Eating Disorders - Articles

1. Older Women, Too, Struggle With a Dangerous Secret

This article talks about older women who suffer or have suffered from either bulimia or anorexia nervosa. According to Lori Varecka, she was able to hide her eating disorder from her family for more than two decades. Another woman said that her husband just thought she had  "funny eating habits."  When hearing a word such as bulimia, we have a tendency to imagine a skin-and-bones teenager. However, it seems like that's just a pure illusion. This dangerous disorder has started to occur more frequently in our every day lives. Some of the similarities between teenagers and older women suffering from bulimia are: loneliness, insecurity and perfectionism. On the contrary, the main difference is considered to be the etiology, in other the words the reason why it occurred. Moreover, according to one particular study more than 20% of women suffering from anorexia died.

(http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/06/health/older-women-too-struggle-with-a-dangerous-secret.html) 

2. Study Links Bulimia to Chemical Malfunction in the Brain

A new study mentioned in this article suggests that bulimia is not only caused by mental problems, but also by brain's inability to regulate serotonin. To be more specific, women in the study who recovered from bulimia and were deprived from trytophan (amino acid found in foods whose function is to make serotonin) were more affected psychologically than the women who were not deprived from trytophan. In the second study, 10 recovered bulimics and 12 normal women were asked to drink a fruit drink. There were two control groups: some drinks contained trytophan and the rest did not. The results showed that lowered brain serotonin function that is caused by lower levels of trytophan in human body can trigger some features of bulimia nervosa.

http://www.nytimes.com/1999/02/16/health/study-links-bulimia-to-chemical-malfunction-in-the-brain.html 

3. VITAL SIGNS: BEHAVIOR; Trouble for Women in the Mess Hall

This article focused on the women in the Army and their eating disorder problems. The results of the recent study showed that 8% of the women who were in active duty in the Army suffered either from anorexia or bulimia. Even though this percentage is not extremely high, it is still higher than for the women in general. Therefore, a larger emphasis should be put on this issue. The study conducted by Dr. Tamara D. Lauder was studying 423 enlisted women at Fort Lewis. The researcher and her team were observing these women for about a year. 142 women appeared to have some clinical feature of eating disorders. According to the results, 33 women actually suffered from eating disorders. Some of them even admitted that they were binging and purging. To conclude, the researchers suggested that male environment full of physical tests might have a negative impact on women's mental health.

http://www.nytimes.com/2000/01/18/health/vital-signs-behavior-trouble-for-women-in-the-mess-hall.html