5 Things You Need to Know About Eating Disorders

If you just go with movies, television, and other media, you will come away with an odd mix of accurate and bizarre ideas about eating disorders. In those spaces, facts are often subordinated to storytelling or plain old sensationalism. It is no surprise then that many people don’t understand what eating disorders are, what causes them, who suffers from them, and how one can recover from them.

5 Things to Know About Eating Disorders

Here are five essential things you need to know about eating disorders.

Eating disorders are a type of mental health issue

As we will note here and later, eating disorders are not some kind of fad or lifestyle choice that someone decides “to get in on.” They are not simply about food but are instead complex mental health problems that a person tries to remedy through the coping or control mechanism of food. Eating disorders are both psychological and medical (or physical) in nature, which adds to their complexity.

There are powerful emotions, behaviors, and attitudes that someone with an eating disorder has around food and weight issues. The DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition) recognizes around 8 categories of eating and feeding disorders. The remedy for eating disorders is not simply about “snapping out of it” or powering through it but getting the help of professionals and others around you to walk with you on the journey.

Anyone can suffer from an eating disorder

One of the widespread myths about eating disorders is that only some people get them. Around 30 million Americans of all ages, genders, or ethnicities will suffer from an eating disorder at one point or another in their lives. Eating disorders do not discriminate. Anyone can develop an eating disorder, regardless of their age, gender, ethnicity, culture, body size, or socioeconomic circumstances.

They are not a lifestyle choice or a fad that someone buys into. Anyone can feel dissatisfied with their body and feel unhappy about themselves and their life, whether due to a comment made by someone or due to life circumstances that are overwhelming and beyond their control. Eating disorders can be triggered by any number of factors, including environmental, genetic, mental, emotional, or social factors.

They can emerge, for example, from false narratives that say that happiness, success, and a sense of well-being are tied to your body shape or weight, and they then begin to distort our relationship with food. This distortion can take shape as one of several kinds of eating disorders.

Eating disorders are detrimental to your health

Eating disorders can severely affect your mental, emotional, and physical health. Depending on food to alter your mood stems from and leads to poor mental and emotional well-being. When we have an unhealthy relationship with our food, we either wind up consuming too much of it, or too little.

Consuming too much food leads to complications and conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, obesity, and its attendant issues. On the other hand, too little food means that the body is not getting the nutrients it needs to function well. Eventually, the body begins to break down as it simply cannot cope with the stress being applied to it without relief. Below we will detail the different types of eating disorders, and how they can affect one’s health.

There are different types of eating disorders

There are different kinds of eating disorders, and these affect one’s physical and mental health in various ways. With the help of a trained professional, understanding the eating disorder you or your loved one are suffering from is key to taking the appropriate steps to address it. The treatment plan for each type of eating disorder is different, and the goals you and your treatment team set will also have a distinct shape.

What then are these different types of eating disorders? The most common types of eating disorders include binge eating disorder, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia nervosa.

Binge eating disorder Binge eating disorder leads people to consume unusually large amounts of food in a set period such as over an hour or two, for instance; eating secretly, even when full or not even hungry. Binge-eaters may use food as a means of comfort during times of distress – as a result, the individual often struggles with being overweight or obese.

This is because, unlike bulimia nervosa, those with binge-eating disorder lose control over their eating habits and binge-eat, but their binge-eating episodes are not attended with compensatory purging behaviors such as vomiting, fasting, or exercise. Binge eating disorder often brings about feelings of shame, distress, and guilt about eating which then need to be soothed, creating a vicious cycle.

Anorexia nervosa It is sometimes simply called “anorexia.” Anorexia nervosa can be fatal because this eating disorder leads to the individual developing medical conditions and complications associated with starvation due to the body not getting all the nutrients it needs to function properly.

The symptoms of anorexia nervosa include an intense and unreasonable fear of gaining weight, a distorted body image, and as time elapses other symptoms such as muscle wasting, damage to heart function and structure, the thinning of bones, weakness, dry and yellowish skin, brain damage, infertility, and multiorgan failure develop.

There are two broad subcategories of individuals with anorexia nervosa: restrictive and binge-purge. Someone with the binge-purge type of anorexia places severe restrictions on the type and amount of food they eat, and additionally, they may have binge-eating and purging behaviors such as using diuretics, laxatives, and vomiting.

A person with the restrictive subtype of anorexia also places severe restrictions on the amount and type of food that they consume. This limits the calories and nutrients they consume, starving their bodies of what they need. The result of this behavior is that the person becomes dangerously underweight, even while they think themselves overweight and continue to weigh themselves constantly.

Bulimia nervosa It is sometimes simply called “bulimia.” A person who has bulimia nervosa may be able to maintain a normal weight or be overweight. In other words, you can’t simply tell from outward appearances alone if someone suffers from it.

Those with this disorder find themselves caught in a cycle of overeating and feeling out of control when they do so. The episodes of binge eating are then followed by compensatory behavior such as excessive exercise and use of laxatives and diuretics, forced vomiting, fasting, or a combination of the above.

You can recover from eating disorders and get healthy

Despite their complexity, eating disorders are treatable. There is hope for recovery and getting healthy! The treatment path that can take for your eating disorder will depend on the disorder you struggle with and its symptoms. Treatment options for eating disorders will include medication and therapy, nutrition education, or a combination of these approaches.

Therapy may last from a few months to a few years. Various therapies have a proven track record of being effective in addressing both the surface and root issues underlying eating disorders. Regarding therapy, your counselor will work with you to set goals for your therapy such as restoring a healthy body image, rebuilding self-esteem, unearthing and addressing the underlying cause(s) of your eating disorder, and setting goals such as healthy body weight.

The road to recovery from an eating disorder is best traveled with others. Your treatment team, the people who will walk this journey with you, may comprise a dietician, a psychotherapist, your family members, and friends who will be your cheerleaders and help you with sticking to your goals.

The health professionals on your team will assist you in developing and tailoring a treatment plan that works for your eating disorder to help you set attainable goals and move toward a healthy lifestyle. Medications can’t cure eating disorders, but they do help in treating co-morbid conditions such as anxiety and depression. Medication may also be needed to treat any physical health problems that may have resulted from the eating disorder.

Nutrition education is an important aspect of a treatment plan. A dietician can help you develop a plan to achieve and maintain healthy eating habits. This may include practicing meal planning, setting up regular eating patterns, maintaining boundaries, taking steps to avoid bingeing or dieting, and correcting any health problems that may have resulted from either obesity or malnourishment.

Next Steps: Christian Counseling in Plano, Texas

We can imbibe false narratives about ourselves that lead us to distort our relationship with food and our bodies. Whether caused by environmental, social, or genetic factors, eating disorders can severely and negatively impact a person’s mental and physical health, and they can be life-threatening in some cases. The good news is that these disorders are treatable, and while the road to health may be long, it is possible to recover and regain a full and healthy life.

If you’re looking for additional support, contact us at Texas Christian Counseling in Plano. We offer faith-based treatment to help you overcome the challenges you face. Reach out today to schedule an appointment with me or one of the other Christian counselors in Plano, Texas.