1.     The most surprising thing about eating disorders to me, was the vast age difference that these problems affect. I always believed it to be a problem endured by teenagers as that’s the time when your body undergoes the most changes. That is false, however, eating disorders affect people of all ages. In fact, people are being diagnosed at younger ages now. I believe this is solely based on the body images that are portrayed as “beautiful” in our society. 

 

2.     I actually had a friend in high school who suffered from binge eating, so to better understand what she was going through was very interesting to me. At the time she kept it a secret – no one really knew what was going on with her. Once the truth came out, I tried to be as supportive as I could be, we weren’t very close but we spoke here and there. She became very withdrawn and distant. We found out about her problem and not long after she stopped coming to school. I was confused because to me, she was so beautiful and I couldn’t understand what she saw wrong with herself. It’s eye opening to see that these problems are a lot deeper than just the physical self, as I believed them to be.

 

 

3.     The research I found most interesting was the in-patient option for treatment. I did not know that was an option for eating disorders, I thought it to be more of an option for drug and alcohol problems. After finding out, it makes sense as there are a multitude of other issues (like malnutrition) that come from eating disorders and would need to be closely monitored in a hospital setting. 

 

4.     I’m most likely to remember the severity of illness with people that suffer from eating disorders. Before doing this assignment, I assumed people with eating disorders were just unhappy with their bodies. This illness runs a lot deeper than what is seen on the outside. It can often stem from or lead to a multitude of other illnesses.