Anorexia: The dangerous reality of the slimming disease
· Citizen
Because of the multiple examples of addictions to booze or drugs among entertainers – from singers to film stars – there has been a tendency to think they were merely weak-willed addicts who just needed a bit of discipline to “pull themselves together”.
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Today, though, expert medical and psychiatric opinion inclines towards the assessment that massive fame brings with it massive pressure and that many turn to substances as their way of coping.
Yet, tragically, there are other coping mechanisms, which can be equally destructive – as the world discovered when superstar singer Karen Carpenter died at the age of 32, from heart failure brought on by complications of anorexia nervosa, the “slimming disease”.
Today’s glitterati watchers have been wondering whether the same thing might be happening to stars like Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, who have lost weight recently.
While we’re not passing judgment on whether those claims about the stars are true, we believe it is a positive thing that the subject of anorexia is being aired in public again, after the condition seemed to have faded into the background.
It is still far from a minor health problem, though, and many people are dying every year because of it.
While many of the victims are women – the ones brought up by our beauty-obsessed society to believe that even the slightest bit of weight means ugly – there are, as we report today, men who are also getting sucked into the anorexia mechanisms.
At its heart, the slimming disease is a way of coping with mental pressures.
Being able to control – often strictly – the intake of food gives many people a sense that they are in control of their lives.
Until that control becomes an obsession.
As with other psychological problems, tragedy can often be avoided if people around the victim are paying attention.