Bulimia Nervosa

Bulimia nervosa can affect women at any age, from the teens well into the middle age. However, white middle-class adolescents and women in their twenties with a strong orientation toward academic achievement and a traditional lifestyle, including marriage, are most vulnerable. Also research has claimed that 10 to 20 percent of female college students have practiced bulimic behavior sometime during their lives.
             Bulimia can have devastating psychological and physical effects. In many instances, it can lead to low self-esteem, low frustration tolerance, and inability to express feelings and emotions. The obsession with food in some cases can set in motion addictive behaviors such as substance abuse and impulsive actions such as promiscuity, shoplifting, and overspending. In addition, the act of hiding food and purging in secrecy in effect leads to social isolation. Depression has also been linked to bulimic behavior, although studies show that only half the number of bulimics experience clinical depression and therefore it is unclear whether or not it is caused by bulimia or vice versa. In severe cases, because of extreme and excessive purging, dehydration and chemical imbalances can result, which in turn can lead to fatigue, seizures, irregular heartbeat, and brittle bones.
             There are several therapeutic treatment options available to bulimics and they range from psychodynamic therapy to group therapy. Psychodynamic psychotherapy or psychoanalysis is usually utilized when traditional, individual psychotherapy fails. Psychoanalysis is rarely used because the program requires tremendous behavioral change and insight which, in most cases, does not help in treating the individual. Family therapy, a somewhat similar option, is a treatment which allows the patient to express family issues pertaining to inner problems, conflicts, and other expectations, which families create. Cognitive psychotherapy, a more relevant treatment, requires patients to maintain strict behavior and scheduled eating during the beginning phase.