Anorexia Nervosa

Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa are both eating disorders.

The symptoms for Anorexia are: Having a fear of gaining weight, seeing yourself as overweight when in reality you are underweight. Not eating certain types of foods; such as, foods with fat or sugar. Also playing with the food to avoid eating it and cutting food into small pieces or moving the food around plate to appear that food is being eaten. As the illness progresses more signs appear such as dull, dry hair, and thinning of the hair, constipation, or going to the bathroom right after eating. Red and swollen lips, menstrual period regularity begins to slow down and eventually stop having period. Shrunken breasts, low blood pressure, depression and suicidal feelings are also signs of the illness. Meal time and eating becomes a big ordeal, and they do not want to eat around other people become secretive.

In her book "Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls," Mary Pipher, Ph.D. says: "Anorexia is a problem of Western Civilization, a problem for the prosperous." Pipher goes on to say: "Once entrenched, anorexia is among the most difficult disorders to treat. Of all the psychiatric illnesses, it has the highest fatality rate"

Symptoms for Bulimia Nervosa are: Binge eating, feelings that you can't control your eating, eating to the point of discomfort and eating too much in a short period of time. Forced vomiting which is called purging, or use of diuretics, laxatives, and also fasting to control weight gain. Exercising after binges in order to compensate for eating irrational fear of being fat and perceived distortion of their own body. Excessively evaluating self-worth oneself through personal weight and physical appearance. Health issues, such as enlarge salivary glands, decaying teeth, dehydration, and scarred hands, which are symptoms of purging behavior. Other chronic problems are with bowels, irregular heartbeat rhythm - or cardiac arrhythmias.

In her book: "A Bright Red Scream: Self-Mutilation and the Language of Pain" Marilee Strong says this: "The fact that cutting and eating disorders often coexist should not surprise us, as the two behaviors share many of the same roots and serve many of the same functions."

There's no doubt we, Western Civilization, have a perverted idea of how a woman should look and this has affected our youth especially our young women. No one can live up to the expectations of what our youth see on TV and magazines and those expectations are all internalized. Our youth, lose themselves in an effort, which in some cases turns into an addiction, to please and to "measure up" they lose their souls. They sell their souls to look right, have the right body shape and style. In an ABC Nightline Report on November 24, 2010, ABC followed a teen girl that was having breast augmentation surgery. When asked