Potential disordered eating symptoms include binge eating, excessive fasting, and avoiding entire food groups.
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What Is Disordered Eating Exactly?
Disordered eating is a range of irregular eating behaviors, often for purported but not evidence-backed health reasons.
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However, it can still pose significant risks to your physical and mental health.
Are Fad Diets Considered Disordered Eating?
Over time, this can set you up for potentialnutritional deficienciesand a harmful relationship with food.
Fad diets are popular, and not everyone who follows one develops disordered eating as a result.
Some common signs and symptoms of disordered eating are:
Disordered Eating vs.
Eating Disorders: Whats the Difference?
Disordered eating and eating disorders are related but unique concerns.
While unhealthy and potentially harmful, disordered eating patterns are often more sporadic and less severe.
What Causes Disordered Eating?
Still, the reasons why someone may fall into disordered eating habits are personal.
Furthermore, traumatic experiences like bullying, abuse, or extreme stress can trigger or worsen disordered eating habits.
For example, individuals with larger bodies often face stereotypes that they are unhealthy or lack self-control.
Weight stigma can result in eating disorders being overlooked, misdiagnosed, or minimized.
The result places you in a category of either underweight, normal weight, overweight, or obese.
While BMI is a standardized health screening tool, it is not an accurate measure of an individuals health.
Socioeconomic Status
Disordered eating can affect people of all economic groups.
While the specific triggers may vary, the underlying factors behind disordered eating are universal.
Age
Disordered eating can impact people at any age, from adolescence to older adulthood.
Teens are especially vulnerable to disordered eating because of the intense social and academic pressures they face.
These pressures can lead to unhealthy eating patterns as they navigate identity and self-esteem issues.
Men
The stereotype that disordered eating and body image issues only affect women is inaccurate.
As a result, men may engage in behaviors aimed at building a more muscular body or using supplements.
Primary care providers should be educated in identifying disordered eating symptoms among men and help destigmatize the issue.
Why Is Disordered Eating so Pervasive?
A healthcare team should also help monitor physical health concerns to prevent and manage complications.
Support groups can also provide a sense of community and shared understanding.
Recovery Challenges
Personalized treatment, appropriate resources, and ongoing support are essential for long-term recovery.
However, depending on how severe someone’s disordered eating patterns have become, recovery can present various challenges.
Developing a healthy relationship with food is a process that involves confronting and unlearning unhealthy patterns.
Seeking support as soon as you recognize a problem is important to creating a healthy relationship with food.
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