Airys Mind Fitness Blog

Bulimia Nervosa

This week is time to talk about bulimia nervosa. Bulimia Nervosa is a disorder that is basically characterized by two things: compulsive overeating (binging) plus a compensative period (purging).

It is important to distinguish between bulimia and cumpulsive overeating. To identify bulimia it’s necessary that a person first has an overeating episode in wich he or she eats a massive amount of food (more than a normal person can take) in a brief period of time, and a following episode in which he or she abuses of laxatives, stops eating for a long time (fasting) or, the in most cases, induces vomiting in order to compensate binge eating.

After an binge episode, the person tends to feel guilty and depressed, so will try to do anything in his or her power to loose those recently added calories by purging.

The are two types of bulimia: purging type and non-purging type. In the purging type people use laxatives or self induces vomiting, this is the most common type of bulimia. In the non-purging type, people uses other techniques like fasting and over exercising

Causes of bulimia nervosa are very similar to anorexia nervosa: a deficient genetic structure, an unhealthy enviroment and some personality characteristics (like poor body image), plus dieting and restrictive eating in this particular case. This is important because when we start a fitness plan to loose wheight, we are committed to change, unfortunately if we  fail, it is common and normal to feel a bit disappointed. It is risky when anxiety takse place and we start eating more that we normaly do, even if we weren’t on a plan, and we try to do crazy stuff to get rid of those calories. In case of anorexia nervosa, the person does not necessarily need to loose weight when the problem starts, in case of bulimia, being overweight and trying to loose some pounds is a risk factor.

Bulimia nervosa is very hazardous to health because of the extreme actions bulimics take. This actions like vomiting or abusing of laxatives, can easyly kill a person.  The damage done to body’s metabolism and gastric system might be irreversible and cause death. I found this picture on the Internet that depicts very well some of the effects of bulimia, when purging is involved:

As any other disorder this has to be identified during the first alert signs. Symptoms of this disorders are progressive, probably someone with bulimia started getting obsessed with their weight, then anxiety led him or her to binge eating until gaining some weight and then started purging uncontrollably. So it is very important to seek for help if you think you are loosing control in the way you eat. You can talk to your health care provider is you feel you might have any of these symptoms so you can sort the best way out of the problem. Treatment for bulimia includes psychotherapy, pharmacologic therapy and nutritional advice, along with medical follow up.

Hope you find this information useful.

Have a great week!!

Next week: compulsive overeating and binge eating disorder.