Counselling for Eating Disorders 

How common are eating disorders?

Between 1.25 and 3.4 million people in the UK are affected by an eating disorder, 75% are female and 25% are male. It is most common to develop an eating disorder between the ages of 16 and 40 but there have been cases as young as 6 and as old as 70. Eating disorders have the highest mortality rates of any psychiatric disorder*. The impact of an eating disorder can be devastating for the sufferer and their loved ones, the quicker you get help, the better the outcome.

Different types of eating disorders

Anorexia nervosa

• Anorexia sufferers do not eat enough food to get the energy needed to stay healthy. It is often less about body image and more about control, low self-esteem and feelings of intense distress.
  

• Common behaviours include; reducing calorie intake or not eating at all, hiding food or secretly throwing it away, constantly counting calories, avoiding foods that have a high-fat content, cooking for other people but not eating, having strict rules around exercise, having very structured eating times, weighing yourself regularly throughout the day.

• Effects on the body can be dramatic weight loss, weakness and slow movement, feeling cold all the time, irregular or no periods, loss of hair, low sex drive, fragile bones, fuzzy hair on your arms and face called lanugo.

Bulimia nervosa

• Bulimia sufferers experience a cycle of eating large amounts of food in one go (binging) and feeling ashamed and attempting to get rid of the food they’ve eaten (purging). Purging can come in many forms; vomiting, taking laxatives or exercising excessively to counteract the calories eaten.

• Common behaviours include starving in between binges, eating in secret, eating foods that are believed to be bad during a binge, experiencing cycles of eating - feeling guilt - purging - feeling hungry and eating again.

• Signs that you may be experiencing bulimia include; dehydration which can have negative effects on the skin, yellow or eroded teeth from stomach acid, irregular or no period, IBS or constipation from laxatives. You may stay at roughly the same weight or it may fluctuate often.

Binge eating disorder

• Suffers experience an inability to stop themselves eating, even when they don’t want to, sometimes known as compulsive eating. Usually linked to an underlying emotion that is being avoided, binge disorder sufferers will use food as comfort to an extreme level.

• Common behaviours include; picking at food all day so that you are constantly eating, eating in large amounts (binging), absent-mindedly eating whilst doing other things, regularly eating unhealthy food, hiding how much you eat, eating when you feel stressed, upset or bored, eating until you feel sick.
  

• The effects on the body include dramatic weight gain, joint and muscle pain, high blood pressure, diabetes, breathlessness, nausea, acid reflux and IBS.
  

Counselling for eating disorders

Once an eating disorder has been diagnosed, the sufferer requires a full treatment plan to ensure all issues are addressed avoiding relapse. Counselling and psychotherapy can be an effective method of determining the causes of food-related disorders. Once the cause is determined your therapist can work with you to develop more healthy coping skills, reassess your relationship with food and move on to live a healthy life. 

Longer-term counselling is recommended for eating disorders due to the complex nature of the disorder. Your counsellor will be able to help you through each stage of recovery. This involves communicating with your friends and family about the disorder, coping with putting on weight, dealing with withdrawal, participating in self-care and believing you are worthy.

*Sourced from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence