No, she is fucked in the head. Depending on the size of the “frame”, at 5’3" 125 to 145 can be considered normal and healthy, add about 10 lbs for every inch taller. In other words, this girl at her so-called “disgusting” heaviest was at the bottom end of healthy for her height.
Me, I’m 5’3" and 150 lbs. No one has ever told me I need to lose weight, except for the stick-thin types, and frankly, I think they’re just jealous that I can enjoy my food without guilt.
How about we just hold our breath and hope they do us a favor by eliminating themselves and their mentality from the gene pool?
Yes Virginia, I’m being facetious.
All of these sites remind me of the movie “Heather’s” - you know - everyone killing themselves so they can be as cool as the cool girls.
Seriously though, anorexia, bulimia, etc. are mental disorders - these girls are in need of psychiatric help (big surprise there). These sites make me very sad - I’ve done extensive research on eating disorders as part of my degree (BSc Psych.) and all I can say is that I hope these young women get help.
Also, the desire to “recruit” certainly suggests that there is additional pathology, appart from just eating disorders at work here.
Yikes.
You ARE being facetious, right?
What upset me most as I looked at these sites was the nature of the “triggering photos” and other pictures of women that the sites idolized. These pictures of extremely thin women, “models” for the pro-ana folks, came from the mainstream press (e.g., vogue, sports illustrated) not from some deviant counter culture. Sure, every now and then I notice that the woman in the Calvin Klein ad is awfully thin. When I see them all lined up like that, I can’t help but notice the pattern.
We have seen the enemy and they is us.
Eissclam
My mom is a dietician, and she was telling me about a patient she had a long time ago who was anorexic. She yelled at my mom for saying that herbal tea had no calories when, in fact, it had almost one! Not 1 kilocalorie, but almost 1 CALORIE! She was very mentally disturbed. My mom said that even today, she has no idea whether she lived or died. When she was working in hospitals, there was about a 50% chance either way.
Nowadays, if a patient comes in that is anorexic, it depends on the situation. If the person is unconscious and dehydrated, they stick a feeding tube into them and start an IV drip. If the person is awake, they have to administer heavy anti-depressants to make them gain the will to eat. Another factor is that people with AN have hyperactivity and try to excersise all of their calories off. If this is a factor, they sometimes administer a sedative. Paxil is the only anti-depressant marked for treating AN on the market today.
I like girls thin, but healthy thin. These sites are horrible.
I remember seeing a documentary on either PBS or the Discover Channel (such thorough citing, I know).
A researcher decided to determine how quickly anorexia appeared in a society that was exposed to the “Cult of Thinness” prevalent in our own media. He went to countries on the cusp of commercialization and countries that weren’t quite there. He looked through over 14,000 medical records looking for cases that were either diagnoses anorexia nervosa or showed all of the symptoms and weren’t diagnosed as anything else.
What he found was that pre-commercialized societies had the same rate of anorexia nervosa as our own.
It isn’t the deification of rail-thin fashion models that does it, repugnant though I still think it is. Anorexia springs from entirely physical causes, and it is devilishly hard to combat. There are disturbances in the processing of neurotransmitters more complicated than those of depression. Some cases of anorexia respond to SSRIs, some don’t.
What the documentary concluded with is that, whatever process causes it, eating makes anorexic women feel even worse than not eating makes the rest of us feel - so much worse that the only way for them to find comfort is to eliminate food intake as much as they can.
Those poor children. We have so little support to offer them, and so much pointless condemnation. Anorexia is an insidious disease, systemic and debilitating. I hope to God we find some sort of treatment. Soon.
For years I’ve had problems accepting that my weight is fine like it is and that I don’t need to starve myself for days, or go insane on exercise to look good. It’s very easy for me to start getting anxious again and trying to lose weight, especially when I weigh myself. Last year, my now-ex boyfriend told me that I would look better if my waist were about half the size that it was (I was and am a 5). This triggered another weight loss and I don’t remember what my weight was, but I decreased it. I have sinced gained some of the weight back, and like I said, I’m about a 5. Maybe less, as my jeans are a bit loose on me. But I can’t fret about it. I’m too darn busy right now. I’m doing school and work full time, I’m going to a culinary arts school and I love to eat! Also, (gross statement coming up) after you’ve worked your way up to a whole fist in your mouth to get yourself to vomit, it’s just too difficult. I pretty much eat what I want to now and haven’t really had a problem with weight gain. I have a little bit of a stomach, but, hey, if I can make myself deal with it, than everyone else can, too!
oh, I was just looking for this!
Ugh, I just want to cry after seeing such things.
My understanding of anorexia (my sister had it, a mild case, we are lucky) is that it’s also about control and fear. Fear of growing up, fear of not being perfect. Fear that you can’t make the world perfect.
Glad to see he’s an ex.
Ignorant prick.
Definitely true. At least, of the part about not being perfect. If I can’t control my surroundings, I can at least control myself. Or, that’s kind of what goes on in your head.
Thanks. Yes, for a while, I pretty much let him dictate how I should be. He was so much better qualified to tell me what I needed to look like. :rolleyes:
Well, I guess the sites didn’t meet the content requirement of the hosters-- they’re all down now.
5’4" at 135— yum. I wonder how many dates she got as Meryl Streep’s skeleton that she found that a better choice. “I have pornographic movies, and amyl nitrate…”
Thanks, Chloe.
broomstick
Heh, I hear that. I’m asked, “How can you eat that?!” all the time.
“Open moutn, insert food, chew, swallow, repeat.”
Whoa… Hang on a second here…
I had to reply to this thread.
I didn’t know someone with anorexia, I suffer from it myself.
I have actually belonged to these clubs. I wasn’t a vocal member, I just skimmed for triggers and ideas. In a way there were good points to these sites (hang on, don’t start yelling, i’ll explain)… an eating disorder is a lonely, sad, disease. To have others who are suffering as much as you are, having the same worries about the calories in toothpaste, it helps you feel a bit more “normal” to know you’re not alone. There have been girls posting that they are ready to kill themselves, because things are so hard, but there is always at least one other girl who attempts to stop them, and talk to them, and be there for them. Most also make the point that those sites are not for those who “want to be anorexic, so they are skinny.” they admit that eating disorders are horrible to suffer through, and they wouldn’t never subject anyone to them. OF course, that’s about where the goodness stops.
Some of you mentioned the girl who was disgusted at being 5’4" and 135 pounds. Well, let me tell you, that may be her stats, but when she looks in the mirror, she sees probably a 5’2" girl who looks like she weighs 220 pounds. This is literally what you see when your perceptions are so distorted.
And yes, Yahoo is trying to get rid of those clubs, but these girls aren’t stupid. You have to be smart to hide starvation, overexercising and significant weight loss. They are simply renaming their clubs under totally different subjects. Tricky, huh?
I remember a club I belonged to some time ago, and there was a woman who posted quite frequently, she was in her thirties and had obviously lived life with anorexia and bulimia. She posted a lot, warning of the dangers that this life could bring, but she was still heavy into restricting, and getting down to the those perfect double digits. Well, I went back after probably a month of not viewing them (I was trying to get better at that time) and there was a message with this woman’s name in the header. This is what it said… “Hi, I am (woman’s name)'s husband. I found this link in her bookmarks, and wasn’t even aware how bad she was still immersed in this disease, but it seemed as though there were a lot of friends of hers on here. I wrote this because I want you all to know that (woman’s name) passed away last week. Her postassium was too low. I loved her, but she loved her anorexia more. Please write me if you could give me more information and remember this great lady”
Scared the hell out of me, but did I stop restricing? NO.
That is how persistent anorexia is.
I’m more than willing to talk to anyone who has questions.
I’ll be back with more input…
Both of those links don’t seem to work.