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Decoding Eating Disorders
In early February, approximately 30 parents settled into Straus
Library to talk with Catherine Steiner-Adair P ’04, a clinical
and consulting psychologist, about teen eating disorders.
Catherine, whose clinical work and research in the area of eating
disorders in girls and how disorders relate to gender equity issues
is internationally recognized, began her presentation, with a sociocultural
understanding of why eating disorders have occurred in our culture;
she reformulated eating disorders as a social justice issue. “Bulemia
was not named until 1985” explained Catherine, “and
since it is very rare for new psychiatric disorders to appear in
society, bulimia must have to do with culture.” Catherine
also explored the connections between gender equity issues and eating
disorders and emphasized the powerful force of media in our lives.
According to Catherine, the three most likely times for the onset
of eating disorders is between high school and college, ages 13-14
and ages 8-10. Adolesence is a time of significant development.
Teens and their families are faced with great opportunities and
challenges — new schools, team sports, dating, going away
to school. However, sometimes these types of opportunities and challenges
are not the focus, because during adolescence, girls spend a lot
of time and energy worrying about their looks, instead of getting
involved in academics, sports and other confidence-building activities.
If someone makes a negative comment about the way a girl looks,
that girl may not raise her hand in class that day. Girls stand
back from academic challenges and avoid other challenges so they
don’t draw attention to themselves because they are fat, ugly
or have bad hair. As adolescents, girls bond in both in positive
and negative ways through body image.
Adolescent girls understand the cruelty of judging someone based
on the color of her skin, but the cruelty of judging someone based
on her body shape is not as obvious. “If adolecents don’t
wake up hating themselves, the group they hang out with will do
it for them. Girls and women are mean to each other, and they judge
each other: who’s the thinnest, who’s the prettiest.”
At the age of 3, 4 and 5 girls have received enough information
to make judgments about other girls based on body shape, from hearing
adults talk about their own body shapes or through the media. In
fourth grade, girls are already putting themselves on diets and
equating feelings of insecurity with being too fat. So it is not
surprising to hear Catherine note that approximately 80 percent
of women ages 20-60 start the day with a negative feeling about
how they look.
Catherine says parents need to help girls sustain their health as
they approach the minefield of adolescence. Girls must be made aware
of weightism as a form of prejudice and must be given the tools
to feel confident in handling the stress of growing up.
What can parents do to stop the cycle of negative body image that
can lead to the development of an eating disorder?
- Check in with yourself about prejudices about weight and body
image.
- Mothers should not say negative things about their own bodies.
- Fathers represent all future boyfriends. When a father makes
a big deal about how grownup a girl looks when she is all dressed
up for the prom, girls assume they must look awful when they aren’t
wearing makeup and have their hair done.
- It is important for parents not to beam on thin people.
- It is important for fathers to tell mothers, in the morning,
that they look beautiful.
- It is important for fathers to stress that weight talk annoys
them.
- It is important for fathers to stress how they hate thin model
ads.
What are some of the warning signs of a potential eating disorder?
A student is:
- eating less
- playing with his/her food during a meal
- skipping periods or stops getting her period
- during dinner, always tired and not hungry
- preoocupied with food
- suddenly becomes an avid exerciser
- is not socializing
- wearing baggy clothes
“You can’t scare students out of an eating disorder,"
warns Catherine, "you need to teach students about prejudice.”
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