Group Paper :: essays papers

Group Paper Anorexia is characterized by a significant weight loss resulting from excessive dieting. The strong desire to be thin and a fear of becoming obese motivate so many women and an increasing number of men, to begin dieting. Anorexics consider themselves to be fat, no matter what their actual weight is. Often anorexics do not recognize they are underweight and may still â€Å"feel fat† at 80 lbs. Anorexics who are close to death will reveille the parts of their body where they feel they need to loose weight. In their attempts to become even thinner, anorexics will avoid consuming food and taking in calories at all costs. An estimated 10 to 20% of anorexics will eventually die from complications related to the disorder (http://www.mirror-mirror.org/eatdis.htm). In my personal experience, a person with anorexia may feel like their life is out of control. In this case since the person feels like they have no control over anything, they turn to anorexia for stability in their lives. They feel that they can control their eating habits and weight, and what goes into their body and what doesn’t. This feeling of control gives the person a sense of relief that he or she is in charge of at least some aspect of their life. They feel a sense of power when they step on the scale every morning and see a decrease in weight. When it does go down, they have â€Å"succeeded† and when it does not, they have failed in trying to accomplish their goal of thinness. When anorexics loose weight, they feel that they have all of the power and control over themselves. Anorexics are usually people who strive for perfection; they will set very high standards for themselves, and they feel that they always have to prove their competence to everybody else around them. Anorexics will usually put their needs on the back burner while putting others’ needs ahead of theirs, even if it may cause their own life to suffer. Sometimes anorexia is an escape for the individual from their problems. By forcing themselves to focus so strongly on dieting and loosing more and more weight, they can block out all of their other personal problems. Anorexics usually have very low self-esteem, and sometimes they feel that they do not deserve to eat.