by eating disorders. Anorexia nervosa, for example, ranks as the third most common chronic illness among adolescent females in the United States.

Side-Effects of Eating Disorders:

Eating disorders have numerous physical, psychological and social ramifications, from significant weight preoccupation, inappropriate eating behavior, and body image distortion. Many people with eating disorders experience depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and childhood sexual abuse, and may be at risk for osteoporosis and heart problems. Moreover, death rates are among the highest for any mental illness.