Eating Disorders are Treatable
Finding treatment for your eating disorder is critical. Eating disorders can be both mentally and physically painful. The control over food intake ranges from dangerously restricting your calorie intake and starving yourself to binging on large quantities of food, then purging it and hiding this from friends and family.
An eating disorder is an illness, much like depression and alcoholism. In the most basic terms, an eating disorder may cause you to adopt harmful or self-destructive eating habits. This could mean:
- Eating too much.
- Binging.
- Starving yourself
- Anorexia nervosa: “is deliberate and sustained weight loss driven by an intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat, and a preoccupation with body weight and shape.” (Santrock, J. W. (2005). Nutrition and Eating Behavior. In Mike Ryan (Ed.). A Topical Approach to Life-Span Development, Fourth Edition (pp 156-157.) New York City: McGraw-Hill.)
- Bulimia nervosa: “is a cyclical and recurring pattern of binge eating (uncontrolled bursts of overeating) followed by guilt, self-recrimination and over compensatory behavior such as crash dieting, over-exercising and purging to compensate for the excessive caloric intake.” (Santrock, J. W. (2005). Nutrition and Eating Behavior. In Mike Ryan (Ed.). A Topical Approach to Life-Span Development, Fourth Edition (pp 156-157.) New York City: McGraw-Hill.)
- Compulsive over eating and other disorders
In whatever way you are struggling with food and body image, you are suffering and likely medicating many feelings that could include anger, pain, hurt, sadness, guilt and shame. Underlying most eating disorders are often issues of depression, anxiety, and unresolved trauma or pain. An eating disorder can feel like it’s controlling your life. And despite your best efforts at hiding your preoccupation with food issues, it greatly interferes with your ability to be with others.
When you get help with your Eating Disorder through counseling or therapy you can;
- Improve your body image and self-esteem.
- Learn ways to eat in a more balanced way and not be a slave to your food, binging, or purging.
- Improve relationships with others because you are no longer distracted by disguising your behaviors.
- Have peace; find relief from the depression, anxiety, guilt and shame of these behaviors that have plagued you.
If any of this sounds familiar, if any of this touch’s you inside, I encourage you to seek to give me a call or email me and we can set up a consultation. During that consultation we will talk about what is troubling you and then we’ll work to create a treatment plan that will put you on the road to feeling better about yourself and gives you the freedom to live better in your body.