What you need to know about Eating Disorders

What is eating disorder?

Eating disorder is a condition relating to an improper eating behavior due to emotional instability that negatively affects a person's body. It usually affects the body shape, weight and leads to several diseases too.

There are different types of eating disorders that impact the body's nutrition level. It’s often diagnosed in teens and young adults. However, with the right treatment one can return to their healthier eating habits and can avoid serious complications too.

Symptoms

  • Obsession with food: A person with an eating disorder gets engaged in an extreme habit of eating which results in increased body weight. This can harmfully affect the person’s health.
  • Food binges: A person always carries an urge to keep eating something. It’s almost like getting addicted to eating. He may even eat junk food all the time.
  • Purging behaviors like puking: As a result of eating too much, the body reacts to it in a negative way, a person might feel heavy or feel like vomiting.
  • Restricted eating pattern: In this condition, the person doesn’t follow a proper eating cycle, he eats whenever he feels like which can affect the body severely.
  • Unwillingness to maintain weight: Excessive eating will undoubtedly be resulted in increased body weight. Physical activities can result in compensation to this habit; one must control the urges for binge eating for the betterment of his health.
  • Low self-esteem: It is natural for a person to feel bad about his body weight; he may feel embarrassed during social interactions. Low self-esteem may also result in worsening the condition of eating disorders.
Obsession with eating leads to eating disorder
Obsession with eating leads to eating disorder

Types of Eating Disorders

  • Anorexia nervosa: In this condition, the individuals follow a restricted eating pattern and get considerably underweight, as compared to other people of their same age. They get an intense feeling of gaining weight and they relentlessly pursue thinness, leading to distorted body image.
  • Bulimia nervosa: In this condition, the individual eats a large amount of food in a specific period of time. Even though he gets a fear of gaining weight, despite having normal weight, they are not able to control eating.
  • Binge eating disorder: In this condition, the people eat a large amount of food, despite not feeling hungry. They constantly have a feeling of shame, guilt, and distress. A person with binge eating disorder often suffers from obesity and has a risk of medical complications too.
  • Rumination disorder: In this condition, a person regurgitates food that he chewed previously. The person brings up the swallowed food to the mouth and re-chews it. This condition often leads to malnutrition or severe weight loss.
  • Restrictive food intake disorder: In this condition, the individual restricts or avoids eating sufficient nutrition and calories because of the fear of weight gain. They have poor development of age and height, and often depend on supplements for nutrient deficiencies.

Treatment

The treatment for eating disorders depends on the particular symptoms and the type of condition one is going through. One can either go for medication or therapy or a combination of both. There are several nutrition education workshops done for treating eating disorders.

If a person chooses therapy for treating eating disorders, the therapist interrogates and addresses other health problems. In severe cases, the therapist might even ask the person to get hospitalized. If untreated for a long period, eating disorders can turn into a serious and life-threatening condition.

Therapies work on an organized approach to manage your symptoms and get a healthy weight.
Here are some common therapies for eating disorder that you will likely benefit from:

Severe cases of eating disorder requires professional help
Psychological treatment is required for people who have severe cases of eating disorder
  • Emotional freedom technique (EFT): EFT is a type of therapy for the treatment of physical pain and emotional distress. It is also known as tapping or psychological acupressure. This is a very effective way of treating a person suffering from Eating disorder.
  • Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT): Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a sort of psychotherapeutic treatment which is used to help people learn about identifying and changing disturbing thoughts and behavioural patterns that have a negative effect on a person.
  • Rational Emotive behavior therapy (REBT): REBT is a psychotherapeutic approach to assist individuals in coping up with emotional and behavioural problems and disturbances to lead people towards a better mental health.

Self-help Tips for Eating Disorder

  • Pay attention to your feelings: The feelings and mood of a person play an important role in several types of eating disorders like binge eating disorder, or restrictive food intake disorder. Hence, one always has to pay a close attention to whatever he feels and respect what is needed the most.
  • Try variations: A person must try replacing the urge of eating by doing something new, like reading a book or visiting a new place. Trekking is also a good alternative to get a healthy body. If a person is suffering from binge eating disorder then this tactic can help to avoid eating a lot.
  • Rejuvenate your mind: Take your time to clear negative thoughts from your mind every day. Try healthy exercises to rejuvenate your body and mind, if a person isn’t able to do all these at first, he can simply try deep breathing techniques.
  • Know your limits: Self-care is important to get over eating disorder, and for this one should know and honor the limits. A person can make an alternate healthy plan for himself by the help of a professional. One must not force anything, because it might affect the mental well being a lot.
  • Spend time with positive people: In this condition, a person must choose to hang out with the right people who would support and motivate the person to obtain a healthy lifestyle. A lot of people aren’t aware of this disorder so it might be hard for everyone to understand the condition.
Therapy improves physical & mental health
Improve your physical and mental health with therapy

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