What is an Eating Disorder

• Eating disorders occur when the focus of a person's everyday life revolves obsessively around food and weight.
• Some people try to starve themselves. This disorder is anorexia, an emotional illness in which a person refuses to eat to maintain a body weight normal for their height
• Eating food becomes unhealthy when we use it to deal with emotional needs. We may numb out feelings of anger, frustration, anxiety, depression.
• Eating may provide temporary emotional comfort. This means that when a person is feeling distressed, they avoid dealing with it directly and try to appease or escape the unpleasantness with food.
• Other unhealthy food use includes it providing companionship for those who are lonely or serving as an activity for those who are bored.
• There is a habit-forming component to using food for other than hunger needs. Eventually, it becomes an automatic behavior when one of the triggering factors arises.
• When food intake seems the only way to make individual choices, some people restrict food or binge/purge as an unhealthy way to gain control in their life.

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