Jocelyn Bennett Mrs. Gallos English 3 Honors 6, April 2017 What it Takes to Achieve the Perfect Body The world today makes it to where if a person is not accepted they go home, they cry, and they try to cope their pain with either food, harm, anger etc. They shut themselves away from the world because they believe that they are imperfect. However, they are not the imperfect ones, it is society. Society raises the rates of depression within victims of eating disorders. There are three main reasons for developing an eating disorder: social, genetics, and psychological. The society today brings many people to the belief that to obtain the perfect body they must put their bodies through unhealthy habits which can lead to the harm of themselves …show more content…
Anorexia is more of the psychological eating disorder. This is said because they believe they are bigger than what they truly are, however they are not. In fact, the victims are mostly under or below weight according to the body mass index scale. (Anorexics). However, “Someone with anorexia may also have a distorted body image, shown by thinking she or he is fat” (Anorexia Nervosa). Viewing themselves as fat causes them to purge (forcibly vomit). Many of the victims are aware of the health effects caused by purging. However, victims of anorexia only consider what they believe is what is truly seen. These victims will do anything to make sure their issue of being “fat” is resolved. The terrible fact about this mentality is that the victim’s mind will not allow them to see anything other than “fat”. So, telling a victim repeatedly that they are not fat will not be an effective solution to their problem. Thus, making anorexia not only a physical disorder but a mental disorder as well. Additionally, many people would not even think that someone would participate in both practices, anorexia nervosa and binge-eating, however there are multiple people that do. The term for having a combination of both symptoms is bulimia nervosa. Unfortunately, “between 1.1% and 4.6% of females and 0.1% to 0.5% of males will develop bulimia” (Bulimia). This may not seem like a lot
Anorexia is an eating disorder that struggles with the fear of gaining weight and refuses to be healthy. Another eating disorder is Bulimia, which is when you overeat followed by forced vomiting and excessive exercise. Binge Eating is one of the most common eating disorders along with Anorexia and Bulimia, Binge eating is when you lose control over one’s eating. All of these common eating disorders all suffer from guilt or depression. “Individuals with bulimia and binge eating eat large amounts of food to reduce stress” (CEDC). They also could have risky behaviors, such as dealing with drugs or alcohol or even death. People with Anorexia or Bulimia are very concerned with being overweight or in other words fat.
Even if some girls were not classified as having an eating disorder 44% of adolescent girls believed they were heavy and 60% were exercising excessively trying to lose weight. (Katzman et al. Pg. 287). Anorexia and Bulimia nervosa are deemed as medical illnesses or used to describe a psychological disorder by of self-induced starvation in order to become thin. People that have either of these illnesses have an excessive fear of gaining weight although they differ in their causation. Anorexia is when the person starves themselves for days without eating and Bulimia is recurrent binge eating, followed by vomiting, purging, fasting, the use of laxatives, diuretics, and over exercising. Sadly they both cause great harm to the human body.
According to NEDA anorexia is the “intense fear of weight gain,” which leads to starving oneself to the point of malnutrition ("Types & Symptoms of Eating Disorders”). Bulimia is when a person continually consumes large amounts of food, followed by purging or excessive working out to eliminate the chance of weight gain. Binge eating is similar to bulimia, both consume large amounts, but binge eaters do this and then eat nothing for a while. Their eating patterns go from enormous amounts of food to nothing and back again (“Types & Symptoms of Eating Disorders”). Public awareness about all these eating disorders has been spread, some doctors preach eating right and working out, but few people listen to or act on the doctors words. Eating disorders have become a major problem in American and we need a solution soon.
Anorexia is a psychologically based eating disorder in a human, when a person feels extremely insecure of his/ her physical appearance by thinking that his/ her physical appearance is not impressive or socially acceptable at all and gets obsessed & involved in continuous efforts to lose weight. Their weight loosing efforts are not healthy rather are extremely unhealthy in the form of vigorous exercises, imbalanced diet plans & intake and unsatisfying mistaken image of themselves towards them. Their problem is not based on the reality of being as fat as they actually are but of the amount they think they are. Their image of being fat doesn’t come from the mirror but from their own mind so it is a virtual reality. The purpose of
Eating disorders are mental illnesses that affect a person’s eating habits, causing them to lose/gain weight in an unsafe manner. There are two commonly known eating disorders, anorexia and bulimia, but there are more than just those two most commonly talked about. Anorexia is an illness where the victim refuses to eat and will over exercise to lose weight. Bulimia is an illness where the victim will binge, or eat a lot of food, and purge, or throw up, shortly after. Binge eating disorder is an illness where the sufferer binges on food, but does not purge. Like bulimia, the sufferers have feelings of guilt but find it hard to control themselves around food, eating portions that are excessive. Orthorexia, another disorder not commonly talked about, is a disorder where the patient avoid certain foods he or she may deem unhealthy, eventually deeming all foods unhealthy and having symptoms much like anorexia. Pica disorder is an eating disorder that is very rarely talked about, but it is still very harmful. People with the Pica eating disorder tend to eat inanimate objects, which can cause obstructions and other medical problems.
Anorexia Nervosa causes people to obsess about weight and the things they intake. There are two common types of Anorexia which are Binge/Purge and Restrictive. Binge eating is a serious disorder in which you feel the need to eat non-stop. A Restrictive food intake disorder is a eating disorder where the person doesn’t get enough of the nutrients that they need.
The effects of Anorexia include; being underweight, fearing gaining weight, bad perception of own body, and depending on the age: absence of their period in women ("Treating Eating Disorders"). Other effects can be; "The physical manifestations of anorexia often include drastic weight loss, erosion of the stomach lining caused by self-induced vomiting, loss of menstruation, anemia and, in severe cases, heart failure. Other symptoms include obsessive exercising and strange eating habits. Anorexics will often play games when they eat, such as not allowing the cutlery to touch their lips; chewing a certain number of times per bite, or arranging the food in certain patterns on their plates" (Goldman). Even after being treated and being brought back to a good health, Anorexia patients can find it hard accepting that they are back to a weight that they used to find uncomfortable to be in (Goldman). Anorexia does not just affect the person whom has it, but the people who care for that person such as family and friends, who are the ones who help the person with it seek
Unfortunately, a not so uncommon problem in American society regarding body image is the development of eating disorders. Though the causes are not always known, a seriously negative perception of body image may result in unhealthy eating patterns. The two most widely known eating disorders are anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. Those with anorexia believe that thinness is the key to self-worth and most are never satisfied with their own body image. Contrary to popular belief, anorexia does not deal directly with food; it has been described that anorexia is an unhealthy way to “cope with emotional problems” (Mayo Clinic). Dieting occupies most of their day, and many purposely starve to lose weight. Many of those affected refuse to maintain a healthy weight and become extremely thin, due to being intensely afraid of gaining weight.
Anorexia Nervosa is an eating disorder characterized by an intense fear of putting on weight with a negative attitude towards body weight (medical dictionary). Due to this extensive fear, people eventually starve themselves leading to extremely low body weights. People suffering from Anorexia take extreme efforts to keep their body weights in check by limiting the amount of food they eat. These efforts range from excessive exercise, misusing diet aids to vomiting after eating just to reduce the level of calorie intake. However, it should be noted that Anorexia is less of an issue about food but more of a mental problem whereby people suffering from it equate thinness to self-worth (Mayo Clinic). As such Anorexia is a psychiatric disorder
Anorexia Nervosa is a mental illness and is referred to as an under-nutrition eating disorder that is often mistaken for a “lifestyle choice”. It is when the person with the illness sees themselves as overweight and wishes to lose a few kilos. So said person begins to diet and exercise and they notice they’re losing the weight. Said person then reaches said goal weight but is still not happy with the way they look so they decide to keep dieting. People with the illness often say they can hear a voice in their head (often referred to it as ‘Ana’ for anorexia and ‘Mia’ for bulimia) telling them that they don’t look good enough and they need to lose more weight. Eventually, said person has lost so much weight that you can see their bones and their knees don’t touch, but no, that’s not good enough for ‘Ana’ so they continue to diet and exercise religiously until eventually, their body can not handle the stress and it shuts down.
It’s the main reason why people end up on a path of suffering from either one of these diseases. People who suffer from anorexic believe that they are fat. There psychological mechanisms in the brain that make them believe such things even if the mirror shows the complete opposite. People starve themselves even though they suffer from then complete symptoms of hunger that it hurt their stomach. They still starve themselves with the idea that they emotionally believe that they are fat and need to lose weight. People whom suffer from the disorder obesity, they have the emotional problem of coping. They cope with their insecurities or anything in their life that is hurting them by eating. Same way that some people escape their life with drugs. Obesity individuals do the same except with
Bulimia Nervosa is surprisingly more common than anorexia. This disorder involves binge eating and then immediate purging of the food by self-induced vomiting, diuretics, enemas, or other medications. It may also be followed by fasting or excessive exercise. These people usually weigh within the normal range for their age and height, but they fear gaining weight and feel intensely unhappy with their bodies. They will almost always hide the behavior due to shame and disgust of the binging, and will feel relieved once they purge.
They often will use dietary aids to purge the unwanted calories from binge eating. In this stage of the purging process, individuals with Anorexia Nervosa will self-induce vomiting like individuals with Bulimia Nervosa. (Schullherr, Eating Disorders For Dummies)
Anorexia is firstly, not a physical disease, nor is it a lifestyle choice, Anorexia is in fact a mental disorder whereby the sufferer sees themselves as much larger than they actually are. This will lead to them having an obsession over what they eat and how much they eat. Their aim is to have as low a body weight as possible, and in order to do so they will often starve themselves, or exercise excessively. To many, body weight is inversely proportional to self-worth, meaning that the lower their body weight the higher their self-worth.
Anorexia may begin with a normal person who diets intending only to lose “just a few pounds”. Dieting then becomes an obsession as they develop a distorted body image and feel larger than they really are. Soon, 5 to 10 pounds is not enough and they slowly begin to avoid food either by denying hunger or claiming to be stuffed after a few small bites.