According to Anorexia Nervosa and Related Eating Disorders, Inc.(ANRED) , one percent of female adolescents in the U.S. are anorexic. Jennifer Egan put it more bluntly in a recent New York Times Magazine article: "... one out of every hundred young women between ten and twenty are starving themselves to death" ("Power Suffering", 5/16/99, p. 112). The National Eating Disorders Screening Program estimates that 1,000 American women die of this illness each year. My mother was one of them.
In an effort to help stem the carnage wrought by anorexia and related eating disorders, I dedicate these pages to the countless sufferers and their families who have grappled-- often fatally-- with these conditions. The resources offered here are intended to provide help, insight, and hope.
Although anorexia has been extensively discussed in scientific and popular literature, little has been written from the vantage point of a sufferer's son. I suspect the reason is that untreated (or unsuccessfully treated) anorexics-- most of whom are female-- either do not survive long enough, or are not sufficiently healthy, to have children. Thus, being both the child of an unrecovered anorexic and male, my perspective is doubly unique.
I have never been anorexic or hospitalized for psychiatric illness. Yet over 20 years after my mother's death, the pain of loss is still with me. My next article, "Growing Up With An Anorexic Mother", will explore that feeling.
The catalyst for these pages has been my experience with anorexia, but I will not overlook related disorders, which can be equally devastating to sufferers and their families. The major eating disorders are anorexia nervosa (self-starvation), bulimia nervosa (binge-purge cycle), and binge eating disorder. The American Anorexia Bulimia Association cites NIMH statistics indicating that over 5 million Americans suffer from these and related maladies. Eagan notes that millions suffer from bulimia, and ANRED observes that many of the 34% of Americans who are obese (20% or more above healthy body weight) have binge eating disorder. Extreme youth and age do not confer immunity: according to ANRED, although most anorexics and bulimics are in their teens and early twenties, clinicians have observed these conditions in 6 year-old and 76 year-old patients. Therefore, we are all at risk.
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