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Nutrition Eating Disorders – A Continuum Of IllnessesNutrition eating disorders can stop any of us from enjoying one of the most pleasant activities that exists – eating. For those with eating disorders food is stressful and can interfere with daily activities since so much focus is given to food and its consumption. These disorders consist of three primary disorders that require the intervention of a professional. These disorders run the gamut of emotional illnesses from self imposed starvation to chronic binge eating. These illnesses actually result from severe mental and physical distortions of the eating process, and they result in physical consequences which are often life threatening. There are three primary disorders of eating which are categorized by The American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV).
These disorders often overlap and they form a continuum with anorexia at one end constituting self-starvation, bulimia in the middle with bingeing and purging as its pattern and at the other end binge-eating disorder with compulsive eating as its pattern.
Those that suffer from these disorders are not purely anorexic, bulimic or binge eaters. These individuals may swing from one pattern to another, at times eating and gorging themselves and at other times starving themselves. These individuals may suffer from one or another of these disorders at different points in their lives, at one point suffering from anorexia and at some other point suffering from bulimia or binge-eating disorder. Nutrition eating disorders are primarily an issue in cultures that place excessive emphasis on a particular perception of an ideal body type as a means to achieving a positive self-image by fitting a large group generally females into a particular mold in society, generally with disastrous results. Since body types are the result of many factors, especially genetics it is unrealistic to expect any group of individuals to all fit a particular mold. By attempting to fit into this mold abnormalities in nutrition leading to poor nutrition and an unhealthy lifestyle can result, and definitely leads to individuals that are physically unfit and unhealthy and opens the door for such individuals to be at risk for a host of chronic illnesses.
Next: For other information on nutrition some great references are: • Nutrition – Fourth Edition by Paul Insel, Don Ross, Kimberley McMahon, and Melissa Bernstein
Exercise and Vitamins
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