Eating disorders are mental illnesses that are characterized by inappropriate eating behaviors and incorrect body perception.
Types of eating disorders
The most common eating disorders are:
- Anorexia nervosa. It is a deliberate, drastic restriction of food, which leads to extreme emaciation. It is accompanied by a strong fear of gaining weight and a disturbed body image.
- Bulimia or mental gluttony. These are severe bouts of binge eating, most often followed by provoking vomiting, restrictive exercise and often the use of laxatives.
- Binge eating, i.e. binge eating with a characteristic loss of control over the amount of food consumed. Here without the use of laxatives.
- Night eating syndrome.
Less common disorders are:
- Pica syndrome – is characterized by distorted appetite. The affected patient feels attracted to eating inedible things such as paper, chalk, hair, soil and others. Such nutrition can have disastrous health consequences and is life-threatening.
- Diabulimia – a disorder that affects people with insulin-dependent diabetes. It consists in deliberate manipulation in administering insulin doses. The patient skips, reduces or delays taking the dose of the drug for fear of gaining weight.
- Orthorexia – a pathological obsession with eating only clean, healthy food. Patients with it eliminate a larger number of available products.
- Pregorexia, or gestational anorexia – is a syndrome of eating disorders in pregnant women.
- Permarexia – meticulous calorie counting and weighing of each food. It is an addiction to being on a constant diet.
- Bigorexia – affects most men and is characterized by obsessive care of diet for fear of losing muscle mass.
- ARFID – consists in panic avoidance of certain foods due to their sensory or olfactory properties.
Causes of eating disorders
Eating disorders do not have a single, specific genesis. A number of factors can contribute to their formation. The most common are:
- low self-esteem combined with a lack of acceptance of one’s own body,
- disturbed peer or family relationships, e.g. lack of acceptance,
- tendency to suppress accumulated emotions,
- perfectionism,
- traumatic experiences from the past,
- a profession that requires a specific figure,
- neurochemical disorders of the brain,
- difficulties in coping with stressful situations,
- genetic predisposition,
- the impact of social media.
How are eating disorders treated?
Untreated eating disorders have serious health effects such as: hormonal disorders, osteoporosis, heart rhythm disorders, damage to internal organs, infertility, obesity, damage to tooth enamel, mental disorders, nutritional deficiencies, diseases of the digestive system and even death. Therefore, it is important for a person affected by an eating disorder to see a specialist doctor, such as a psychiatrist. Sometimes he works closely with a psychotherapist and psychodietician. Treatment requires an interdisciplinary approach. In this case, psychotherapy is combined with pharmacology and dietary support. It is also often necessary to help the family and relatives of the person affected by the disorder.
