The-F-Word.org

Despite decades – even centuries – of research into the diseases, anorexia and bulimia are as misunderstood today as they when Saint Catherine of Siena starved herself to death in the Middle Ages.

Both diseases are usually thought of – by even medical personnel who should know better – as a disease of the affluent, young white girl. Adult women with the disease are often dismissed as well as women of color, and men are all too often absent altogether from the eating disorder radar.

Hopefully, more articles like the one written by Cathy Spader, R.N. will work to illuminate these myths: “Men and Boys Suffer to Be Thin.”

While the traditionally accepted statistic places women at an estimated ratio of 10 to 1 more likely to develop an ED than men, the gender gap may be smaller than previously though, says Barbara E. Wolfe, RN, PhD, APRN, FAAN, a professor at the Wm. F. Connell School of Nursing, Boston College.

Although the risk factors and signs of eating disorders are very similar in both males and females the condition is more frequently overlooked and less likely to be diagnosed and treated in males, writes Spader.

“Eating disorders are perceived as a woman’s disorder. Physicians don’t go there. It’s just not on their radar,” says Allisyn Pletch, RN, MSN, NC3, head nurse of the Johns Hopkins Eating Disorders Program in Baltimore.

So, why I am I posting this on a blog which usually addresses women-related disorders? Aside from shedding light on the complexities of eating disorders in general and the dangers in stereotyping victims, it also lends credence to the belief that eating disorders are at least partially organic in nature.

After all, cancer strikes both men and woman, as does heart disease, depression and a host of other physical ailments. It stands to reason men would also be suspect to the same genetic anomalies that predispose one to an eating disorder.

Believe it or not, there are still doctors who dismiss eating disorders as simply a “phase” in a girl’s life. Maybe this will enlighten them.