For Liz Rene, a recent UNH alumna, it started in seventh grade with a class trip to a water park.
"For some reason I wanted to lose seven pounds [before the trip]," said Rene in a written statement. "I was never fat, but I had always played a lot of sports and was muscular. I started to cut out some food groups and restrict a bit." Rene estimates that she lost a couple pounds through dieting, but she lost more weight while sick with mononucleosis. Afterward, she could not return to her usual weight. "Once I had lost that weight it was like I couldn't allow myself to gain it back," she said. It led to a seven-year battle, with three attempts at treatment, before she made a successful recovery. Rene's story is not uncommon. According to the National Eating Disorders Association website (www.nationaleatingdisorders.org), as many as 10 million women and 1 million men are struggling with some type of eating disorder - with millions more struggling with binge eating.
College students and teenagers make up the largest group affected by eating disorders. According to the Eating Disorder Foundation, 27 percent of girls age 12 to 18 show significant eating disorder symptoms; 31 percent of college females have an eating disorder. According to a UNH counseling center survey conducted in 2001, over 25 percent of UNH student respondents reported an eating disorder or symptoms of disordered eating.
Suzanne Sonneborn, a nutrition educator at UNH's Office of Health Education and Promotion, said the number of people affected by eating disorders is probably higher than reported, since many students will not disclose personal eating habit information. This is because there tends to be secrecy and shame surrounding eating disorders. She said the percentage of students who exhibit disordered eating at some point during their years at UNH could be as high as 30-50 percent.
The feelings of shame and secrecy have presented a challenge to students and staff who are trying to reach out. "When we do education on this campus, it's a really tricky topic," Sonneborn said. "We're looking for any way to get to people."
Marie Coyle, a member of the student advocacy and awareness group Students Ending Eating Disorders (SEED) said there have been instances in the past where she was concerned a fellow student might have disordered eating, but found that reaching out was difficult.
"What can you do?" Coyle said. "What can you say to that person?"
For those suffering from an eating disorder, it is just as challenging, if not more so, to reach out and get help. "It's really scary to seek help," said Maria Larkin, an on-campus nutritionist who specializes in eating disorders. But it is not stopping some individuals with eating disorders, their supporters, or campus organizations from speaking out and trying as hard as they can to change things. For example, it was Laura Plummer's observations about the silence surrounding eating disorders that sparked her to found SEED.
"I noticed that there were some rather clandestine initiatives taking place on campus to generate awareness of eating disorders, but none as loud and in-your-face as I felt an awareness group of this nature should be," Plummer said in a written statement. "I was tired of the culture of shame and silence surrounding eating disorders and those who suffer with them."
"I think in the past couple years, especially, there have been some great strides made in bringing more awareness and attention to the problem," said Rene, who founded the counseling center support group. The phrase, "it's not about the food" is used as part of her recovery process. "From peer-education to the support group and SEED, people are becoming more active in bringing awareness to eating disorders," said Rene. "So we've got a ways to go, but at least we are heading in the right direction."
Eating disorders and their causes
There are many types of eating disorders. They include anorexia nervosa, which is restrictive eating; bulimia nervosa, which is binging then purging through methods like laxatives, excessive exercise, or vomiting; and eating disorder not otherwise specified (EDNOS), which involves a combination of symptoms of different eating disorders. People may also have disordered eating habits, which are unhealthy but do not fall under the strict criteria of a diagnosable eating disorder like anorexia or bulimia.
Linda Guttman, a psychologist at the UNH counseling center, called eating disorders "complicated" because there are many underlying issues beyond what may seem at first glance to be a problem about physical appearance. Depression and anxiety can manifest themselves through eating disorders. Also, Guttman said the person affected may have difficulty managing their feelings or have a high need for perfection in other aspects of their lives beyond just appearance.
Larkin described the eating disorder mentality as a conversation in the person's head, with one voice being the eating disorder and the other the person's true voice.
Rene experienced this herself when she started getting attention for all the weight she had lost. She said the attention was clearly negative, but the eating disorder twisted it into something positive.
"There literally is a voice in their head that, when struggling, they can't tell is different from their own voice," said Rene.
Sonneborn said many times people with eating disorders feel like the eating disorder is their friend because it relieves stress or anxiety and gives them tangible gains. This makes it more difficult for people with eating disorders to want to change their behavior. Also, length of the disordered eating is a factor.
"The longer you have the eating disorder, the stronger it becomes and the more difficult it is to overcome it," said Larkin. She said the eating disorder becomes a part of the person's identity.
Be the first to comment on this article!