Normal Behaviors And Eating Disorders

Have you ever eaten when you were not hungry, just because something tasted good? Have you ever been too nervous or too upset to eat anything at all? Have you found yourself back at the refrigerator for a third time while struggling through a research paper? Maybe you've compared yourself to your friends and your family members and wondered whether your eating habits were normal. Statistically speaking, your eating habits are probably perfectly normal. Feelings and emotions often affect how often and how much people eat.

When you're in your teens, or at any other age, really, it's normal to think about food often-just as it's normal not to think about food very often. How large a role food plays in your life will vary based on your upbringing, your personality, and your likes and dislikes. Sometimes, though, food becomes a true obsession, and the result is an eating disorder. Eating disorders are serious illnesses that usually Involve eating way too little or way too much, and they can seriously endanger one's health.

At one time, eating disorders were rarely mentioned and poorly understood. Today experts throughout the world openly research, peat, and discuss eating disorders. These efforts have challenged many early assumptions about eating disorders. For example, the idea that they are limited to young, white girls has been debunked. Although many young, white girls suffer from eating disorders, they affect people regardless of gender, ethnicity, and age.

Experts now know that eating disorders ore mental health diseases that have recognizable causes, clear symptoms, and predictable outcomes. They also respond to treatment.

Between five and ten million Americans suffer from eating disorders, according to estimates from the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders (ANAD), the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA), and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). The great majority are female, but males are not immune. The NIMH estimates that 5 to 15 percent of people with anorexia or bulimia and an estimated 35 percent of those with binge-eating disorder are male. Although eating disorders most often appear in the early teen years, they may also occur in young children, the middle aged, and the elderly.

There are three main types of eating disorders: anorexia, bulimia, and binge-eating disorder. Anorexia is self-imposed starvation and occurs when someone avoids food to the point that he or she is 15 percent or more below a healthy body weight. Bulimia is a disorder in which someone binges and then purges. Purging is a way of counteracting overeating through vomiting, excessive exercising, fasting, and/or taking laxatives.

Those who suffer from a binge-eating disorder binge regularly but do not purge. They may or may not be overweight. Many who have the disorder cycle between dieting and bingeing, which keeps them from being overweight but does not mean they are healthy. All of these eating disorders are serious mental health problems that should not be ignored. They can and sometimes do cause death.

Now that health experts have learned about eating disorders some are focusing on prevention, and education is critical. Increasing awareness of eating disorders can help reduce the stigma that may be associated with having one and may increase the number of people who get help early, when treatment has the best chance for success. Efforts to help young people build self-esteem by focusing on more than just body image can also go a long way in helping to prevent eating disorders.