Anorexia and Bulimia

When Being Thin is All You Think About

Jennifer is 14 years old and on the eighth-grade honor role at school. She is five feet four inches tall and originally weighed 110 pounds but has lost about 30 pounds in the past year. She wants to lose more. Jennifer says she is "grossed out" by overweight people. She wants to be "athletic-looking without flabby curves."

Most days Jennifer eats plain yogurt with fruit for lunch. (OMG! I eat fried chicken for my lunch, and I lost about 3 kg last week.) For breakfast she has a stick of sugarless gum. (A gum for breakfast?!) If she eats dinner, it might be carrot sticks or a small salad. (Well, I have a pecel leleor bebek cabe ijo / roasted duck for my dinner. Yummy!) Despite her skin-and-bones appearance and assurances from others that she is too skinny, Jennifer exercises almost two hours daily.

Thin is in. Exercise programs, diet centers, infomercials, weight-loss groups, and figure salons cannot meet the demand. Some estimate that over 20 million people in the country are seriously dieting, and that they spend more than $10 billion yearly to do so. (If I have those money, I would buy the Poncan Island for myself! HAHAHAHAHA!!!)

The media do their part to preach the thin-is-in message. Slinky models smile from the covers of magazines, billboards, and television. Their message is celar: "If you want to be happy and succeed, you cannot be too thin."

This message is deeply disturbing to some people. Their passion for thinness becomes an overwhelming obsession that takes priority over everything else. These people suffer from disorders called anorexia and bulimia.

Pop singer Karen Carpenter died in 1983 of unexplained heart failure at the age of 32. After her death, her family revealed that she had been suffering from anorexia for 12 years.Anorexia is a life-threatening starvation syndrome. A person with anorexia has an irrational fear of being fat and is constantly trying to become thinner. Anorexia can be deadly.

Bulimia is characterized by repeated cycles of binge eating followed by self-induced vomiting, laxative abuse, or fasting and excessive exercise. During a binge phase, bulimic people consume enorjmous amounts of food like ice cream, chocolates, and candy. They sometimes binge for hours! To relieve the painful feeling of being gorged and to reduce worries about weight gain, bulimic people will often force themselves to vomit. While weight loss may not be as extreme as in anorexia, bulimia can lead to kidney problems and many other serious problems.

Here are some suggestions.

1. Look at your attitude about weight loss

If you're dieting, ask yourself why. Are you truly overweight, or do you just want to look thinner? Are you under a doctor's orders to lose weight for medical reasons, or are you trying to please friends and potential dates? (If my boyfriend asked me to lose my weight, I would know that he's NOT the one, he's just ONE of jerks.) All I ever thought about was my weight. Finally my mom helped me manage my weight without losing my mind. Hahaha... Thanks mom! ♥

2. Find a good counselor

Every person who struggles with harmful eating habits can benefit from seeing a trained expert. Ask a teacher, minister, or physician to recommend someone skilled in dealing with eating disorders. But for me, my best counselor is my mother.

3. Keep a food journal

It helps to keep track of the type and amount of food you eat. Record the times and places when you eat and the feelings and thoughts you have before, during, and after eating. This will help you to become more aware of the connections between your feelings and eating habits and to identify the kinds of feelings that lead to unhealthy eating patterns.

4. Schedule a medical exam

Every person with anorexia or bulimia needs to get expert medical attention --- a physical exam is a must. Without knowing it, your blood pressure, heart rate, body temperature, and respiration rates could be dangerously out of balance. A pharmacist in a drug store might be a good person to turn to for direction.

LOOKING AHEAD

If you are obsessed with thinness --if it's all you seem to think about -- you don't have to continue to suffer and put your health at risk. Talk with a professional about this problem. It can save you years of heartache. It can help you to see you are beautiful just the way you are(Bruno Mars' song - Just The Way You are) and that real beauty comes from within. It may even save your life.

Discover the beauty within you!