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What is an eating disorder?

Eating disorders can be described in medical terms or can have a much wider definition which includes the many issues both males and females have with food and/or body image.

We live in a society which constantly gives men and women messages that their bodies are not acceptable unless they are perfect. These messages are present in our every day lives, in magazines, books and television. They are so much a part of our lives that we are not aware of the effect they have on us. Very subtlety they tell us that 'thin is beautiful, happy and successful' and we begin to believe that if only we were thin then all our problems would be solved.

The models who are used represent an incredibly small percentage of women's natural body shapes and sizes, yet are seen to represent ALL women. Imagine if the magazines, television, etc were filled with pictures of women, men and teens who were various shapes and sizes and looked just like you or your family or your friends and were all seen as being acceptable and desirable. Would that affect the way you feel about your body?

It is the things we do in striving for the 'perfect body' which leads to dieting, bingeing, purging and exercise. When one or all do not work, we feel lousy and depressed, worthless and failures and these feelings often trigger another binge. Very soon we can become trapped in a cycle of behaviours which take over our lives.

We categorise food into good food (usually the food we dislike most) and bad food (usually the food we like most). Food can become a reward if we have been 'good' or a punishment if we have been 'bad'.

We can also use food as a way of coping when we are not able to face past or present pressures and stresses in our lives.

Food and how we look can become the primary focus in our lives, an obsession which isolates and exhausts us.

Getting healthy usually begins when we make a decision to find ways to deal with our feelings other than by using food. In moving away from seeing food as a way of coping with life we can instead begin to see it as part of nurturing and nourishing our bodies. Once we can accept and value our bodies we develop a great sense of self worth and our capacity to ENJOY our lives increases.