Anorexia Nervosa is an eating disorder where the fear of getting fat makes people resort to unhealthy diet plans and routines where food is taken in highly restricted quantities. People who are normally thin are in a state of delusion in this condition and they start thinking that they are very fat. Very low self esteem with regard to their body makes them take drastic measures which might even result in death.
It is a very serious disorder that needs to be identified and treated at the earliest. There is a lot of physical and emotional damage that patients of this condition bring upon themselves. Nowadays there is a lot of information about it and this will help individuals get themselves out of their self destructive pattern.
Anorexia nervosa and bulimia are two sides of the same coin and individuals having symptoms pertaining to one of them usually suffer from the other eating disorder too. Individuals with restricting type anorexia nervosa starve themselves and hardly take any form of food while the purging type are those who do consume food and then indulge in a cycle of vomiting and taking laxatives.
The number of people who are afflicted with this disorder are growing at an alarming rate as more young people are been diagnosed with this. It has been seen that people with anorexia nervosa have low self esteem and self confidence and due to this they feel they are not in control of their lives. The only thing that they feel they can control is food and this creates havoc with their physical and mental development. Symptoms of anorexia nervosa include:
- Dieting in spite of been very thin,
- Preoccupation with food,
- Obsession with calories consumed,
- Lying about their eating habits and strange diet plans.
The physical symptoms of this condition include:
- Massive weight loss,
- Not acknowledging been thin,
- Negative body image,
- Very critical about physical appearance and
- Obsession with body shape and size.
The causes of this condition are biological, psychological and family and social pressure. Biological factors that cause this disorder is that it runs within the family. If your sister or mother been victims of this disorder then there is a possibility that you might get affected.
Research has thrown light on the fact that individuals with anorexia nervosa are actually perfectionists who expect everything as per their rigid rules and are distressed when this does not happen. The psychological factor of not been able to control things leads them to controlling food.
Nowadays there is increased pressure on teenagers to conform to a particular body size and this pressure is exerted both within the family and socially. Due to this a lot of young people suffer from low self esteem with regard to their body. They start thinking that they are imperfect and this starts a cycle of self destruction that is difficult to get out.
Anorexia nervosa treatment could be through medication but the main component of treatment involves dealing with the problem by restoring self confidence of the individual through regular counseling.
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