Anorexia in Women

Anorexia is most commonly known as fear of food and fear of getting fat. Anorexia usually begins in women when they are young. Anorexia also is known to start forming when women are at a very young age, adolescents, or young adults. Some of the women mentioned in my essay will speak from experience of anorexia. In my research I encountered that most anorexia comes from social media and school for adolescents girls and young women.

Social media has a way of making women feel less of a person in less than thirty minutes of them being on social media and encountering all the “perfect” bodies portrayed (Sundquist 1). The biggest social media this portrayer is seen on is Instagram, the app with over one billion users worldwide, with over half of the users being females . Instagram has a lot of models on it to do ads for companies and in those ads they usually are exposing their body to show every inch and every curve they have. Those types of “perfect” bodies really upset most women and make them want to lose weight faster, which is where anorexia comes into place.

As mentioned before, the school system also has adolescent girls over the edge about their physical appearance. Physical education in school is a factor in anorexia on young teenage girls. School tries to enforce that young girls should be skinnier than a stop signs metal pole, also causing them over stress and anxiety. These actions are not looked on enough. While I was doing my research for anorexia I came across a PDF file of a book with personal experiences of a young lady named Lauren, who overcame anorexia. In her experience with anorexia, she claimed when it was lunch time for her and she would try to go eat her lunch, like any normal student would, she would always feel the pressure to not eat. Lauren always felt eyes on her from different students for the fact that she would eat. If anyone saw her eating it would be considered “wrong” and disgusting.

During my research, I came across a book that had young lady’s personal experience with anorexia. There was one statement that really popped out at me, the ladies name was Gwyneth. Gwyneth explained she kept a journal with her and she would log her daily experiences with anorexia. She explained how looking back at her journal, she is shocked by how much anorexia takes control over your mind and how blinding the starving mind can be (Abraham 132). She also stated how when she was anorexic she would not even use lotion on her body for the fear that fat would seep into her skin. She also mentioned how her anorexia would affect her menstrual cycle. Anorexia does not only affect the outside physical appearance but also the inside bone structure, and blood functions.

If a girl at a young age was not feed appropriately than they will not know how to maintain food. They will also not be informed on the correct intake of food a human being should proceed daily. When that little girl that was underfeed becomes an adult and has her own earned living she will suffer no food storage from her body being so used to not holding much food that started at a very young age.

In a article I came across I came to find that most common anorexia symptoms can be found in the mouth. For example hypersensitivity to hot and cold, the throat having redness, spots on the teeth repeated by coming in contact with acidic vomited contents. Most of the time people aren’t diagnosed with anorexia until they have gone to the doctor for an oral check up which then they can see symptoms or spots in their mouth or in their teeth that can lead them into thinking that a person has anorexia. In some cases, which are mostly directed towards a woman, the anorexia become so bad that they stop producing estrogen, which damages their bones (Dentists Often 5).

A women with toxic anorexic problems would be able to know how many calories are in specific amounts of food. For the fact being that they are really scared to even gain a pound. They may also weight themselves multiple times throughout the day as well as going to the restroom right after eating a meal to be able to vomit it all back out. Anorexic women tend to stay home more than usual people for being scared to go to social events and encounter food. Instead of being the one person at the event being boring and not wanting to eat, they rather eat in front of people so no one worries or forced them to eat anything. But shortly after having a meal anorexic women will vomit the consumed food. These are a couple of major signs that a women is having problems with their weight or encountering the disease anorexia.

Social media and schools are a major part of anorexia, it is where most young ladies get diagnosed as anorexic. Women should be more careful on what they publish on any social media platform, but especially Instagram. Schools should be educating young ladies to know how to stay fit, but not inforce being skinnier than a pole. Young girls that are underfeed can also be diagnosed as anorexic, for not knowing the proper food intake. The personal experiences of the two young women in my essay back up the symptoms I informed the reader about.