Kirsten Wheaton, 27, from New York, N.Y., was 14 when she started restricting her food intake. The developing teen noticed changes in her body – and she didn’t like them. The normal growth of her hips and thighs left her feeling helpless and unhappy. Six months later, Wheaton was diagnosed with bulimia.
Eating disorders are defined as a disturbance in the normal eating routine, and they affect as many as 10 million females and one million males in the United States, according to the National Eating Disorders Association. Another startling statistic: 81 percent of 10-year-olds are afraid of being fat. And 42 percent of first through third graders want to be thinner.
Mandy Golman, coordinator of Girls in Motion, a mentoring fitness program at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, that includes discussion about healthy eating, body image and the dangers of dieting, says there is no simple answer to the rise of eating disorders in children. But Golman believes eating disorders are a physical expression of mental turmoil.
“Depression is often associated with eating disorders [and] it’s sometimes hard to say which came first,” Golman says. “An eating disorder can certainly cause depression and the reverse is also true.”
“I was depressed for about a year before I developed an eating disorder,” Wheaton says. “I cried a lot and became secretive at home. Some of this may have been normal teenage adjustment, although in retrospect, it was probably more profound.”
Thin Is Too In
Society, the media and views on what is the “right” and “wrong” way to look also play a role in eating disorders. “Young girls today are presented with an unrealistic body type – one that less than 5 percent of the population could achieve,” says Golman. “Our society has a preoccupation with thinness and beauty. Girls today are given the message: It is important to be beautiful and thin above all else.”
Learn how to recognize the signs of eating disorders and how to prevent them in the current issue of Family Energy!
