Eating Problems
Food plays an important part in our lives, and most of us will spend time thinking about what we eat. Our relationship with food often changes – sometimes we may try to eat more healthily, have cravings, eat too much or lose our appetite. We may find it hard to eat if we’re feeling stressed, or eat comfort food if we feel unhappy. Changing your eating habits every now and again like this is normal, and doesn’t need to worry you.
However, if you aren’t eating a regular balanced diet over a longer period of time, it could start to become a problem for you. Having an eating problem can be very hard to cope with but it’s important to understand that eating problems aren’t just about food. They can be about difficult things in your life and painful feelings, which you may be finding hard to express, face or resolve. Focusing on food can be a way of disguising these problems, even from yourself.
What are eating disorders?
The eating disorders anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge-eating disorder, and their variants, all feature serious disturbances in eating behavior and weight regulation. They are associated with a wide range of adverse psychological, physical, and social consequences. A person with an eating disorder may start out just eating smaller or larger amounts of food, but at some point, their urge to eat less or more spirals out of control. Severe distress or concern about body weight or shape, or extreme efforts to manage weight or food intake, also may characterize an eating disorder
What are the signs to look for?
Below are some signs of difficulty which need to be taken seriously:
- Regularly skipping meals and obsessively counting calories
- Eating only low calorie food
- Showing a keen interest in buying or cooking food for others
- Wearing very loose clothes to hide the body
- An obsession with exercise
- Dramatic weight loss or gain
- Disappearing from the table directly after meals (in order to make themselves vomit)
- Saying they are unhappy with their body
- Food missing in large amounts from the kitchen.
Seeking help
Sometimes people worry about talking to someone because they feel their eating disorder isn’t serious enough, they don’t want to worry people or waste their time, or because they feel guilty, embarrassed or ashamed. Whether your eating difficulties began recently, you’ve been struggling for a while or you’re finding yourself relapsing, you deserve support and with this support you can overcome your eating disorder. Eating disorders are illnesses and you deserve to have your concerns acknowledged respectfully, to be taken seriously and to be supported in the same way as if you were affected by any other illness.
