The vicious cycle that is eating disorders
Eating disorders of all kinds are on the rise because of the media’s persistence in coupling beauty and sex with being incredibly thin. Young impressionable men and women succumb to these harmful behaviors each and every year and they are increasing at an alarming rate.
There are a variety of reasons that people become stricken with eating disorders but one thing is certain, the process is often long, grueling, and extremely taxing on the person’s health. Once someone becomes involved with an eating disorder it often turns into a vicious cycle that leads them down a path of ill health and despair that gets repeated over and over again and in the worst cases, can lead to death. One such eating disorder is called bulimia nervosa.
Bulimia nervosa is characterized by the sufferer practicing a form of eating called binging where they will eat large amounts of food all at one sitting. This process of gorging themselves is then followed by other harmful practices designed to try and rid themselves of the calories they consumed in order to avoid gaining weight. These practices can include the use of laxatives, other forms of diuretics, intense over exercising sessions, and the most common form of ridding themselves of these calories, purging. What happens initially is there a psychological trigger that leads a person to a binge session. Research has shown that this could be triggered by feelings of anxiety, depression, or insecurely whereas the binge session replaces something that they are lacking in their own life. When they realize what they have done, they want to immediately rid themselves of the potential harmful effects of eating all of that food so they take one of the drastic measures mentioned above. When they do this, they realize that they negated the effect of what they have already done and this leads to positive reinforcement for a very negative act. What then happens is that the person feels that they can binge any time they have those same negative feelings about themselves and all they have to do is exercise, purge, or take diuretics to reverse the effects and everything will be okay. This leads to a never ending harmful cycle that can cause the person all types of medical maladies including diseases of the esophagus, weakening of the heart and teeth and in worst cases, death.
While there is no guaranteed cure for the eating disorder of bulimia nervosa or any other types of eating disorders, there are treatments available by qualified psychologists that can work with the individual to get to the root of the problems causing their unhealthy attitudes about food. It is important that you seek treatment at the first sign of any unhealthy behaviors surrounding food or those of your friends or loved ones around you. Oftentimes, the sufferer does not realize they have a problem until it is too late for them to stop on their own. This vicious cycle of eating disorders can strike without warning and once it takes hold it may continue with no end in sight.
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Tagged with: bulimia nervosa
Filed under: Eating Disorders
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