A Guide to Eating Disorders

Helpful/Interesting Articles

I've been doing quite a bit of reading about Eating Disorders online recently and I decided to post a chapter of previews and links. I find these interesting, helpful, or informative.

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Much like mental health, eating disorders are often stereotyped and cast aside as not a "real" disease. However; that couldn't be farther from the truth. In the last ten years I have dealt with eating disorders in my own life, my friends lives and my family members lives. It is a heartbreaking disease that so many are not aware of. In the midst of hearing lots of stereotypes, misconceptions and "taboo" statements about eating disorders, I thought I'd write about a few things I think everybody should know about eating disorders.

1. Not every eating disorder looks the same.

While the most common eating disorders are anorexia and bulimia, eating disorders look very different for every person. While the stereotype is that everybody with an eating disorder either starves himself or herself or purges their food, there are several other types of eating disorders. For instance, a different type of bulimia is eating and excessively exercising afterwards. Exercising to the point of dehydration, fainting, vertigo etc. Another look of an eating disorder is bingeing one day and then abstaining from food the next day or next few days. Eating disorders come in different variations and not any single one is simple.

2. It is not always about body issues.

Another widely misinterpretation of eating disorders is that all stem from a body issue. While many do, some come from other problems within; such as control issues, self-harm, and self worth. Some feel they do not deserve to eat, some feel...read the rest at

http://thoughtcatalog.com/chelsea-ellise/2015/02/6-realities-every-person-should-know-about-eating-disorders/

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For such a common mental illness, (affecting up to 24 million people of all ages, nationalities, and genders) eating disorders are riddled with myths and falsities. There are dozens of misconceptions and misunderstandings about what cause eating disorders, how to tell if someone has one, and how to treat them.

Articles like this one,( http://thoughtcatalog.com/tori-sousa/2015/02/the-real-issue-with-being-skinny-and-how-we-talk-about-it/) while well-intentioned, are perpetuating some of the biggest lies that feed into many people's false understanding of the disease. It's so easy to point the finger at the fashion industry, to claim that size zero models and society's beauty standards cause eating disorders. Yes, we can agree that images of extreme thinness promotes a beauty standard that is unattainable to most. But it's important to keep in mind that eating disorders are a mental illness - and to say that one could develop anorexia from reading too much Vogue does a huge disservice to the gravity of the disease itself. Poor body image is one thing - an eating disorder is another.

Furthermore, eating disorders are not always about wanting to be thin, and sometimes they really aren't about food or weight at all. There's a host of reasons why someone might cling to the coping mechanisms of restricting or purging. At the root, it's rarely as simple as wanting to look like a Victoria's Secret angel.

As a survivor of an eating disorder, I feel a certain duty to point out what eating disorders are not: They are not lifestyles. They are not choices. They are not reactions to seeing a skinny model. I think it's time we stop talking about them as though they are anything but a serious mental illness - and one that has the highest death rate of any other psychological disorder, for that matter.

All eating disorders are as real as any other illness. Just because they don't always present themselves as a physical ailment doesn't mean they aren't wreaking havoc on someone's body.