Anorexia Tips.......................................

Our mental image of anorexia shows somebody who looks so thin and hungry. There could be more than meets the eye. Anorexia nervosa takes a significant toll on the body. In fact, it has the highest death rate of any psychological illness. Five percent to twenty percent of people develop the disease and sooner or later die from it. The longer a person has it, the higher the chances of dying from the eating disorder.

Did you know that the damage that anorexia creates also reaches in the inside? What, exactly, could happen inside a human body subjected to this grim eating disorder? The bones and heart suffer the most. For those who survive, the disorder can damage almost every body system. Take a look at what anorexia does to the human body.

The bones are the first victim of anorexia.

The disease often develops in adolescence right at the time when young people are supposed to be building up the critical bone mass that will endure them through adulthood. Such bone loss can set in as soon as six months after anorexic behavior starts, and is one of the most irreversible draw back of the disorder.

The heart gets the most life-threatening damage.

Anorexia allows the body to lose muscle mass, at the same time; it loses heart muscle at a preferential rate. As an effect, the heart gets smaller and weaker. When people with anorexia engages in a strenuous exercise, it gets worse at increasing circulation in response to the physical activity, and the pulse and blood pressure get lower. This is the common reason for hospitalization in most people with anorexia.

While anorexia ultimately damages the bones and heart, it is also a multisystem disease. All of the body systems can’t escape its effects. About half of people suffering from anorexia have low white blood cell counts, with about a third are anemic. Both conditions can weaken the immune system’s resistance to disease, placing the person susceptible to infections.

Anorexia damage starts early

Medical consequences have long begun even before a person with anorexia starts to look “too thin”. Young women who start to severely restrict food intake experiences sudden loss of menstruation before serious weight loss sets in. Most of the people suffering from anorexia are teenage girls and young women whose ability to bear children can also be affected.The ability of anorexics to conceive is severely affected based on the rate of recovery. The rate, frequency, and number of pregnancies of fully recovered anorexics are normal.

When we look at fertility clinics having those patients who have infrequent or absent periods, they may think they’re fully recovered but their weight hasn’t gotten high enough. Many women with anorexia would rather select fertility treatment for their eating disorder instead of having the eating disorder treated. Women who have fully recovered from bulimia and anorexia have a slightly higher rate of miscarriages and caesarean sections. In addition to, a 30% higher incidence of postpartum depression as compared to other women.

Damage from Anorexia May Be Reversible
Now that we know the complications of anorexia, here is good news. The key to turn around the complications of anorexia is to return to a normal weight. The main goal for anorexia recovery is to restore the weight to reverse outcomes. It is the most essential part of the treatment and is an essential first step in recovery and treatment.

The common misconception of anorexia is that it is exclusively a psychological disorder. Too many people ignore the medical complications of anorexia not until the patient becomes visibly and lethally thin. Medical practitioners need to understand that a good therapist is only a part of the treatment for anorexia and other eating disorders, and these patients need treatment from a medical doctor as well.

Studies shows that many people who require treatment for anorexia are not actively seeking any treatment. The cost of treatment could be the reason why they chose to remain passive and not seek any treatment. Inpatient treatment can cost more than $30,000 per month, while outpatient treatment can run as much as $100,000 per year.

A huge issue of anorexia recovery is the access to care. The number of sessions for a long-term care can be as many as 40 sessions. In turn, the monthly cost of sessions goes up to $800. Each session can cost. Most health insurance companies only pay for an average of 10 to 15 treatment sessions for people with eating disorders. Eating disorders are not considered to be more serious than cancer. It’s been treated like it’s voluntary and willful as opposed being a serious, life-threatening psychiatric and medical illness.

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Depression is a disorder that can affect anybody at any time in life. It is most often associated as one of the symptoms people with anorexia nervosa has to face and deal with. The symptoms of depression can manifest at the same time when you have been sick for several weeks.

Are eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa related to depression? The answer is a big yes! Depression and anorexia come together hand in hand. Depression can trigger your eating disorder in the first place or you may have gone into depression resulting from the effects that anorexia has had on you.

The person suffering from anorexia can be suffering from depression at the same time. He or she usually feels symptoms of worthlessness, hopelessness and self hatred.  Depression and anorexia robs a person of happiness and self worth and can easily wreak chaos on innocent lives.

A loss of a loved one can trigger a major emotional crisis. When a death takes place, you may experience a wide range of emotions. Many people who suffers from depression report feeling an initial stage of numbness when the realization of death sets in.

You may experience some emotions including:
Denial
Disbelief
Confusion
Shock
Sadness
Yearning
Anger
Humiliation
Despair
Guilt

The forms of depression

Depression is known to be of three different forms, normal, mild, and severe.

Normal depression - This is a natural reaction to the loss of a loved one. It caused sadness, lethargy, and in some serious cases is grief to the point of loss of appetite, insomnia, anger, obsessive thought about the loved one who passed away. The difference of a normal depression from other forms is that most people eventually recover and resume to their typical moods after encountering normal depression. When the mood of the person do not lift and instead lingers, then mild depression sets in.

Mild depression - When a person become chronically depressed, holds low self esteem, and has some symptoms of severe depression, then they are considered to have mild depression. A person with mild depression can still function in daily living. It is hard, however, for them to beat “the blues” Often, the mildly depressed person has nothing to do to be accountable for their altered mood. A person progresses to mild depression when his or her moods do not lift and instead continues.

Severe depression - When a person has a severe depression, he or she feels utterly hopeless and feels such great sorrow resulting to lost interest in life. It causes the person to be incapable to rouse out of bed. The more you try to encourage the severely depressed person to do activities, the person feels anxious, irritable, agitated, and chronic indecisiveness. Similar to mild depression, severe depression often does not sink in after a traumatic event or the loss of a loved one. Intense feelings of grief, guilt, and unworthiness are experienced just the same like the other forms of depression. Untreated depression has an estimated 25% depressed persons try to kill themselves after 5 years of suffering from the chronic mood disorder.

What triggers depression to happen?

The question on finding out which triggered what ends up similar to a game whether egg or chicken comes first. The most important thing is to determine the main cause that triggers the depression currently.

The feelings of helplessness and hopelessness from anorexia can easily aggravate somebody’s moods. The person suffering from an eating disorder feels helpless like spiraling out of control, while desperately searching for control or starvation or purging. These people equate self worthiness to losing enough weight as their ultimate goal.

Approach in treatments

It is a sad reality that we are living in a “pill society” where therapists tend to treat depression alone with drug therapy instead of a more psychological basis. Just like other disorders, depression must be treated along with the eating disorder. Often depression treatment includes Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) that identifies the ten forms of distorted thinking found in depression. Apart from CBT, drug intervention consisting of anti-depressants are used. It includes the famous Prozac, Zoloft, and Paxil. It is known that a person generally progress well when placed under a medical therapy but depression resurfaces and relapse into old thinking patterns once drugs are discontinued. A very promising result form studies show that depressed people when treated along with CBT are weened off from anti depressants without many problems. The success is attributed to better rationalization techniques along with the use of drugs as a “booster” but not the main part of the treatment. In the end, the person undergoing treatment will learn how to rationalize and use logic to rise above the problems thus no longer needing anti depressants.

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Gone are the days that women are known to be prone to fall into a vicious cycle of eating disorders. Eating disorders are now more common in men than previously known. Despite this fact, men are not as likely to seek treatments for eating disorders according to a study published in the April 2001 American journal of Psychiatry. The gender of people who suffers from anorexia nervosa has been found with many psychological similarities between men and women who experiences similar symptoms. A continuing debate as to whether men with eating disorders suffer from the same mental disorders and symptoms as women. It is a question that has been fueled by the reality that men are not represented in program that treats eating disorders.

Anorexia nervosa is a refusal or inability to maintain a healthy and normal weight combined with intense fear of gaining weight. A study was conducted involving 62 men who met all or most of the Diagnostic and Statiscal Manual of Mental Disorders criteria for eating disorders with 212 women who had similar eating disorders, and 3769 men who had no eating disorders but with a variety of medical histories.

Little recognition male eating disorders
It is clear that there is a lack of visibility of anorexia or bulimia in the male world. As a result, men tend to withhold information with other men out of embarassment as anorexia is a female issue. The standard of men’s beauty lies on masculinity directly related to body mass, muscle bulge and definition, not weight loss.

A specialist of the Department of Psychiatry at Toronto Hospital shared that men are generally very similar to women with regard to psychopathology. The illnesses are much more equivalent in prevalence than was previously thought. The next potential area is to determine why men wouldn’t come for treatment.

A very likely explanation is that men are hesitant to come for help because they feel eating disorders are labeled as “woman’s diseases”.

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The Maudsley method is comparatively new approach to anorexia treatment. While some methods focus on the causes of eating disorders, the Maudsley method does not. This method does not simply view anorexia nervosa as a dangerous illness with a priority of increasing the consumption of calories. The entire family is involved to play an active role to help the person with anorexia to get the nutrition she or he needs.

The Maudsley Method

The most unique feature of the Maudsley method is its use of family of the person with anorexia. Nobody is blamed for the development of the eating disorder even parents. It is quite the opposite in this method wherein parents are empowered to assess the situation in a different way. Parents are taught to find their own systems to help children to eat. It includes creating healthy consequences after non compliance with the set eating plans. The main essence is to link the parents and their child to work towards a common goal of dealing with the eating disorder.

Priority of Maudsley method

The Maudsley method addresses the physical aspect as the initial priority. This approach has numerous benefits. Its immediate action must be consciously done by the person with anorexia to start the process of healthy eating. The person who suffers form anorexia needs help on dealing with weight gain issues. By applying the Maundsley method to these patients, it will improve the functioning of mental and physical functioning. It will also help them to deal with other counseling issues more effectively.

Phases of the Maudsley method

The first phase of treatment is to help the child gain weight. Parents are greatly encouraged to avoid force and punishment. A rewards system is followed based on the child’s ability to function. The child is gauged according to his or her physical level and fitness to draw a line. Say, a child is too weak physically to participate in sports then the child’s participation requires a certain weight or strength level.

The second phase of treatment requires transferring control of eating back to the child. The only time that the child can regain of control in eating is to demonstrate a good weight gain to begin to assume responsibility for her own eating.

The third phase starts when the child maintains a weight of 95% of her target weight without significant supervision from her parents. During this phase, the child begins individual therapy. It highlights and addresses the issues during childhood and adolescence which may have been relatively untreatable prior to weight gain.

Considerations to make before starting the Maudsley method

The major strength of the Maudsley method is its high parental involvement. Parents are needed to invest time and energy to attain the goals of the treatment. It is usually advised for parents to settle differences between them and their child to embark in the common struggle to fight eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa.

Pros and cons of the Maudsley method

Pros

Involvement of the family especially parents
No blame is given on anybody as the cause of the eating disorder
Initially focuses on the physical problems Encourages immediate action

Cons

More control to parents thus may not be appropriate to most dysfunctional family systems
High parental effort is needed to enforce food plan
Not suitable for those with a chronic eating disorder, aged 18 or older

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