.. Disordered Eating
.. Binge Eating
.. Bulimia
.. Anorexia
.. Men & Eating Disorders
.. Signs & Symptoms

What is Disordered Eating?

Eating attitudes and behaviours vary along a broad continuum. The 'healthy' end of this continuum describes someone who is at an appropriate and sustainable weight for their frame, practices healthy eating and exercise habits most of the time, and generally likes their body and feels comfortable in their own skin. The other extreme of the continuum describes someone with an eating disorder - bulimia, anorexia, or binge eating disorder.

There are a vast range of eating attitudes and behaviours in between, including body dissatisfaction, preoccupation with food, weight, and body image, yo-yo dieting, fasting, excessive exercising, steroid use, laxative abuse etc.

Disordered eating means "eating in irregular and chaotic ways - dieting, fasting, bingeing, skipping meals - or it may mean consistently under-eating much less or overeating much more than your body wants or needs" (Berg, 2000).

While the majority of us may occasionally exhibit disordered eating - that is, eating for reasons other than to satisfy a physiological hunger - the various eating disorders described in these pages are characterized by recurring cycles of behaviour which are prompted by a desire to cope with feelings (such as anger, depression, shame, boredom, anxiety, hopelessness, etc.) and have negative consequences (such as health problems, mood disturbances, family relationship disturbances, and an increase in the very feelings the behaviour attempted to suppress).