Teenagehood ( ON HOLD)

Bonus Chapter : Eating disorders

Hello people
Shout-out to claudia-143 thank you for the contribution
Thank you all for the 1k+reads,
I appreciate the votes and comments and also those that added this book to your reading list
I decided to publish this as a bonus chapter.
Expect an update soon.......

Today, I'll be talking about eating disorders. This is what most teenagers and even youths face at one point in a time in their life. This is a bonus update and this topic is just to create awareness. We may find out that we're experiencing some of what I'm about to talk about and we may tag it as a normal thing but it's important that if you're suffering from any of these eating disorders, it's important to get help.

Some adolescents, mostly females, become so concerned about their weight that they take drastic measures remain slim . Some overeat and then force themselves to vomit in order to avoid gaining weight while some actually starve themselves to keep their weight down. Adolescents with eating disorders have extremely disturbed body image. They see themselves as overweight even when they are actually underweight. Many girls whose weight are normal by medical and health standard believe that they are actually overweight. Many girls want to be slimmer because they believe that being slimmer would make them happier, more popular and more successful thereby they take drastic measures.

Believe in yourself. Love yourself the way you are. You are wonderfully and beautifully created by God.

To expatiate on these common eating disorders, take a look at this illustration.

Kate is a 14 years old. She's in her
first year of senior secondary school and a straight A student. She's slim by any standard and just weighs 55kg but yet she's worried that she's fat therefore during meal times, she eats little even if she's hungry.

Linda is a 17 years old girl. She's president of her school's Literary and Debate Club. She has a busy social life outside of school but she has a secret. Almost everyday or sometimes several times a day, she eats food that has high calorie intake like doughnut, ice cream,etc. and then she vomits the food to get rid of it from her body.

These two girls are suffering from two different eating disorders. Kate has anorexia nervosa while Linda has bulimia nervosa. These eating disorders will be discussed in length as we go further.

What is anorexia nervosa ?

anorexia nervosa is a emotional illness in which a person refuses to eat in fear of gaining weight. It occurs mainly in adolescent girls and young women. The word anorexia means without appetite but anorexics patient may be hungry most of the time yet they refuse to eat in fear of gaining weight. They avoid food for psychological reasons. Victims of anorexia nervosa have an unreasonable fear of being fat. They severely limit the food that they eat even when they're near starvation.

This disorder mainly affects girls in their early teens as this is a period where their body begin to mature. A typical anorexia patient can be described as a quiet perfectionist. She may begin dieting because she's a few pounds overweight or she may not be overweight at all. Even when she's very thin, she still sees herself as over weight. Seeing isn't believing for a victim of this eating disorder, despite what she sees in the mirror, she still believes that she's overweight. To make sure that she won't eat too much, she picks her food, eats little. Even when she's starving, she denies that she's hungry. Even when the diet leaves her drained of energy, she still exercise effort to lose more weight. The symptoms of this is are
-severe weight loss.
- Low blood pressure
-In females, menstruation stops.
-victims begin to feel withdrawn

Let me share a similar experience I've had. There was a time that I used to weigh 29kg. Anytime I checked my weight, I'd feel bad if I slightly gain weight because I always wanted to weight 29kg. If I notice that I've added weight, I'll kind of reduce my food intake till I gain back my 29kg weight. Looking at it now, that was a long time ago apparently when I was still in primary school. I was not overweight at all but I wanted to maintain that weight of 29kg. Funny a enough now, I'm more than double the weight. Now, when I'm trying to point out is that victims of anorexia tend to feel that need to remain slim even if they are thin, they still feel that they are overweight which in fact is not true. In a bid to lose the weight that's not even there, they eat little, even when they're are very hungry, they still starve themselves.

Bulimia nervosa .

Bulimia is a disorder in which individuals experience frequent and uncontrollable periods of over eating called binges. Unlike people who overeat, people with bulimia usually cannot stop a binge once it has started. After binging , they vomit the food out or take large dose of laxatives to help them empty their bowels. Thus, , most of them don't gain weight.

Bulimia seems to be more common than anorexia nervosa. It's difficult to know those that suffer from this because many of them that suffer from this disorder succeed in keeping it a secret. While victims of anorexia nervosa weight decrease drastically , the weight of a bulimic may still be hard to notice the weight loss. The problem is harder to spot and may remain untreated for years.
Like anorexics, bulimics are obsessively concerned about their weight. Many of them are perfectionist and while they seem to have it all, they may suffer from low esteem. Frequent victims of this disorder are athletes, actress, all of whom may feel extra pressure to stay trim however the disorder can affect anyone.
In my opinion, bulimia nervosa is a disorder where the victims consume a lot of high calorie foods and then they vomit it out or purge it out to avoid gaining weight. Unlike anorexics victim they don't starve themselves instead they overeat and the get rid of the food.

I did not just decide to talk on this topic for fun but instead so that we can be aware. Sometimes, we want to lose weight even though you don't need to lose weight infact you need to gain but sometimes we tag this things as normal. If you're currently experiencing these disorder, get help or if you know someone that's experiencing it, encourage the person to get help. The longer one have suffered from this disorder, the more difficult it is to break up the habit that make up the problem. Recovering from it may take time but in the end it's possible to overcome. This disorder is not a child's play. The results of these disorder are sometimes fatal so if you know anyone showing suspicions of having it, encourage the person to seek treatment

It's important for victim of these disorder to get help. The longer one has suffered from these disorder, the more difficult it is to break the habit s that make up the problem. If you suspect someone of having this disorder, encourage the person to get help. Recovering from it can take time but these are problems you can overcome and you can if you get help.

Hello everyone,
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Till next time 😘

Source: google
World Book (of knowledge)