Back to Bulimia. People who have bulimia go through periods where they eat a lot of food in a very short amount of time binge eating and then make themselves sick, use laxatives medicine to help them poo or do excessive exercise, or a combination of these, to try to stop themselves gaining weight. You can get advice and support during the coronavirus outbreak from the eating disorder charity Beat.
These symptoms may not be easy to spot in someone else because bulimia can make people behave very secretively. Read more about the symptoms of bulimia and warning signs in others. Getting help and support as soon as possible gives you the best chance of recovering from bulimia. They'll ask you questions about your eating habits and how you're feeling, and will check your overall health and weight. If they think you may have bulimia or another eating disorder, they should refer you to an eating disorder specialist or team of specialists.
Pay attention to your hunger. This only leads to overeating! Eat regularly. Try not to let over 4 hours pass without a meal or snack. When something is off limits, it becomes more tempting. Instead of eating mindlessly, be a mindful eater. Slow down and savor the textures and flavors. While bingeing is often triggered by overly strict dieting that backfires, it can also be a way to control or numb unpleasant moods or feelings.
Are you eating to calm down, comfort yourself, or to relieve boredom? Is it anxiety? Avoidance and resistance only make negative emotions stronger. Dig deeper. Where do you feel the emotion in your body? What kinds of thoughts are going through your head?
Distance yourself. Realize that you are NOT your feelings. Emotions are passing events, like clouds moving across the sky. Sitting with your feelings may feel extremely uncomfortable at first. Maybe even impossible. Even emotions that feel intolerable are only temporary. You can choose how to respond. She can learn to eat normally again and stop purging. Other mental health problems such as depression often happen with bulimia.
If a person has another condition along with bulimia, more treatment may be needed, and it may take longer to get better. Eating disorders can take a long time to overcome. And it is common to fall back into unhealthy ways of eating.
If you are having problems, don't try to handle them on your own. Get help. It can be very scary to realize that someone you care about has an eating disorder. If you think a friend or loved one has bulimia, you can help. The cause of bulimia is not clear, but it probably results from a combination of genetics, family behaviours, social values such as admiring thinness , and other things that can put someone at risk such as perfectionism.
Your risk for bulimia increases if your parent, sister, or brother has the condition. But family history may be only part of the cause. Stressful life events such as moving, divorce, or the death of a loved one can trigger bulimia in some people. Many young women, such as those in university or high school, have unhealthy attitudes toward eating and toward their bodies.
Socially, they may accept and encourage destructive behaviours like extreme dieting or binge eating and purging. These beliefs and behaviours are not normal or healthy.
They can play a part in developing eating disorders that need treatment. Women who begin to severely restrict their diets in order to lose weight are at risk for bulimia. Bulimia, like all eating disorders, is a complex physical and psychological condition. Recovery requires treatment that helps you change your behaviour and also deals with the deeper attitudes and feelings that cause you to binge and purge.
Any of the above symptoms can be a sign of bulimia or another eating disorder that needs treatment. If you or someone you know has any of these symptoms, talk to a doctor, friend, or family member about your concerns right away.
Bulimia and other eating disorders can be hard to diagnose, because people often keep unhealthy thoughts and behaviours secret and may deny that they have a problem. Often a person won't get evaluation and treatment until someone else notices the signs of bulimia and encourages the person to seek the help that he or she needs.
Common signs that a person may have bulimia are when the person:. Conditions that commonly occur with bulimia, such as depression, substance use disorder, or anxiety disorders , can make treatment of bulimia harder.
Recovery from bulimia can take a long time. And relapse is common. If the person feels extremely discouraged, be sure to tell the doctor immediately so that the person can get immediate help. In some cases, people who have an eating disorder may feel suicidal. If you or someone you know shows warning signs of suicide, seek help immediately.
Bulimia is different from anorexia. People with anorexia have an extremely low body weight. But most people with bulimia are in their normal weight range. Some people who have anorexia make themselves vomit, but this is a different eating disorder. For more information, see the topic Anorexia Nervosa. When you have bulimia, you judge yourself harshly on your body weight and shape.
In order to help cope with these feelings, you follow a strict diet to try to lose weight. But over time, the hunger from your diet triggers you to binge eat. Binge eating may also be triggered by a stressful event, when food gives you a sense of comfort. Feeling guilty and ashamed of binge eating can cause you to purge to avoid weight gain. This starts the cycle of binging and purging that becomes a habit. As bulimia develops, you may not eat at the beginning of the day.
But later you may binge to comfort yourself, especially at the end of a stressful day. Vomiting causes the body to release endorphins, which are natural chemicals that make you feel good.
Eventually you may make yourself vomit even if you have not overeaten so that you can feel good. Soon you lose control over the binge-purge cycle. Repeated vomiting, fasting, exercising too much, or misusing laxatives, diuretics , ipecac syrup, or enemas will eventually cause serious, long-term health problems.
After bulimia becomes a pattern, it is very hard to return to normal eating without help. Unhealthy eating behaviours can continue for many years before a person seeks treatment. If not treated, bulimia can lead to serious, long-term health problems. It is common for people to hide the condition from others for years. By the time others discover the disorder, many people with bulimia already have serious problems.
These range from mild to severe, depending on the type of purging behaviours and how long they have continued. Health problems caused by bulimia include:. Overuse of medicine such as ipecac syrup to cause vomiting can lead to diarrhea, weakness, low blood pressure, chest pain, and trouble breathing.
A person can die from prolonged overuse of these medicines. Other mental health problems often occur along with bulimia, which may make treatment take longer or make bulimia harder to treat. Although bulimia is a long-term disorder linked to serious health problems, it can be successfully treated. Many people with bulimia recover completely with treatment. Although treatment is usually successful, bulimia is a long-term disorder, and setbacks can occur.
A return of symptoms relapse might happen. But with ongoing treatment and patience, most people can eventually overcome bulimia. Bulimia among teens with type 1 diabetes is becoming more common. These teens often lose weight before their diabetes is discovered, then quickly gain weight when treatment begins.
Some learn that they can lose weight by skipping insulin doses. This causes poor control of their diabetes and can result in serious problems that can lead to blindness or kidney failure.
The risk for bulimia or another eating disorder is greatest if a person: footnote 2. Call your doctor immediately if you or someone you care about has been diagnosed with bulimia and now:.
Call your doctor to discuss bulimia if you or someone you care about:. Taking a wait-and-see approach called watchful waiting is not appropriate if you think you or someone you know may have an eating disorder.
Call a doctor or an eating disorder hotline to discuss your concerns and learn what you can do to help. Your family doctor or general practitioner can diagnose and treat bulimia. You may be referred to a specialist, such as a:. There is no single test that can diagnose bulimia or any other eating disorder.
But these illnesses may have a visible effect on your health and eating habits. If your doctor thinks that you may have an eating disorder, he or she will check you for signs of problems caused by your diet and purging, such as malnutrition or electrolyte imbalances. He or she also may ask questions about your mental well-being. It is common for another mental health problem such as depression, anxiety, or obsessive-compulsive disorder to play a part in an eating disorder.
Common examinations and tests for a possible eating disorder include:. A person can have bulimia and be underweight, average weight, or overweight. Most people with bulimia are in their normal weight range. Many binge in secret and deny that they may have a problem. These factors can make bulimia hard to diagnose.
People with bulimia often seek medical care for related health concerns, such as fatigue or stomach problems caused by repeated vomiting. Early, accurate diagnosis and treatment of bulimia can decrease the chances of long-term health problems and even death in severe cases. Unfortunately, there is no routine screening for eating disorders. It is common for a person with bulimia to try to hide symptoms, which can make it hard to detect.
Most often a loved one thinks that there is a problem and seeks help for bulimia. It is common for a person to have bulimia for a long time and to develop serious health problems before anyone realizes that the person has the disorder. Treatment for bulimia involves psychological counselling and sometimes medicines such as antidepressants. Treatment does not usually require staying in the hospital, although this is sometimes needed. Both professional counselling and antidepressant medicine can help reduce episodes of binging and purging and help you recover from bulimia.
Both are long-term treatments that may require weeks or months before you notice significant results. You may need treatment with counselling and possibly medicines for more than a year. Bulimia that occurs with another condition may take longer to treat. Some people will have one binge and purge episode and then go into a period of calm. Others may binge and purge multiple times before stopping.
After a binge and purge episode, there may be a period of calm. At this point, a person may resolve to never binge or purge again. He or she may even decide to begin restricting his or her food intake.
Unfortunately, this will simply lead to binge eating again. There are also people who acknowledge that they will likely binge and purge again. They feel hopeless to stop the cycle. If you are experiencing bingeing and purging, the first thing is to know that recovery is possible. You may be able to apply some strategies on your own. Keep food records to understand your own patterns. Learn some strategies for breaking the cycle. Finally, seek help from a qualified professional. Learn the best ways to manage stress and negativity in your life.
American Psychiatric Association. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Washington D. Initial evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment of anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. Am Fam Physician. Excessive exercise in eating disorder patients and in healthy women. Aust N Z J Psychiatry. Understanding eating disorders: Anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and obesity.
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