What is Bulimia?
Young people with bulimia are very concerned about their weight and because they want to control their weight they are trapped in a cycle of binge eating and then making themselves sick or taking laxatives to get rid of the food.
You will eat a lot of food in one go, bingeing on lots of fattening food that you would otherwise avoid and then feel very guilty or depressed and make yourself sick or take laxatives to go to the toilet or exercise a lot. You will be very secretive about what you are doing and hide it from other people.
Bulimia is not just about food, it is about feelings and emotions too and young people may binge eat and then vomit or take laxatives (purge) to cope with stress and painful feelings. Sometimes people who are bulimic have been anorexic in the past.
People with bulimia usually keep their weight steady and so it is less obvious when people have bulimia than people who have anorexia as you can tend to see their weight loss as a sign of their eating disorder.
Symptoms of bulimia include:-
- binge eating
- vomiting or taking laxatives
- excessive exercise
- sore throat
- dehydration
- bad teeth (from vomiting)
- heart problems
- muscle spasms
- swollen glands
- some weight loss
- change in periods (for girls)
- isolating yourself
- feeling helpless.
You may sleep badly, feel depressed and lose interest in other people. You may become constipated, get brittle bones and be unable to get pregnant. If you vomit you may damage the enamel on your teeth, get puffy cheeks, have palpitations, feel weak, tired and have epileptic fits. If you use laxatives you may have stomach cramps, find that you can’t go to the toilet without laxatives and have weight swings.
People may become bulimic because they feel out of control and want to have control over something ie what they eat. You may become bulimic if you want to be thin or link being slim with success and want to be like models or celebrities. Or you may feel not good enough and think being thin will make you more popular. You may develop bulimia if you hate your body, maybe if you have been abused.
Bulimia often starts in the mid-teens although often it can be much later when people seek help as they can hide it. Sometimes when they face a new situation like living with a partner for the first time they will seek help.
About 4 out of every 100 women experience bulimia at some time in their lives. Boys do get bulimia but girls are 10 times more likely to develop it.
Bingeing and making yourself sick can cause serious harm to the body in the long term and so it is important that you get help if you have bulimia.
See our next section on getting help.