Eating disorder in Egypt

Our judgmental eyes could easily spot severe eating disorders like Anorexia or Bulimia Nervosa. However, can we pinpoint other less severe disordered eating and understand the calamity of its emotional dangers on people? Disordered eating is mostly common in young girls who are obsessed with weight, calories, diet and size. As young children, most of the girls grow up in a culture where being thin in sexy and being a little chubby or fat is a shame. As girls grow up to become teenagers, this idea is emphasized as they see their favorite female actors and singers with their “perfect” body. This problem is common in the United States, where 1 in 5 women struggle with an eating disorder or disordered eating. However, this idea seems to have increased in our Egyptian culture lately. The Egyptian Medical Association for the Study of Obesity estimated that “15 percent of young Egyptian children are obese--a notable increase from only 6 percent in 1990”. Young Egyptian females now either starve themselves or eat in an uncontrollable way to simply fill the void. Extreme thinness has become a social and cultural ideal, and women partially define themselves by how physically attractive they are. The problem is not only that beauty pressures lead to eating disorders, but also the reckless way our country and culture handles the problem.
As a teenager, I have seen a lot of cases of disordered eating at my school. There is that thin girl who is always on diet and another girl who is always eating for no reason. Both cases have internal struggles with self-esteem and lack the ability to face the problem and find an appropriate solution for it. In addition, both cases dislike their bodies and size. They don’t see themselves as beautiful creat...

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... the mainstream idea that being thin or skinny is attractive, more and more young girls believe that controlling their weight will allow them to achieve their goals and success in life. However, instead they end up hating themselves, hating their bodies, and hating their lives.

Works Cited

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kirsten-haglund/national-eating-disorders-awareness-week_b_4782650.html