Anorexia Insights

After our brief discussion on eating disorders yesterday in Psychosocial Class, I was reminded of a fascinating article I read in my Abnormal Psych class last year. I dug up the article and the paper I had written on it. Here is an excerpt from my paper:

"The article I chose to read was titled "Portrait of a Hunger Artist" (Psychology Today, March/April 2010). This story provides insight into the life of a young anorexic woman. The author, Emily, debunks myths that anorexics don't feel hungry and don't like food. On the contrary, she states that "eating was the point of living, precisely because it was so special, it had to be waited for, made more and more perfect by the hunger that would grow deeper and deeper so that nothing else mattered." Emily explains that her anorexia was probably born out of a desire to be thin, however it manifested itself into a ritual that provided a sense of control, a sense of power and strength from being able to "defer" food. Then the ritual grew into an entity all its own, an all-encompassing lifestyle where her sense of self worth was completely tied into "deferring, restricting, and meticulously, secretively orchestrating the eating of food."
I can relate to the feelings and thoughts in which Emily became entangled through her anorexia. Though I've never had an eating disorder, I can see how easily one could fall into the trap. Having dieted in the past, there is a point, after a few days, where I felt I had triumphed over the emotional, desire-based need for food and had entered into the realm of need-based eating. That sense of control and domination was very powerful. Emily explains how "deferring food was proof of strength." I think anorexics take one more step than the rest of us and cross the threshold into another world that totally envelopes them in a sense of intoxicating mastery."