Candidly Canada: Education necessary to debunk eating disorder misconceptions
Despite living outside American borders, I still plan to observe this week as one of great importance, and it’s not just because it’s my week of spring break.
February 26 to March 4 marks the National Eating Disorder Association’s Awareness Week. This year is themed around breaking the silence surrounding eating disorders.
While society has made strides toward becoming more transparent about the realities of mental illness, eating disorders are still very misunderstood. Open, educated dialogue about eating disorders is crucial in spreading awareness about their severity and prevalence.
Growing up, I only received a brief overview of eating disorders in the occasional health class. I never realized the dramatic and often deadly consequences of them, nor did I ever associate disordered behaviors with my own life.
Looking back, I now see that I was exhibiting signs of future struggles with anorexia and body dysmorphia as early as I can remember. If I had felt less ashamed and ignorant about my mental health, I probably would’ve endured much less hardship than I have.
A common misconception is the increased emphasis on physical side effects of eating disorders. How a person looks and their place on the outdated Body Mass Index (BMI) scale is often the “evidence” to prove how “sick” somebody is.
According to the Canadian Mental Health Association, eating disorders are not just about food. They’re often a way to cope with difficult mental problems or regain a sense of control.
An eating disorder diagnosis can’t come from simply looking at somebody. They are extremely complicated illnesses that are often biologically influenced and are never a lifestyle choice.
Nobody chooses to live every day with a mindset solely on their body, food or counting every pound, calorie or inch.
Just struggling with body image isn’t equivalent to an eating disorder. Media and society have proven to affect the ways people think about their bodies. Body image is how we each see ourselves in the mirror and our mental interpretations of that image. With eating disorders, the media and poor body image can be triggers, but not the cause.
Eating disorders are also not only represented by rail-thin teenage girls exposed to too much media. Eating disorders look different for everybody, and anybody can suffer from one, even if it’s not clinically diagnosed.
According to Canada’s National Eating Disorder Information Centre, eating disorders affect people of all genders, ages, races, sexual orientations and socioeconomic statuses. Eating disorders don’t only include anorexia or bulimia, but a spectrum of behaviors and diagnoses, including orthorexia, overexercising or binge eating disorder.
Canada has stepped up its battle against stigmatizing mental illness, and the United States should also consider doing so. The Canadian Education Association states that Evergreen, the national child and youth mental health framework, identified the importance of developing school mental health initiatives as part of a comprehensive approach to addressing the complex mental health needs of young people.
After seeing that early approaches to addressing mental health literacy were often one-dimensional and not contextualized to the school setting, a new curriculum has demonstrated that students exposed to mental health, information on specific mental illnesses and how to seek help substantively improved their mental health literacy, showing increased knowledge and decreased stigma.
General beliefs and misunderstanding about mental health affect universal responses to eating disorders. It’s crucial that everyone understands the facts about mental health and eating disorders.
This leads not only to a more aware and accepting community but also improves prevention, early identification and help-seeking.
By opening our minds to the harsh realities of eating disorders and mental illness, we could foster a welcoming environment for everybody, eating disordered or not, to truly prioritize their mental health.
