Currently Browsing: Feature
Society has influence on eating disorders
.
Written by Alex Ginn, Staff Writer
I’m fat. That’s what the young girl thought as she looked at herself in the mirror. Fat. She thought, “Look at my obese arms and thick legs. Look at this gut jutting over my jeans, falling out over the material. Why can’t I be skinny like Paris Hilton or Nicole Richie?”
Many men and women in the United States think they are overweight or “pudgy.” While they may or may not fit the medical definition of obese, they think the idea that thin is beautiful. Because of this, tiny waistlines and a low BMI seem to be what many people think make them “hot” or “sexy.” A growing number of females consider themselves “fat” or “overweight” when in reality, they are average weight, and in some cases, underweight.
“People with anorexia have an extreme fear of weight gain and a distorted view of their body size and shape,” according to www.kidshealth.org. As a result, they strive to maintain a very low body weight.
Some students feel pressured to lose weight. Diets based on nutritional requirements, such as Weight Watchers, may allow them to lose weight safely. However, there are many diets that hurt more then they help.
One of these unhealthy diets is the Chicken Noodle Diet, where the dieter only eats chicken noodle soup.
According to www.livestrong.com, eating only chicken noodle soup does not provide a person with enough nutrients from vitamins or minerals. In fact, soup only provides a fraction of the dietary fiber needed each day.
Diets can quickly turn into eating disorders, the dark monsters that loom by the fridge. Anorexia is one of the most common eating disorders, and it can turn into a killer. Anorexia is where the afflicted person fears gaining weight and therefore does not eat and loses excessive amounts of weight. In most cases a person with anorexia believes he or she can never lose “enough weight.”
“You think about food, dieting, and weight all the time,” www.webmd.com reported about anorexia. “You have a distorted body image. Other people say you are too thin, but when you look in the mirror you see a fat person.”
Many suffer from this disorder, and some are less lucky than others in fighting it. One of those who were not as lucky was French model Isabelle Caro. She started suffering from anorexia when she was a little girl and died from it at age 28. In 2007 during a photo shoot, three years before she died, she weighed 60 pounds at a height of five feet, four inches.
“My anorexia causes death,” Caro said in an interview three years ago. “It is everything but beauty, the complete opposite. It is an unvarnished photo without make-up. The message is clear – I have psoriasis, a pigeon chest and the body of an elderly person.”
There have also been successful stories like those of Demi Lovato and Mary-Kate Olsen who battled with anorexia and survived. Lovato now speaks out against it to help others who are going through this painful disorder. “I wish I could tell every young girl with an eating disorder, or who has harmed herself in any way, that she’s worthy of life and that her life has meaning,” Lovato said to Seventeen Magazine “You can overcome and get through anything.”
Even though there are many celebrities who do speak out against eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia, a majority of them promote eating disorders without realizing it. This happens because celebrities, who are usually called beautiful or hot, are skinny. People may not realize it but when they see everyone who is pretty and thin, it makes them think that’s what all beautiful people should look like.
“From an early age we are bombarded with images and messages that reinforce the idea that to be happy and successful we must be thin,” According to a website called Rader Programs. “Today, you cannot read a magazine or newspaper, turn on the television, listen to the radio or shop at the mall without being assaulted with the message that fat is bad.”
So naturally, girls think in order to be beautiful they have to be skinny. Most people try diets and exercise, but what happens when that doesn’t help them lose the weight they want to or don’t feel they’re skinny enough? With all this pressure on girls to keep a tiny hourglass figure it’s no wonder there are over 7 million American women who have an eating disorder and one out of 200 of women that suffer from anorexia. This means there are over five girls at West with anorexia.
“Getting help early is important,” the National Institute of Mental Health (NIH) says. “Treatment involves monitoring, mental health therapy, nutritional counseling and sometimes medicines.”
Email This Post 
Print This Post
Loading ...
Leave a Reply