Causes and Analysis Of Eating Disorders and The Theory of Social Learning

Causes and Analysis Of Eating Disorders and The Theory of Social Learning I was going to write this exercise as a study or a list of facts about the problems caused by eating disorders, and how they effect people of my age. However, I have to decide to give the real facts and feeling that the glossy magazines exclude. For about a year I have had an obsession with my weight and appearances, in many ways it has gradually over take my life, controlling what I do and how I think. Just after the school Christmas holidays I started treading on the â€Å"day deciders†. These small objects would decided whether my day would go well or not, to a person with an eating disorder this block of metal and plastic that tell your weight, controls their day, week and even their month. The text book definition of anorexia is â€Å"A persons who intentionally stave themselves to loss weight†. The text book definition of bulimia is â€Å"A person that removes food from their body with out letting it be thoroughly digested this can be by making themselves sick, using laxatives and over exercising (this can be seen in anorexics as well). They may be the texts books version but they are not anywhere near the truth of the problem. This is my story it is full of the fact and experiences that the books will not tell you. Do not judge me before you have read this. I used to that to people with an eating disorder before, I only hope people will not do that to me. In the beginning, it started with missing the odd breakfast. I had always hated the smell of a cooked breakfast and I stopped touching then at the age of twelve. It was the whole idea of eating the droplets of fat on the plate and what they might do to me when I ate them. Eventually I in had stopped eating anything up to eleven o’clock by the age of fourteen. I used to pretend to have eaten something by swishing a bit of milk and cereal around the bowl – this would fool my mum and it still does. After Christmas 2000 I went on the scales, I notice that my weight had reason to ten stone! The day before we had been talking about our weights at school, my friends were only eight to seven and a half stone, I felt like a freak. In addition, I close friend had call me fat as a joke but it went straight to my heart. So I decide to loss some weight. At this time I just controlled what I ate, I missed lunch a few times and deliberately made myself late for school so I could miss breakfast. By February Half Term, I had lost about a stone. I got talking to a friend who was telling me about her weight and how she felt over weigh, as well. She was going to loss it sensibly though by dieting. People started to come up to me at school and say â€Å"why are you not eating lunch† and â€Å"look at yourself Emily you don’t need to loss weight†. The school had started to notice as my fellow pupils told teaches and they started to hassle me. By the Easter holidays, I had made myself ill. I had caught severe tonsillitis because my immune system was low. I was ill for about three weeks. I decided to stop trying to loss weight. I had internal exams and course work to do; I had to be my best. All this time my parents had not noticed. When the summer holidays had started, I start going out and getting self conscious about my self again. I felt that people saw me as fat. I went away on holiday and I wore a bikini, I again felt that people view me as fat and ugly. When I came back, I promised myself to loss weigh. This is when it stared to get bad. This time I wanted to loss weight without people finding out or bothering me could not stand the attention. In the last term we had, had personal and social education lessons, I knew the two different ways to loss weight anorexia and bulimia. I decided bulimia was the best option. I would be seen eating and psychologically I would see myself as eating. I also started I new eating pattern. I again missed breakfast, but to be seen at school as eating I would occasionally go to lunch (about three times a week) at home I would eat a usual family meal. The key to being bulimic was to drink lots of water. That way it came back up easier as the weight came of a started to feel more comterble about me. I was happier when I was being sick, it gave me a sense of relieve when there was nothing inside me. After about two months, it became an obsession. I would have schedule that I would follow nightly. So my parents would here I turned my music up and the bath water on then, I would then spray p erfume, and after that, I would be sick. After I was sick I would bush my teeth and wash my face this happen for six months and I still do. Just before Christmas, my mum became seriously ill, my life became very emotionally confusing. This did not help with my eating disorder I began to feel that the food I put into my month became he only thing that I could control. My grandparents came up to stay, this inflamed the situation because my grandmother life revolves around food. She did not know about the eating disorder nobody did. The only conversations that the family could have were about food and this was at the dinner table. I soon developed a phobia of eating at the dinner table at home. This phobia still is with me. I also developed a phobia of my grandmother visiting I am afraid that whenever she stay I have to be forced to eat. As my mother stayed in hospital, I became very depressed, and I stopped sleeping as well, this emotional rollercoaster that I went though will be with me for my life. By February my mother had come out of hospital and she was recovering. I began to take control of my life but I could not stop being sick. I did try to stop but it made me angry and irritable. Eventually I broke down at school and I told the friend who had tried to loss weigh by dieting, she had since become anorexia. She told me to tell my mother. I was afraid and ashamed of what she might think of me. I feared that she would see me a failure or attention seeking. I do not want the help. It is up to me to change myself and I do not feel that I am ready to do that. Yet. By writing this down, I wish to tell people that by telling anorexia people to eat or telling bulimic people â€Å"they look great any way† and †that they don’t need to change†. This does not help it just hinders them. People who go round eating chocolate and then say well I will be sick later or say I am anorexia are not the true anorexics and bulimics they are the ones tha t keep quite. I hope this will allow people not to judge people as being strange for having these problems, but to help them and encourage them to sort themselves out. On this page are some facts about eating disorders. Anorexia Surfers intentionally starve themselves. It is commonly found young people around the time of puberty. It involves weight lossat least 15 percent below normal body weight. Many people with the disorder are convinced they are overweight. they become terrified of gaining any weight. People with anorexia continue to think they are overweight even when they are bone-thin. The person suffering from anorexia believes that their body Weight, shape and size is related to how good they feel about themselves and their worth as a human being They refusal to eat in front of others. They often do to strict exercise routines to keep off weight. Not menstruating is a common sign. Men with anorexia often become impotent. Bulimia Bulimia is an eating disorder characterized by binge eating. It appears to be relatively uncommon in men and is common in girls between fifteen to twenty. Dieting behavior usually starts before it. A complex lifestyle may cause an eating disorder behavior There are feelings of isolation, self-deprecating thoughts, depression, and low self-esteem. There is full recognition of the behavior as abnormal.