The Difference Between a Diet and an Eating Disorder

Hello everyone

I thought I’d address a serious issue here. Sometimes it is easy to get carried away with dieting and exercise and before you know it you may be focusing all your attention on it. There is help out there if you feel you may need it.

A few differences between an eating disorder and dieting:

. An eating disorder is trying to make yourself look better by depriving yourself of food in an unhealthy way whereas dieting is about losing weight by regulating your diet in a healthy way.

. Eating disorders are all about your confidence being based on your weight and how you look, whereas dieting is just a matter of losing weight in a controlled manner.

. Eating disorders are losing weight to look good not considering the damage you could do to your system, whereas dieting is losing weight in a healthy way so you feel good about yourself on the inside as well as on the outside.

. Through negative attention, eating disorders are a way to seek approval and acceptance from people whereas dieting is about losing weight and doing it to feel good about yourself.

. Eating disorders are all about stress, acceptance, fear, coping, anger, etc. whereas dieting is just about losing a bit of weight.

A few points to ponder upon:

. Hunger is a natural thing and has to be satisfied. If you deprive yourself of food needed to satisfy your hunger this could be the beginning of an eating disorder. Dieting in the short run causes weigh loss but almost 95 percent of it is regained in addition to extra pounds. What happens if you go off your diet is that you end up bingeing because the body starts reacting to what is called the built in starvation reaction which is natural.

. Everybody’s genetics are different, an individual could be thin, fat, or in between. As long as you accept this position there will be no problem. Trying to be what is not natural is when you end up with an eating disorder.

. Try not to be influenced by what you see in advertisements. Advertisements always try to make you feel that there may be something wrong with you for instance a not so natural standard of beauty which may make you feel not so good about yourself and that you are lacking something by comparison.

. Hunger should be satisfied completely with nutritious food rather than with today’s available food, which is nothing more than junk food, or low nutrient food.

. If you maintain a healthy diet and a regular exercise routine, you will be able to maintain your natural weight throughout your life.