UALR

Project 2b
Peer Review

Taylor Adams
Composition 1
Stephanie Williams
April 6, 2016

Anorexia Nervosa is a terrible disorder that is influencing people to starve themselves.

Anorexia is an eating disorder that is defined as the obsession with losing weight and, in most
cases, extreme exercise and self-deprivation of food is used to quickly loose undesirable weight
(Anorexia Nervosa). Anorexia currently has the highest mortality rate of all mental illnesses with
a 5.8 which equates to .58 percent of all deaths annually (Anorexia Nervosa). Anorexia is most
common in females from teens to young adults (Eating Disorders Statistics). The cause of
anorexia is currently unknown, however it is common for anorexia to run in a family and there
are multiple psychological factors that could influence anorexia (Anorexia Nervosa).
The causes of anorexia can vary from social pressure to sexual abuse to many other
things (Anorexia Nervosa). It is commonly believed that the reason anorexia nervosa is found
primarily in females is from the pressure of the current society (Hisam). Many believe that the
images on media displayed to females as they are growing up, describe a beautiful woman as
thin (Hisam). In recent times, the media has slowly started to portray women as beautiful at any
size with many popular female icons to push that idea (Hisam). Other beliefs suggest that
anorexia could be caused by chemical imbalance in the brain or mental trauma at a young age
(Anorexia Nervosa).
Anorexia in males is less common to anorexia in females (Eating Disorders Statistics).
The amount of anorexia cases of women more than double the cases of men (Eating Disorders
Statistics). There are many beliefs why this is but there is no clear reason. Some research shows
that anorexia is more common in homosexual males than heterosexual males (Eatng Disorders
Statistics). Another suggestion is that male anorexia stims from childhood sexual abuse or social
pressure to be fit to be desirable (Anorexia Nervosa).

Some symptoms of anorexia include extreme weight loss, dehydration, sensitivity to cold,
lack of emotion and depression (Anorexia Nervosa). A person with anorexia will often have very
low energy and will rarely eat in sight of others in most cases (Anorexia Nervosa). People with
anorexia will also most likely have an eating schedule and will rarely veer from it (Goode).
Another symptom of anorexia that usually occurs after many days of self-starvation is binge
eating, which is eating a large amount of food in a short time, and in some cases, to the point of
vomiting (Eating Disorders). These symptoms are usually hard to spot depending on the person,
in most cases the person will be very secretive about when they eat and will often claim they are
not hungry at regular meal times (Eating Disorders).
Spotting someone with anorexia is a very difficult task, as most people with anorexia will
conceal their behavior. In many cases, sufferers of anorexia will claim that they are dieting to
those who ask and the person himself/herself will likely believe that they actually are just dieting
(Fetters). A large reason victims of anorexia are hard to spot is because they, themselves, do not
realize that something is wrong (Waldman). If a person is not looking too closely, anorexia can
look like a form of dieting (Moorhead). The lack of emotion is usually ignored by many parents
and attributed to lack of sleep or mild depression as teens with lack of emotion due to anorexia
can seem similar to those who are not suffering from anorexia (Waldman). After interviewing a
childhood friend of mine, Ryan Covey, about his experiences with a relative who suffered from
anorexia, I learned how people see anorexia from the outside. He stated that when his relative
was suffering from anorexia, he and his family believed that the person had been using drugs and
never suspected that she had anorexia for many years (Covey). After he and his family found out
that their relative had anorexia he claimed that he had no idea that she was suffering (Covey).

Anorexia is a very dangerous disorder and is rarely identified in time to prevent permanent
damage.
The treatment of anorexia usually involves multiple counseling sessions with a mental
health doctor (Anorexia Nervosa). An eating schedule, provided by a dietician, is another way to
help treat anorexia (Anorexia Nervosa). In many cases, there will be multiple medical conditions
caused by anorexia at the time of treatment and the appropriate doctor will help treat symptoms
such as heart problems, organ failure, and depression (Quick, Bredbenner, and Sztainer). Almost
all cases of anorexia will require treatment from doctors to help improve the condition (Anorexia
Nervosa). It is rare for someone suffering from anorexia to get well on his/her own (Waldman).
Anorexia is still a very prominent disease today, and many clinics and hospitals are doing
what they can to help treat it to the best of their abilities (Kleiner). One such company is Veritas
Collaborative, which is a company that is expanding their facilities for eating disorders (Kleiner).
There have been movements in the past to help prevent eating disorders and even more still
today, from promoting against general social medias ideas of being thin to be beautiful to
support groups to help eradicate the condition (Hisam).
There are many other disorders that can stem from or correlate with anorexia (Quick,
Bredbenner, and Sztainer). A common disorder that is usually found alongside anorexia is
bulimia nervosa (Quick, Bredbenner, and Sztainer). Bulimia nervosa is described as
uncontrollable overeating usually followed by self-induced vomiting, and guilt and self-hatred
(Eating Disorders). This disorder can be just as damaging as anorexia and even more devastating
when paired with anorexia. Another disorder that commonly occurs after treatment of anorexia is
Binge Eating Disorder (BED) (Quick, Bredbenner, and Sztainer). BED is described as multiple

episodes of eating unusually large portions of food very quickly to the point of well past full
(Eating Disorders). A mental disorder that is usually caused by suffering from anorexia is
Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) (Quick, Bredbenner, and Sztainer). BPD is characterized
as unstable moods and relationships stemmed from early childhood or adulthood (Fetters).
There are some groups that claim anorexia is a life-style choice and should be accepted
by doctors and families. The groups are known as pro-ana and, despite the high mortality and
mental and physical side effects of anorexia, they still believe that it is just an extreme form of
healthy dieting. Many of these groups have dedicated websites where they share techniques of
hiding anorexia from doctors and parents and of ignoring the pangs of hunger. These sites have
shown a decrease in peoples self-esteem and an increased desire to become anorexic. In some
cases, people who view the sites as ways to diet unknowingly become anorexic by following the
site as a healthy way to diet. Many sites, after being taken down by Yahoo! and Geocities in the
late 2000s, now try to conceal their sites to avoid the public eye (Brenneisen).
Anorexia Nervosa is a terrible mental illness that kills hundreds each year (Eating
Disorders Statistics). The parents and others who have a child or friend with anorexia will rarely
notice the presence of the disorder. Anorexia has a high mortality rate and people are trying to
find the source anorexia stems from to help treatment and possibly completely eradicate the
disease. In the future, hopefully anorexia will claim less lives and be less prominent.