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Anorexia and Bulimia are the two main dietary disorders which have swept other dietary disorders aside. They mostly effect girls aged 14 - 17. The causes vary between culture, family pressures, chemical imbalance, emotional & personality disorder. Also genetics might play a small role in contributing to this disorder. In this era, we are constantly bombarded with the images of extremely thin, anorexic models.
We are constantly told, if we want people to like us we must get thin. It has crossed ever womens mind, to be thin and to be popular. These images draw in many girls at tender ages (14 - 17). First they start dieting, consuming less and less food as the weeks progress.
Eventually it gets to a point where they will not place a single piece of food in their mouth because of the fear of getting fat. This would be called anorexic behaviors. Anorexia is a severe revulsion towards food, making him / her malnourished and thin, leading to a possible death if not helped. The other alternative would be to be bulimic, meaning to binge, to eat till your hearts content, and then spend time in the washroom or wherever and throw it up either by yourself or with the aid of laxatives, diuretics, vomit-pills, etc. You may not realize it, but a simple suggestion can lead to one of these disorders. Statistically, around 40 % of 9 - 10 year-old girls try to lose weight because their mothers might have mentioned they should try to eat a little less.
Mothers or other family members of bulimic girls are usually very critical about outer appearance and are detached from their children. Now its not only the mother, but the mother is usually closer to her children when they are at the age of 9 - 10. These disorders might be the results of having parents who abuse drugs, alcohol or other substances. The genetic linkage is that when some people have anorexia there were problems when the mother was pregnant or after the birth like: infections, physical trauma, seizures, etc. Its eight times more common when you have a relative with this disorder. Earlier I mention how families of bulimic girls are usually very critical etc. , I put family in brackets because a family could be the blood family, or another type of family, like a sports family.
Take gymnastics for example, the coaches (family) keep urging the gymnasts to get thinner because the thinner you are, the faster and better. Most gymnasts, as you see arent developed (hips, breasts, etc) this is due to muscular activity they endure and being bulimic. Puberty gets extremely slow and never makes the potential amount it should. The constant yelling from coaches to be thin gets these girls to be depressed and the only way they can be happy is to binge.
So they binge, and then throw up so they wont gain any weight. They get into this cycle, and eventually when they cant take it anymore they get anorexic, think of suicide or keep telling themselves they are fat and they need to get thinner. Their self-esteem drops, they are hypersensitive, the slightest bit of criticism and rejection sends them into another stage of depression. Some experts say serotonin (neurotransmitter) in anorexic and bulimic patients is in a higher level; they are more depressed and have obsessive compulsive disorders.
Emotionally the patient is thinking in a negative pattern. View of life, himself / herself , everything, he / she has a pessimistic view on it all. 40 - 96 % of these patients have been depressed. Bulimia is more common than anorexia. Girls think, if they eat and then throw up, some nutrients are going to stay in their system, thats their mentality. There are three categories for personality disorders: Avoidance, Borderline and Narcissism personality disorders. Avoidance Personality is when people try to be perfect, they are very sensitive and quiet, overall giving an impression of a good human being.
They are afraid to be ridiculed or humiliated, not good with criticism. This is most common in Anorexic people. Borderline Personality is when a person has unstable moods, cares overly too much about self-image, etc. They want attention, they cannot control impulsive behavior.
They have emotional weapons such as: tempers, tantrums, suicidal threats, etc. This is common in bulimic people. Narcissism is when an individual cannot soothe or emphasize others, he / she is hypersensitive to criticism, rejection, etc. This is common in both Anorexic and bulimic patients. Every disorder has symptoms, so do these dietary disorders. The symptoms for anorexia include: denial (everyone else can see that person is skin and bones yet the individual sees fat).
Pressure increases in skull causing nausea, vomiting, and infections in the mouth. The person will undergo a big amount of weight loss, if its a girl, her menstrual cycle will skip some months or just completely stop. His/ her skin will be dry covered by fine hair, feet / hands always cold or swollen, stomach is bloated. Thinking and judgment is impaired or very slow, the individual will commit themselves to compulsive exercise. If the person is very far into the anorexic stage they might go into shock, or have an inadequate supply of oxygen to the medulla oblong ata (region of the vertebrate brain that regulates involuntary body functions. ) In severe cases, the heart rate is very slow; the blood flow is reduced therefore causing a low blood pressure making that person more prone to fainting. They loose bone minerals (osteo penis), there is nerve damage in their system, they might have seizures, might feel numb, and get bloated or constipated.
Anorexia and bulimia share some symptoms like: undergo vigorous exercise routines, they both end up with bone mineral loss, both have low potassium level (weakness, paralysis, lethal heart rhythms) and the list goes on. The specific symptoms for bulimic people are: they binge and then throw up with the aid of laxatives, diuretics, etc, they may have broken blood vessels in their eyes, salivary glands swell below the corners of their mouths. Abdominal region is bloated, their teeth are decayed and their gums are diseased. In a rare case, because of purging, rectum is weak and can no longer control sphincter, must undergo surgery to fix that problem. These individuals might get rashes and pimples all over their bodies. It is not easy to diagnose these types of disorders.
Its hard to catch the problem before the problem catches the person, and the person dies. Most doctors diagnose a person is anorexic by different methods such as: tests for thyroid hormones, protein levels, electrolyte imbalances, blood count level, anything that can indicate that the individual is malnourished. Or the doctor can do it a different way. He might look at her height, age and compare it to her weight. The doctor will also take a look at the patients eating habits etc. Then, will make the diagnosis of a severe dieter or an anorexia bulimia (bingeing throwing up individual).
With bulimia its a bit harder. Most bulimic people are very secretive, but if the doctor gets family and friends involved then he / she can view the patients eating habits (bingeing then throwing up). According to that information, if it includes 2 bulimic episodes per week over a period of months then he / she will conclude that the patient is bulimic and is using medication to get rid of the food. If the individual doesnt have those symptoms then the patient is fasting.
In both cases the patient has a problem but the patient who is fasting can slip down into anorexia. Treatments for these dietary disorders vary from one another. For bulimic individuals you might want to give them anti-depressants like Trofranil, Prozac, Luvox, etc. You would not want to give anti-depressants to anorexic patients because anti-depressants lower the persons appetite (weight loss).
On the other hand anorexic patients should get admitted, and get hospitalized, while bulimic patients dont. In both cases nutritional therapy is very important because it sets out the right type of diet that the person is supposed to go on, and they start off with less calories to adapt with the patients body and then move on to higher numbers. Also all patients should undergo Cognate behavior therapy, that is when the patients diet, habits, everything the patient does is watched. The very last type of therapy all individuals should undergo is Interpersonal therapy.
That the therapy where you talk about the patients feelings about weight food, image etc. Then you try to talk about why they fell that way about those topics. As a professional, you analyze their answers and help them overcome the paranoia of becoming fat. You dont go into this stage right away because the patients mind is still clouded with his / her depressed thoughts and is malnourished. As stated above when a patient is in the state of anorexia or bulimia their minds and ability to think is very distorted. Anorexia and bulimia are not digestive disorders that should be viewed lightly.
Most people think, yeah so what if the person is to thin, they dont see beyond that factor. They do not realize that the patient is malnourished and body functions no longer work. They also do not realize that slowly one by one the organs that cannot function anymore close down, this leads to death. If there was a statistic based on what reasons people become anorexic or bulimic the number one ranking reason would be media. All the models are thin, thats what they view as appealing. Everyone wants to be appealing and to get noticed.
Sometimes there are magazines where they print an article about how you should be proud of who you are and not have to change for people to like you, then you flip the page and the title of the article is about how to lose weight and change your so that you can appeal to people. What type of message is the media sending out to the youth today? The number of people with these types of dietary disorders increases daily. Watch out and dont get caught because once you are in the circle of bulimia and anorexia its hard to get out.
Free research essays on topics related to: laxatives diuretics, anorexia and bulimia, eating habits, personality disorders, anti depressants
Research essay sample on Anorexia And Bulimia Laxatives Diuretics
