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How To Identify Anorexia Nervosa

Written by Admin
Wednesday, 06 February 2008
Anorexia is an eating disorder that involves men and women of all ages, and in all walks of life. This disorder is not about wanting to drop a few pounds and getting more exercise as a means of staying physically fit. Anorexia is about self-starvation, usually to the point where the patient's life is at stake due to malnutrition. The origins of the disorder are not physical in nature, such as the severe loss of appetite of patients on chemotherapy or suffering from AIDS. Anorexia is a condition that has its genesis solely in negative or unresolved emotional conditions such as mood or anxiety disorders that have spun way out of control. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association, Version Four, Text Revised, lists, as follows, the primary symptoms of Anorexia Nervosa: Refusal to maintain body weight at or above a minimally normal weight for age and height, or failure to make expected weight gain during a period of growth, leading to body weight less than 85% of that expected. Intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat, even though underweight. Disturbance in the way in which one's body weight or shape is experienced, undue influence of body weight or shape on self-evaluation, or denial of the seriousness of the current low body weight. In postmenarcheal females, amenorrhea i.e. the absence of at least three consecutive menstrual cycles. How can anorexia be explained in "normal English?" An anorexic is grossly underweight for his/her age and body size. The patient has obsessive thoughts and fears about being fat or becoming fat even though he/she may have a 0% body-fat measurement. An anorexic that looks into the mirror sees "fat" instead of seeing his/her body as dangerously underweight. Due to severe malnutrition, women anorexics cease to have menstrual periods. Many anorexics have a co-existing Body Dysmorphic Disorder; this condition is characterized by preoccupation with a body part, or parts, being unattractive and disgusting to others, even though this is clearly not the case. It's technically incorrect to say that anorexics are constantly battling their appetite because they have no appetite. The problem is that the anorexic person has suppressed their desire to eat for so long that the body has simply forgotten how to be hungry. It is a battle to convince the person when they need to eat and how much they need to eat to stay healthy.