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Eating disorder symptoms

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Eating disorders are complex mental health conditions that affect more people than breast cancer, HIV, and schizophrenia combined.1 They can have very serious complications if they go untreated for too long. In the most progressed cases, an eating disorder can cause irreversible damage, and may even be fatal.2,3

Many people who suffer from eating disorders do so in secret, because they are ashamed, or they may be in denial. So, it’s important to be aware of warning signs and eating disorder symptoms that can indicate someone may need help or a medical intervention. 

12
 sources cited
Last updated on 
February 17, 2023
Eating disorder symptoms
In this article

Diet culture

A growing body of research is proving our culture’s fixation on fitness, weight loss, and what is perceived to be “healthy” eating—which are all part of a system of beliefs called “diet culture” to have an extremely detrimental effect on health and well-being–and lead to numerous negative health outcomes and eating disorders.4

Dieting involves restricting food intake and calories to induce weight loss. When researchers reviewed years of data, they found staggering results.

Dieting can:4
  • Result in negative health outcomes
  • Cause “yo-yo cycling” of continuous diet changes
  • Not guarantee maintained weight loss
  • Lead to long-term weight gain
  • Place significant long-term strain on the body
  • Worsen gallstone attacks, osteoporosis, and hypertension
  • Increase inflammation
  • Worsen body dissatisfaction, increasing the risk factor for developing an eating disorder
  • Lead to healthcare avoidance
  • Contribute to weight stigma

Weight stigma is the social rejection of those who do not have a “socially acceptable” body weight and shape, which, in turn, often leads to disordered eating.6

Diet culture and disordered eating signs and symptoms

Almost half of the adolescent population in the United States reports feeling body dissatisfaction and engaging in some form of disordered eating, both of which predict later risky health behaviors.5 Negative body issues can motivate people to lose weight, which they believe will improve their health. 

But, although they have become socially acceptable as part of diet culture, diets of any kind increase risk of developing harmful disordered eating patterns and adverse health outcomes. And many of the practices diet culture promotes are actually examples of disordered eating signs and symptoms.

Here are some examples of truly helpful and healthy relationships with food, eating, and your body, versus common misperceptions about what is “healthy,” and, instead, are examples of both harmful diet culture behaviors and eating disorder signs and symptoms.1,3,4

Helpful
Unhelpful

Signs and symptoms of eating disorders

Disordered eating progresses to a full-blown eating disorder when extremely unhealthy weight control behaviors occur regularly and frequently for many consecutive months. 

Signs that someone may have an eating disorder include:1,3,4
  • Starvation
  • Binge eating what is considered large amounts of food in less than two hours numerous times a day or week
  • Hiding or hoarding food
  • Eliminating certain foods or entire food groups (may be seen as picky eating)
  • Eating in secret
  • Refusing to eat with people
  • Avoiding social gatherings
  • Excessive exercise
  • Having strange or rigid food rules and rituals
  • Purging behaviors (i.e., self-inducing vomiting)
  • Taking medications to lose weight, such as laxatives, stimulants, ipecac, or diuretics
  • Extreme weight loss or gain in a short period of time
  • An intense fear of gaining weight
  • Skipping meals

If you or a family member struggles with any of the above signs and symptoms, it’s critical to seek professional help as soon as possible. 

Eating disorders often co-occur with other mental disorders, including depression and anxiety. Disordered eating adds to feelings of despair and demoralization, which include feeling:4 

  • Distressed
  • Incompetent
  • A loss of meaning and purpose in life
  • A lack of social support
  • Isolated
  • Hopeless, helpless
  • A sense of feeling trapped or a personal failure
  • Suicidal

It's important to seek treatment for an eating disorder as soon as possible to avoid further medical complications and other health consequences.

Disclaimer about "overeating": Within Health hesitatingly uses the word "overeating" because it is the term currently associated with this condition in society, however, we believe it inherently overlooks the various psychological aspects of this condition which are often interconnected with internalized diet culture, and a restrictive mindset about food. For the remainder of this piece, we will therefore be putting "overeating" in quotations to recognize that the diagnosis itself pathologizes behavior that is potentially hardwired and adaptive to a restrictive mindset.

Resources

  1. Hudson JI, Hiripi E, Pope HG Jr, and Kessler RC. (2007). The prevalence and correlates of eating disorders in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication. Biological Psychiatry, 61(3), 348-58.
  2. Yager, J., et al. (2022). Eating Disorders: Overview of Prevention and Treatment. UpToDate. Retrieved Oct 4, 2022.
  3. Yager, J., et al. (2022). Eating disorders: overview of epidemiology, clinical features, and diagnosis. UpToDate. Retrieved Oct 4, 2022.
  4. Jovanovski, N., Jaeger, T. (2022). Demystifying ‘diet culture’: Exploring the meaning of diet culture in online ‘anti-diet’ feminist, fat activist, and health professional communities. Women's Studies International Forum, 90, 102558.
  5. Bornioli, A., et al. (2019). Adolescent body dissatisfaction and disordered eating: Predictors of later risky health behaviours. Social Science & Medicine, 238, 112458.
  6. Douglas, V., & Varnado-Sullivan, P. (2016). Weight stigmatization, internalization, and eating disorder symptoms: The role of emotion dysregulation. Stigma and Health, 1(3), 166–175.

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