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Anorexia may not be noticed in the early stages because it often starts as an innocent diet. They often become hyperactive because they exercise frantically in an attempt to burn calories to lose weight.
In the later and more dangerous stages, the disease may not be noticed by family members because the anorexic usually wears layered and baggy clothes.
Even though the anorexic is emaciated, she still feels "fat" and wants to hide her "ugly, fat body." An anorexic may have ritualistic eating patterns such as cutting the food into tiny pieces and weighing every piece for food before she eats it. These behaviors can be found in people who are on a normal, healthy diet, but in anorexics these behaviors are extremely exaggerated.
A number of research projects involving experimen- tal preventive measures have been reported in the current medical literature. Some of these experiments may prove to be helpful either in reducing the risk of anorexia nervosa, or perhaps preventing it altogether:
(1) instruction on the harmful effects of unhealthy weight regulation;
(2) intervention with programs of weight regulation by practicing sound nutrition and dietary principles and beginning a regimen of aerobic physical activity; and
(3) development of coping skills for resisting the diverse sociocultural influences that appear linked to the current popular obsessions with thinness and dieting.
There are many reasons as to why women develop anorexia nervosa. One is that it is dieting taken to a dangerous extreme.
Another is that societal pressures dictate a woman be thin in order to be beautiful -- the "waif look" was recently popular. But what these theories come down to is an issue of control. Whatever else is going on in the anorexic's life, the one thing that she feels she can control is food.
When problems in the family contribute to the feeling of loss of control, family therapy has provided a 90% improvement rate (Nichols...