Disordered Eating Vs. Eating Disorders
Is it the same thing? How do we tell the difference? What does it look like to not have disordered eating? These may all be questions you as yourself as you read the title of this post. As we dive in, you will learn what the difference is between disordered eating and eating disorders and how to catch those tricking disordered eating behaviors.
The difference between an ED and disordered eating: Does it matter?
Disordered eating habits and clinical ED's both contribute to poor health. Diagnosis are primarily influenced by severity and intensity of the disordered eating behaviors. Disordered eating often includes the behavior similar to eating disorders whose symptoms are less frequent or less intense.
There are a number of different aspects of eating disorders. Having a disordered relationship with food doesn't necessarily qualify as causing eating disorders. A major differentiation among eating disorder is the severity. Disordered eating patterns can be associated with eating problems, although the symptoms occur less often or less intensely. That isn’t to say disordered eating can’t be fatal.
The Impact of Eating Disorders and Disordered Eating
Eating disorders can have numerous health consequences and can adversely affect your heart, gastrointestinal and nervous systems. A disordered diet can affect you even if you have not formally received a diagnosis of an eating disorder. These symptoms can result in bone sagging, bowel disorders, fatigue, headache, low cardiac blood pressure, difficulty in concentration and heightened anxiety and depression.
Types of Disordered Eating
Disordered eating may have behaviors that are abnormal or similar to eating disorders. Disordered eating habits may also involve self-induced compensated behavior after eating. This may include self-induced vomiting, use of diet pills, or other actions such as vigorous physical activity. Typically, these behaviors are considered disorder if occur occasionally, but satisfy the criteria of eating disorder for a period of 3 months.
Fad diets are everywhere, but that doesn't mean they're healthy.
Turn on your TV or browse Instagram to see what's new. As Americans strive to achieve their desired weight, many are not surprised by this. It may seem tempting to experiment with the newest diet trends — but this will lead you into an unhealthy eating pattern. Diets have been shown to be 95% ineffective. There are strong links of disordered eating and eating disorders when folks diet.
Signs of an Eating Disorder
Disordered eating and eating disorders both demands a lot of time and mental energy. They might hinder a persons ability to function properly at different levels, such as work, school and social life. Many of us avoid socially interacting with others because we are avoiding eating with other people.
Types of Eating Disorders
The three most common eating disorders are binge eating disorder, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia nervosa. Those with a diagnosed eating disorder must fit specific diagnostic criteria. All three of these diagnosable eating disorders come along with distorted body image and unhealthy behaviors around food intake.
Anorexia Nervosa
Anorexia Nervosa is a form of eating disorder that has an intense fear of weight gain, severely restrictive diet, and distorted image. It's attributed to an extensive limitation of calories and food variety. Frequently the extreme restrictions cause significant weight loss. Anorexia has the highest death complication amongst all psychiatric disorders.
Bulimia Nervosa
Bulimia nervosa consists of episodes of binge eating behaviors, combined with compensatory behaviors. What this means is that when someone has the clinical eating disorder, they will eating larger amounts of food in a certain period of time, followed by some time of compensatory behavior, such as diet pills, over exercise, induced vomiting, or laxative use.
Binge Eating Disorder
Binge eating disorder or BED is similar to Bulimia except there is no compensatory behavior. When one is struggling with binge eating disorder, they often feel guilt around the food intake and binge eating behaviors.
Weight stigma and discrimination can prevent people from receiving ED diagnoses
Some criteria are excluded from the diagnosis. To diagnose anorexia nervosa a person must have a low bodyweight or low BMI. These are challenging metrics because, but they ignore the fact that disordered eating and related health problems affect individuals of all sizes. The likelihood that individuals of all body sizes are consuming food with unhealthy habits is much higher than that reported. Because of their high BMI, however, doctors often exclude them to receive diagnostics and thus to treat them.
What Does Non-Disordered Eating Look Like?
Folks often as me what "normal eating" looks like. For me, I feel like normal eating can look different for everyone. Healthy eating does not have to do with choosing the right food groups, but rather your intention behind it. Learning to listen to your body and practice intuitive eating, can be a game changer. Take the focus off of body weight or shape and focusing on the mind-body connection, will help increase your mental and physical health.
Eating Disorder vs Disordered Eating; Coping and Preventing
When you detect symptoms of disorderly or uncontrolled eating, then it's possible to change your behavior to improve your physical and mental health. Finding ways to cope with the resulting behavior is helpful whether the behavior have developed into a full-blown eating disorder or not. Often the first step is to reach out to a specialist that works with eating disorders, such as an eating disorder therapist or registered dietitian. To schedule a free consultation call with me, check out my schedule here. At Serendipity Counseling Services, my goal is to help you improve your relationship with food, your body, and movement.
