Dying To Be Thin Anorexia

Dr. Levenkron talks about Anorexia Nervosa as a pathological distortion of today’s society of being “Fashion-model thin.” This source is reliable because it is told from a doctor's/psychotherapists perspective of the disease. It informs and broadens my research on the pathological aspect of the disease. Dr. Steven Levenkron uses case studies and specific strategies to explain and help cure the disease.

The film “Dying to be Thin” followed the cases of several individuals who have struggled with an eating disorder at some point in their lives, showing the different factors that play a role in eating disorder onset. Different individuals in the film have different reasons for developing an eating disorder but there are some over-arching themes such as the media’s influence, career-related pressures, and certain personality types.

“Dying to be Thin,” produced by PBS, is a documentary that examines the troubles that persons who are affected by eating disorders go through and the constant, daily struggles they face with health and body image. The film tells the story of a number of young women who battled mainly anorexia and bulimia and mixes a variety of ages to give a “during” and an “after” perspective. Many of the women in the video were ballet or some similar type of dancer. Dancers, by their own account, are encouraged to be thin. The issue really came to the forefront after a young ballet dancer from Boston died of heart failure at the young age of 22, with an eating disorder deemed to be the cause. The narrator goes on to introduce more young women and detail the potential illnesses that their eating disorders can cause. Chronic low blood pressure, kidney and liver damage, severe early osteoporosis, and heart failure are all common things seem in patients who suffer from eating disorders. Most patients have dangerously low body weights, body fat percentages, and, often, young women will experience amenorrhea, which is the loss of menstruation. All of the people in the video wanted to be better and were seeking a road to recovery. The video showed though, how difficult that can be since the eating disorders can be so wide ranging and have a number of different root causes. Often patients develop eating disorders as something that they have control over, in a world that they feel is out of their

It seems like every young girl dreams of becoming a model these days. Every young girl has the desire to get thinner than other girls in order to look like models on T.V, magazines and so on. The New York Times publishes articles for the majority of the audience to read, which is mostly adults. Mim Udovitch’s article, “A Secret Society of the Starving” talks about two major eating disorders that are anorexia and bulimia within many girls. Udovitch reports stories about three girls that are going through these disorders or have gone through them. The three girls Udovitch includes are Claire, Chaos, and Futurebird. Ken Jackson’s interpretation of

Treatments of eating disorders vary in approach. Individual, group, and/or family psychotherapy, medical care and monitoring, nutritional counseling, medications, acceptance and commitment therapy, anti-depressants,

To briefly summarize, “Dying to Be Thin” was a documentary sharing the stories of young females suffering with eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. Anorexia nervosa is an emotional disorder where an individual starves themselves in order to lose weight. Bulimia nervosa is another eating disorder where the individual binges enormous amounts of food at a time and then forces vomiting. In both cases, the diseases are very harmful to the human body and can ultimately lead to death if untreated.

The documentary “Dying to be Thin” is about women that suffer from eating disorders and their success stories of how they overcame their disorders. All of the major eating disorders are covered through out the film, which include: Anorexia, Bulimia, and Binge-eating disorder. These are all represented through real life examples presented in the film. I felt many emotions while watching this film.

Anorexic danger close to dying after weight fell to 35kg, recounts the story of a 20-year-old girl, Korey Baruta and her battle with an eating disorder, anorexia. Korey is a dancer, and constantly receives criticism on her size 10 appearance. The disorder first develops at the age of 15 and lasts for four years, until she is forced to seek help at an eating disorder clinic. Once arriving at the clinic, she is required to immediately transfer to an emergency ward, here she is given a warning on her life. Baruta has lost a large percentage of her body mass, has been diagnosed with “kidney failure, liver problems, and a heart murmur”, due to this loss in weight.

THIN is a documentary that appropriately displays individuals suffering from eating disorders while residing at The Renfrew Center, a residential facility for the people who are trying to seek help. The main patients who are shown in the film are Alisa, Polly, Shelly, and Brittany. The camera crew follow the girls around the facility to accurately depict how treatments are performed, their meal times, therapy sessions, and more. THIN is a knowledgeable documentary because it provides an excellent insight in the life of individuals with eating disorders, how eating disorders could be handled or treated, and how others who view the film can learn from the patients who are suffering. Treating eating disorders may seem confusing for some, mostly

In the video “Dying To Be Thin”, by PBS - NOVA, the video addressed anorexia in the world of dance. The Ballet world is especially vulnerable to anorexia as there is a rigid concept of the perfectionism of the ballerina. Although the dancers in the video were obviously thin, the ballet company expects each ballerina to be atleast thirty pounds thinner than the average model, which makes each ballerina become anorexic.

The CBT model process is beneficial with helping the client identify negative behaviors. In stage one, the therapist helps the client weigh in and the therapist provides them with ways to be aware of their eating patterns. The goal is to accomplish self-monitoring techniques. In stage two, the therapist and client identify ways to guide the client to a healthy outcome. The goal of CBT is to assist clients to not dropout of the treatment program. In stage three, the heart of the treatment, the therapist helps the patient identify eating distortions “(underweight, overweight, over evaluation of body shape and weight, control over eating, dietary restraint and restriction, and event- and mood-triggered changes in eating)” (Danielsen et al., 2016, p. 6). The plan is to devise a personalized treatment program geared toward behavioral changes. In stage four, the therapists’ goal for the patient is to ensure that the implemented treatment changes are long-lasting and the risk of relapse is minimized (Danielsen et al.,

The three major eating disorders are Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia Nervosa, and Binge-Eating Disorder. All of these involve disturbed eating patterns and their own ways of maintaining body weight. The first is Bulimia Nervosa. The person is obsessed with their weight and body shape. They binge eat large amounts of food, then purge themselves, so they do know gain weight. The common way of purging is by gagging themselves, until they vomit. Many that suffer with this are secretive, and it comes as a shock when others find out. Treatment is very hard for all eating disorders. The most common is this disorder is CBT. It helps the patient change their thoughts about food and themselves. It offers alternatives, such as purging the food out, they can exercise, or find healthy food choices.

To treat an eating disorder and recovering from one can take a long time. To treat a disorder usually involves monitoring a individuals physical health and helping them deal with psychological problem. It is important for friends and family to be there for the individual and help them believe they can get better with time and support from the loved ones. Examples of treatment could be cognitive behaviour therapy also known as CBT, another method is interpersonal psychotherapy, dietary counselling and also medication.

Allow me to introduce myself my name is Edwin Fuller Torrey and I am a trained psychiatrist and schizophrenia researcher; I help treat individuals with their psychological disorders. My treatment option for someone with an eating disorder is to first conduct psychotherapies to see what type of eating disorder my client is experiencing. Depending on the severity of my clients symptoms I would then suggest prescribing medications and managing drug therapy. Unfortunately, based on my experience medications cannot cure eating disorders. However, medications may help control urges to binge or purge or to manage excessive preoccupations with food and diet. In some cases, I have prescribed antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications to my clients

People suffering from eating disorders cannot solely help themselves. Although they may be able to stop for a short time, in the long run they will be back in the same path of self-destruction. Kirkpatrick & Caldwell (2001) state, "Because eating disorders are a complicated mix of physical and psychological abnormalities, successful treatment always includes treatment of psychological issues as well as restoration of a healthy diet" (p. 131). Trained therapists should treat eating disorders. The severity of the disorders will determine the need for outpatient therapy or an in-hospital program (Matthews, 2001, p. 178). There are many goals of therapy but the return to normalcy is the main goal. The eating disorder sufferer needs to restore and maintain a normal weight as well as develop normal eating and exercise routines. Kirkpatrick and Caldwell (2001) state,