The story of Karen Carpenter and her Anorexia Problems Anorexia is a mental illness that affects all age groups and all ethnic groups. Anorexia does not only have physical symptoms, but mental symptoms also. There are environmental and natural causes. Anorexia affects people in different ways. There are various treatments for this disease (NEDA). Karen Carpenter was one woman who was affected by anorexia (“Karen Carpenter”). Anorexia is a serious mental illness, but some people do not take it seriously. On average it is estimated that one percent of females in their teens and early twenties will develop anorexia (“Anorexia Facts”). Women suffering from anorexia are usually between the ages of fifteen to nineteen. The word anorexia means …show more content…
The reason why the women percentage is higher is because the world tends to have really high expectations for females(27). Some people have an unhealthy desire to be “perfect” in the public eye (20). If someone has been through some type of trauma, for example: bullying, that can also cause anorexia. Now if someone has a disorder where their body just naturally cannot gain weight and keeps losing it, that is not anorexia. Anorexia is mostly seen in females that when male anorexics go to the doctor for help, the males are misdiagnosed (“Anorexia Facts”). In severe cases of anorexia, hospitalization could be required (“Anorexia Facts”). When a girl does not eat, her body will run on adrenaline, same thing with a boy. Adrenaline is a chemical in the body. Adrenaline is not healthy if it is being pumped twenty-four-seven. If a young person has anorexia, they will most likely to have a slowed growth and have a short stature. Anorexics have a more slow and sometimes abnormal heart rate, low body temperature, electrolyte imbalances, and low blood pressure. Although anorexia is found in every race, caucasians and Hispanic females are most likely to have anorexia as opposed to black or Asian (“Anorexia …show more content…
During her life when she was anorexic, she was very self conscious. She wanted to look “perfect” yet after the man commented on her, many people already thought she was perfect. Karen Carpenter was very family friendly. Here is a quote about Mickey Mouse: “The image we have would be impossible for Mickey Mouse to maintain. We're just... normal people.”. “We spent an awful lot of time trying to achieve perfection as close as we can come. It's the foremost thing in both of our minds, at all times” (“Karen Carpenter”). Karen is one person of many who try to achieve the “perfect” look. In reality, beauty is in the eye of the
Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, written by Chris Crutcher, is about being an outcast, friendship, and standing up for what is right. The main character Eric, or Moby, whose best friend is Sarah Byrnes, find themselves going through a series of events of dark secrets, violence, betrayal, and more. In the book, these two best friends learn that friendship and sacrifice are vital in order to help find themselves.
Rachel recalls that whenever she would see a picture of herself she would fell repulse and sick to her stomach. She said she hated her nose and the whole right side of her face. Her lips where too flat, her lips where uneven, and her neck was too long that she looked like a duck. As time went on she developed obsessive compulsive disorder and used to wash her face at least 30 times a day. Rachel wouldn’t leave her house for 7 years because she was too ashamed of what people might think of her appearance. Rachel even tried to cut off the fat from her leg with a regular kitchen
Anorexia Nervosa may be described directly as an eating disease classified by a deficit in weight, not being able to maintain weight appropriate for one’s height. Anorexia means loss of appetite while Anorexia Nervosa means a lack of appetite from nervous causes. Before the 1970s, most people never heard of Anorexia Nervosa. It was identified and named in the 1870s, before then people lived with this mental illness, not knowing what it was, or that they were even sick. It is a mental disorder, which distorts an individual’s perception of how they look. Looking in the mirror, they may see someone overweight
At the age of 25, Portia De Rossi met the criteria for the eating feeding disorder of anorexia nervosa binging/purging type. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 5th edition people must meet all three criteria in order to be diagnosed with anorexia nervosa binging/purging type. These are a.) restrictive food intake and weighing below normal body weight b.) have an intense fear of gaining weight and c.) have distorted beliefs on body image. To meet the diagnostic for the binging/purging type the person with anorexia nervosa must also be having recurrent binging/purging episodes for at least 3 months. In the case of Portia De Rossi, she met such criteria at the age of 25. ......
“Eating disorders are ‘about’: yes, control, and history, philosophy, society, personal strangeness, family fuck-ups, autoerotics, myth, mirrors, love and death and S&M, magazines and religion, the individual’s blindfolded stumble-walk through an ever-stranger world.” (Hornbacher, 4)
Many causes are attributed to anorexia, and scientists have studied the personalities, genetics, environments, and biochemistry of people suffering from this disorder. Women most often share various traits--although the more that is learned, the more complex each individual case becomes--low self-esteem, feelings of helplessness, and a fear ...
When an individual refuses to eat enough food to maintain a healthy body weight, he or she is dealing with a serious illness known as anorexia nervosa. People with this illness maintain strict control over food intake. About ninety percent of anorexia nervosa cases are women, particularly teenagers. (Alters & Schiff, 2003, p.37). For every one in one hundred that develops this illness, it most commonly evolves in their high school years. The symptoms of anorexia nervosa are:
Anorexia is a psychiatric disorder that is most common in young women. Those who suffer with anorexia have a fear of gaining weight and have an inaccurate portrayal of their own bodies. They see themselves as being fat, even though they are already thin to begin with. They are willing to go to extreme measures to lose weight, but the only outcome is a severely unhealthy body weight. To achieve the weight they want they will either starve themselves or do a tremendous amount of exercise.
Anorexia is a mental illness that can be identified by its victims starving themselves in order to drop weight to dangerous levels. Most often, anorexics will restrict their food or exercise excessively in order to decrease their body weight. Anorexia has the highest mortality rate of any mental illness. This is mainly due to suicide and the complications that occur consequently from starvation. These complications include heart and kidney failure as well as osteoporosis and muscle atrophy. Females may also stop menstruating. The gastrointestinal, cardiovascular, and endocrine systems may also be affected. Thus, Anorexia has detrimental effects on a person’s physical and mental health.
Anorexia nervosa is a life threatening eating disorder defined by a refusal to maintain fifteen percent of a normal body weight through self-starvation (NAMI 1). Ninety-five percent of anorexics are women between the ages of twelve and eighteen, however, “…in the past twenty years, this disorder has become a growing threat to high school and college students”(Maloney and Kranz 60). Anorexia produces a multitude of symptoms, and if not treated, anorexia can lead to permanent physical damage or death.
Anorexia is a disorder that goes much deeper than the trite image pushed by the media. Anorexia occurs most often in young, adolescent females, can be caused by biological, socio-cultural, and psycho-developmental factors, causes considerable damage to the body and the heart, and treatment is not often attained and is long and difficult for the patient when it is.
According to Laura Shapiro, a notable researcher on eating disorders, the medical condition of anorexia consists of several elements. By definition, anorexia nervosa is a condition characterized by intense fear of gaining weight or becoming obese, as well as a distorted body image, and a feeling of loss of control (Shapiro 69).
Anorexic: this word is an adjective, a label, and to some, a lifestyle. Medically speaking, it is someone who suffers from the deadly and heartbreaking disease, Anorexia Nervosa. This term translates to “nervous loss of appetite”, but anyone who has battled through this sickness is aware how that is anything but true. Eating disorder patients do not, in fact, lose their appetite; there is more to it than that. Many perceive eating disorders as a choice to be thin, a diet, or a cry for attention; they do not see the mental destruction going on inside of the mind. Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any mental illness, yet only 30% of people fully recover (ANAD). The general mindset that society has about eating disorders walks hand in hand with these statistics, slowing down any advances patients may be able to make. Eating disorder patients are not getting proper treatment because of ignorant misconceptions about the illness.
In 1978, Brunch called anorexia nervosa a 'new disease' and noted that the condition seemed to overtake ?the daughters of the well-to-do, educated and successful families.? Today it is acknowledged and accepted that anorexia affects more than just one gender or socio-economic class; however, much of the current research is focused on the female gender. ?Anorexia nervosa is characterized by extreme dieting, intense fear of gaining weight, and obsessive exercising. The weight loss eventually produces a variety of physical symptoms associated with starvation: sleep disturbance, cessation of menstruation, insensitivity to pain, loss of hair on the head, low blood pressure, a variety of cardiovascular problems and reduced body temperature. Between 10% and 15% of anorexics literally starve themselves to death; others die because of some type of cardiovascular dysfunction (Bee and Boyd, 2001).?
Of the three eating disorders, anorexia gets the most attention and has the highest mortality rate of six percent out of any mental illness. According to the International Journal of Eating Disorders, half of the deaths caused by anorexia are suicide. Anorexia is when an individual feels that his or her body is distorted. Anorexia is also when an individual starves himself or herself because of the fear of being overweight (Elkins 44). If an individual suffers from anorexia they will loose anywhere from fifteen to sixty percent of their body weight by starving his or herself. Some of the symptoms of anorexia are heart problems, anemia, and fertility problems (“Eating Disorders”). Another horrible eating disorder is bulimia, which is when a person over eats, feels guilty, and then purges, take...