Eating Disorders - Anorexia Nervosa
Signs
By Michael Russell
In our continuing series on eating disorders,
this article will focus on Anorexia Nervosa.
Anorexia Nervosa is a very serious eating
disorder which can be potentially life threatening.
It's main characteristic is self starvation
and excessive weight loss.
Anorexia Nervosa has four main symptoms and
they are as follows:
1. A strong resistance to maintaining
a person's body weight at or above what
would be considered a normal minimum body
weight for that person's age, weight and
height.
2. A very strong and intense fear of
getting fat or being overweight even though
to all appearances the person is at a
normal or even below normal weight.
3. A strong disturbance by the shape
of the person's body. An obsession with
achieving a certain look that, though
to all normal appearances, is thin and
frail, to the person suffering from this
disease looks perfectly normal.
4. A sudden loss of the menstrual cycle
in women who are past the age of puberty
and in girls who have yet to reach puberty,
the cycle never begins.
It is important that to have the best
chance of successfully treating a person
with Anorexia Nervosa that the disease
be diagnosed early and treatment begin
immediately.
There are many warning signs that someone
is suffering from this disease. They are
as follows:
a. A sudden and dramatic loss of weight
in a very short period of time.
b. An obsession with counting calories,
grams, fat content and a number of other
things associated with the food the person
eats, reaching the point where they keep
daily charts of calorie intake to make
sure they don't go above a certain level.
c. A gradual elimination of certain food
groups that the person believes to be
fattening such as sweets and eventually
reaching the point of eliminating essential
foods that contain carbohydrates. Eventually
there is very little food the person will
eat.
d. A person suffering from Anorexia Nervosa
will often make comments about how fat
they are even though it is apparent that
they are in no way overweight. This is
usually one of the earliest warning signs.
e. The person may be very hungry and
in need of food intake but will deny that
they are hungry at all.
f. The person will start to develop odd
food rituals such as eating foods in a
particular order and arranging the foods
in a certain way on the plate. The person
will also begin to excessively chew their
food in the hopes that more will be digested
and less will turn to fat.
g. The person will start to make excuses
for missing meals such as, homework, tired
or just not hungry. They will do anything
to avoid eating.
h. The person will often begin a rigid
exercise routine regardless of weather,
fatigue, illness or even injury. The person
will push themselves to any length to
get their exercise in. This in itself
can cause great harm if the person is
out of shape.
i. A person suffering from this disease
will withdraw from friends and activities.
They will eventually become totally reclusive.
In our next article we will cover some
statistics of Anorexia Nervosa and some
statistics of the disease.
-------------------------------------------------------
Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to Eating
Disorders
