Natural Treatment Of Anorexia Nervosa
Anorexia nervosa simply known as anorexia, is an life-threatening eating disorder characterized by lack of appropriate weight gain in growing children or weight loss. People having anorexia find difficult to maintain an appropriate body weight for height, age, and stature; and, in many individuals, distorted body image. A person with anorexia is preoccupied with calorie intake and weight.
Anorexia can affect people of all ages, genders, sexual orientations, races, and ethnicities. Historians and psychologists have found evidence of people displaying symptoms of anorexia for hundreds or thousands of years.
Types Of Anorexia Nervosa
There are two common types of anorexia, which are as follows:
- Binge/Purge Type: The person struggling with this type of eating disorder will often purge after eating. This alleviates the fear of gaining weight and offsets some of the guilt of having ingested forbidden, or highly restricted food. The compensatory purge behavior by the individual with Binge/Purge Type anorexia may purge by exercising excessively, vomiting or abusing laxatives.
- Restrictive Type: – The individual suffering from restrictive anorexia is often perceived as highly self-disciplined. They restrict the quantity of food, calories and often high fat or high sugar foods. They consume far fewer calories than are needed to maintain a healthy weight. This is a heartbreaking form of self-starvation.
Though two classifications of this eating disorder exist, both types exhibit similar symptoms, such as an irrational fear of weight gain and abnormal eating patterns.
Causes Of Anorexia Nervosa
The exact cause of anorexia is unknown. It has been said that eating disorder is based on genetic predisposition, personality traits, and environmental factors. Although there are many other contributing factors, including:
- Perfectionism
- Strict dieting
- Body dissatisfaction
- Low self-esteem
- Emotional difficulties
- History of physical or sexual abuse
- Troubled family relationships
- Family history of eating disorders
- Other traumatic experiences
This disorder begins at adolescence age. But this can also happen in older or teenage.
Signs And Symptoms Of Anorexia Nervosa
An individual suffering from anorexia nervosa may reveal one or several signs and symptoms such as:
These are also some Emotional and behavioral problems that a person suffers:
- Denies feeling hungry
- Dramatic weight loss
- Dresses in layers to hide weight loss or stay warm
- Develops food rituals
- Expresses a need to “burn off” calories taken in
- Feels ineffective
- Shows inflexible thinking
- Has strong need for control
- Has limited social spontaneityThere are also some Physical problems such as:
- Dizziness
- Stomach cramps, other non-specific gastrointestinal complaints
- Fainting/syncope
- Sleep problems
- Dry skin
- Cavities, or discoloration of teeth, from vomiting
- Cold, mottled hands and feet or swelling of feet
- Fine hair on body (lanugo)
- Cuts and calluses across the top of finger joints (a result of inducing vomiting)
Anorexia nervosa Treatment
According to Ayurvedic perspective, as explained in the Astanga Hrdayam, “consuming of insufficient quantity of food does not help improvement of strength, growth, and vigour, it becomes a cause for all diseases of vata origin.”
