Eating Disorder:
It is a serious, complex, psychological, and behavioral disorder characterized by severe and persistent disturbance in eating patterns that impact both one’s emotional and physical health. The development of unhealthful eating habits is a sign of eating disorders.
People with eating disorders develop unhealthy relationships with food, weight, or appearance. They can be highly serious conditions that affect people’s ability to function in social, psychological, and physical ways. In 2019, 14 million individuals, including about 3 million children and teenagers, suffered from eating disorders.
Most frequently, mood and anxiety disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and issues with alcohol and other drugs co-occur with eating disorders. Eating disorders are often associated with an obsession with food, weight, or shape or with anxiety about eating or the consequences of eating certain foods.
What are the Types of Eating Disorders?
Eating problems come in a variety of types. Some people may suffer from more than one type of eating disorder. Types consist of:
Anorexia Nervosa
Anorexia nervosa is characterized by self-starvation and weight loss leading to low weight. People who have anorexia nervosa severely restrict their caloric intake and sometimes even starve themselves. It is indicated by an obsession with weight loss and an unwillingness to consume the recommended quantities of food for your body type and level of exercise.
The physical signs and symptoms of anorexia nervosa are related to starvation. Common symptoms of anorexia nervosa include
- Extreme weight loss
- Severely restricting food intake
- Intense fear of gaining weight
- Persistent behaviors to avoid gaining weight
- Fatigue
- Insomnia
- Dizziness or fainting
- Obsession with thinness
- Inability to maintain a healthy weight
- Weak hair/nails
- Cold intolerance/ insensitivity
- Muscle weakness
- Severe constipation
- Exercising excessively
Anorexia nervosa has two subtypes:
Restricting type. whereby people typically lose weight by dieting, fasting, or severe exercise, and
Binge-eating/purging type. eating large amounts of food and then trying to eliminate the extra calories in an unhealthy way.
Anorexia can be very damaging to the body. In addition, serious medical complications can be life-threatening and can result in heart, brain, or multi-organ failure and then death.
Bulimia Nervosa
Bulimia nervosa patients binge or overeat for a short period of time related to a sense of loss of control over what, or how much one is eating. After that, they would force themselves to get rid of the calories in some other way, including vomiting, using a medication, or engaging in excessive exercise. A person with binges consumes food quickly and past the point of fullness, which can cause him nausea and discomfort.
The following list contains possible indicators of bulimia nervosa:
- Consuming unusually vast amounts of food in one sitting
- Frequent toilet visits soon after eating
- Salivary gland swelling in the cheeks
- Persistent throat pain
- Dental decay
- Heartburn and gastroesophageal reflux
- Misuse of medicines or diet pills
- Recurring diarrhea without a cause
- Feeling dizzy or faint as a result of intense purging behaviors
- Self-esteem is influenced by body shape and weight
- Fear of gaining weight
- Severe dehydration
Like anorexia, bulimia often appears throughout adolescence and the early stages of life and seems to affect men and women differently. The most effective treatment for bulimia nervosa is cognitive behavioral therapy. It aids patients in managing thoughts and feelings that fuel the disease and normalizing their eating habits.
Binge Eating Disorder (BED)
A person with a binge eating disorder has a loss of control over their eating. They consume a lot of food in a short length of time. However, they don’t expel food or burn off calories through binging. Instead, they experience uncomfortable satiety and could battle despair, regret, or guilt.
Moreover, unlike people who have bulimia nervosa however, they do not regularly use compensatory behaviors to get rid of the food by inducing vomiting, fasting, exercising, or laxative misuse. Obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disorders are just a few of the major health issues that can result from binge eating, which is a chronic condition.
Common symptoms of binge eating disorder include
- Eating more quickly than normal
- Eating until extremely full
- Eating a lot of food even when not hungry
- Eating alone because one is ashamed of how much they are consuming
- Eating follows up with feelings of depression or extreme guilt
- Experiencing a loss of control during episodes of binge eating
- No use of purging behaviors
Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder
A recently identified eating disorder called avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID) is characterized by high pickiness and a chronic inability to achieve nutritional demands as a result of disturbed eating. Furthermore, food avoidance or restriction commonly begins in infancy or early childhood and may last through adulthood. Its symptoms include
- Decrease in weight
- Nutritional deficiencies
- Disruption of social interaction
Pica
Pica is an eating disorder that involves consuming items that are not recognized to be food and do not have any nutritional value. Individuals with pica crave non-food substances such as paper, paint chips, soap, cloth, hair, chalk, metal, charcoal or coal, or clay.
Pica can occur in adults, children, and adolescents. A higher risk of poisoning, infections, gastrointestinal injuries, and nutritional deficits may exist in people with pica. Pica may be fatal, depending on what you ate.
Rumination Disorder
After eating, people with rumination problems frequently bring their food back up into their mouths, re-chew it, and then either swallow it whole again, spit it out, or both.
Other Eating disorders
- Night eating syndrome. People with this condition regularly overeat at night, frequently after waking up.
- Other specified feeding or eating disorders (OSFED). Any additional disorders that don’t fall under one of the above disorders but exhibit symptoms like those of an eating disorder are included in this category. (continue reading)
Treatment, Medication, and therapy for eating disorders at Novus Beginning Psychiatry in Sugar Land, Texas
Follow these steps to begin counseling at Novus Beginning Psychiatry:
- Get in touch with our office to schedule an appointment or to learn more about eating disorders
- Meet our experienced psychiatrist who will look for solutions to assist you with your psychological health
- Visit our website and learn more about human psychology.
- Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn to be updated about psychological issues
Additional Services We Provide
At Novus Beginning Psychiatry, we provide therapy and medication treatment services for people of all ages having anxiety disorders, mood disorders, psychotic disorders, eating disorders, depression, ADHD, autism, and women’s issues. We provide couples and marriage counseling, counseling for children, young adults, and teenagers, family therapy, men’s issues, trauma counseling, and group counseling. Please contact Novus Beginning Psychiatry immediately if you’d like to know more about our psychiatrist, therapist, and counseling service.
