I don't think that there is enough help in the world for the huge amounts of teenage girls and young women who are trying to overcome Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa. There are many people in the world who are oblivious to the differences between Anorexia and Bulimia. People with Anorexia starve themselves, avoid high calorie foods, and exercise constantly. People with Bulimia eat huge amounts of food, but they throw up soon after eating, or take laxatives or diuretics (water pills) to keep from gaining weight.
People with Bulimia don't usually lose as much weight as those suffering from Anorexia. These illnesses mainly affect adolescent girls and young women but do occasionally affect older married women. Only one patient in 15 is male. Eating disorders are becoming increasingly common.
They are distressing for the sufferer's family and friends because they cannot understand her self-image regarding the need for food (in Anorexia sufferer's) and the need to be sick after eating (in the case of a Bulimia sufferer. ) The sufferer has convinced herself that she is too fat and that she HAS to lose weight.The sufferer is unlikely to listen to advice from family or friends about the need for help so they should be prepared to seek medical help on the patient's behalf. Treatment is difficult because people with eating disorders believe that there is nothing wrong with them. Patients in the early stages of anorexia or bulimia (less than 5 months or with just a small amount of weight loss) may be successfully treated without having to be admitted to hospital. But for successful treatment patients must be willing to change and have family and friends to help them.
People with more serious anorexia or bulimia need care in hospital, usually in a special unit for people with an eating disorder. Treatment involves more than changing the person's eating habits. Anorexic and bulimic patients often need counselling for a year or more so they can work on the feelings that are causing their eating problems. These problems may be about their weight, their family problems or their problems with self-esteem. Treatment is essential and although most cases recover, occasional fatalities do occur. Being a teenager myself, I can see why teenagers develop an eating disorder.
In fact, I feel that in some ways teenage girls can be pushed into it. Everywhere you go, you see famous people like J-Lo, Britney Spears, Kylie Minogue, Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss. Teenage girls idolise these people and feel a need to be like them. Magazines are a big part of the problem. If you look at a typical teenage magazine such as J17, Bliss, Sugar, Cosmo girl, Cosmopolitan, Glamour Magazine or Vogue, they are filled with "what to wear," which is fine if you are a size 10 or under. It is a bit of a blow to your self-confidence if you are bigger than a size 10.
I've randomly taken a magazine from one I mentioned earlier.The front cover says: "The hottest 23 bikinis to wear this summer. " When you look at the article, they give you a nice selection of bikinis that mostly say "available in sizes 6-12 only. " And then there are lots of pictures of nicely tanned size 8 girls modelling them.
The majority of models are slim. Another cover headline said, "What a guy really wants in a gal" Men seem to have very stereotypical views on "the perfect girl. " Duncan, from blue (a very popular teenage boy band) said: "I go for petite brunettes" and Lee (a member of the same band) said, "I like a blonde, quite small, with a great personality.I don't think that bands in the public eye should say that. There are thousands of teenage girls that idolise them and that could really offend girls and make them want to be that "petite brunette" that Duncan wants. There is also the 'teasing' aspect; girls can get 'funny' about girls that are larger than them, and boys can sometimes tease.
They look for someone who is that bit different, as a target, they can make themselves look tough in front of others. Bullying can really make someone want to be a 'normal size' but what is normal? Everybody is different. And people should realise this.Girls may still enjoy reading girly magazines because of the content.
I enjoy reading them. I like keeping up to date with the new fashions and make up trends, Laughing at the embarrassing moments and swooning over the celebrity on the front cover. But what I don't think is right is the message a lot of these magazines are sending out. According to some, you have to be tall, thin, and physically perfect to be completely happy. I don't deny, some of the information is good, but the magazines should stop pressuring girls into thinking that they are unworthy unless they have a Barbie doll figure.Television programmes can also give out the same message.
About a year ago there was a television programme called "Popstars" There was a huge auditions process, the judges didn't pick any people who wouldn't look 'right. ' They turned away people who were 'overweight' because, they wouldn't have the 'right look' for the band. - It didn't matter if they had a good voice or not. I thought that the music industry was about singing. Good voices.
Looks shouldn't matter if you have a good voice. Certain things can make teenage girls have a distorted image of their body.Also on the television, they have programmes such as 'Friends' and 'Buffy the vampire slayer" that feature the stars with the "to die for look" they are skinny and beautiful. Just what men want to have on their arm, and what women want to be. I was discussing this issue with a friend and she agrees with me that girls are pushed into having the 'right' look. The usual high street shops such as Topshop, New Look, Dorothy Perkins, and French Connection, all make clothes for small people.
It means girls of bigger sizes cannot find designer clothes to fit their figure. Even the mannequins staring at you through the window are all tiny too.Is it really a wonder that there are so many girls with eating disorders? Offering up air brushed pictures of perfectly shaped women as the norm, is at best misleading, but hard to resist. Even though most teenagers are aware or what is happening, some still can't help feeling, less than adequate. It's hard enough to be a teenage girl, without these magazines telling you who, to be and what to look like. No-body should be made to feel inadequate because of their size.
Commentary My essay was about eating disorders in teenage girls and young women. It was originally written to be an informative piece.But once I started to write, I realised what a serious and common problem eating disorders are, so it began to get argumentative towards teenage magazines, as I realised that they are a factor of the reason that there are thousands of young people my age suffering from the problem. I wrote the piece with no particular audience in mind, but I did try to use sophisticated language. It is most suitable for teenagers and young adults that don't understand eating disorders. I tried to use emotive language, as I wanted the reader to feel involved in the piece and understand what I was talking about.
What inspired my piece was a magazine article about bulimia, and how common an illness it is. And I mentioned it to a friend, who said she couldn't understand why people develop eating disorder and that it is a really selfish thing to do. I have never thought that this is the case, so it made a good subject for my essay. It's unfair of people to stereotype anorexics and bulimics as being selfish when they don't know why people do it. I wanted people who are oblivious to eating disorders to realise why people make themselves sick or deprive themselves of food.I wrote out my first draft and let a few of my friends read it to see if it sounded all right.
They said that it was a good insight into eating disorders, which I was glad of. But, I wasn't objective enough to start with. I wanted to blame eating disorders entirely on magazines. When I reread what I had written I realised how one sided my essay sounded and that wasn't the idea. I like the television programmes and magazines as do a lot of teenagers, and the point of the speech wasn't to put things down, it was to establish eating disorders and what encourages young girls to do it.
So I changed it all and I'm happy with the final result.My piece is very opinionated which I think makes it a better piece. But there are also plenty of facts, and it is astonishing how common the problem is, because its not very well publicised yet it's a common illness. I feel that my opening is very strong and launches straight into the piece, its quite informative. The conclusion sums up the whole piece and I'm reasonably happy with the piece as a whole. I think having different people looking at it and suggesting how it could be made better really helped me improve it, they pointed out that It was too personalised, and that wasn't the idea of the piece it was to inform.
