How People With Eating Disorders Are Helped In Psychology

Eating disorders are among the most dangerous psychopathologies, and that is why at the first sign that their symptoms are present in a person, it is urgent to go to therapy.

However… What is psychotherapy applied to cases of eating disorders? In this article you will find a summary about that.

• Related article: "The 10 most common eating disorders"

What are eating disorders?

As the name suggests, eating disorders are pathologies associated with a dysfunctional behavior pattern in relation to eating habits. They can be reflected both in an over-intake of food and in a lack of nutrition, or even in the tendency to eat what is not due.

Thus, eating disorders are Very serious psychological alterations that must be intervened as soon as possible in therapy, since they can lead to death in the medium and long term. These are not purely physical diseases related to nutrition (that is, the way in which the body extracts nutrients from what is ingested, Rather, it is based on psychological processes prior to digestion, which cause the person to develop a problematic relationship with food.

All eating disorders have in common that those who develop them they internalize dysfunctional behavior patterns that wear down their health and quality of life, and over which they feel they have no control.

In fact, it is common for people with these psychopathologies to not even recognize that they have a problem, ensuring that everything they do is perfectly deliberate and obeys their highest aspirations. honest.

There are even extreme cases in which people identify these disorders as part of their identity and way of being, which is why they believe that putting a brake on it would imply "betraying" themselves. Therefore, a phenomenon similar to anosognosia appears, the fact that many people with neurological disorders, due to the fact that having developed them, they are not able to be aware of them and are not aware that these symptoms are affecting them and harming. However, unlike what happens in these cases, eating disorders are not triggered by a neurological disorder but by a set of psychological variables, which distort the self-concept of the person and their way of assessing what is good for them and what no.

• You may be interested in: "Self-concept: what is it and how is it formed?"

Main types of eating disorders

Diagnostic manuals are not limited to talking about eating disorders in general terms, but also describe different variants of these psychopathologies. Each of them has its own associated symptoms, although in all of them there is an alteration of mental health that in turn generates physical health problems that can become very severe.

The main eating disorders are as follows.

1. Anorexy

Anorexia is characterized by constant avoidance of food intake, limiting it to the minimum to a point where death from malnutrition can occur.

It is very common for people with anorexia to perceive themselves as being overweight, despite being very thin. This is a psychological disorder with a very high mortality rate, so it must be treated urgently.

• Related article: "Anorexia nervosa: symptoms, causes and treatment"

2. Binge eating disorder

In binge eating disorder, the person feels the uncontrollable urge to binge on food even without being hungry. This can lead to overweight or malnutrition, since foods rich in carbohydrates and / or fats are favored.

• You may be interested in: "Emotional hunger: what is it and what can be done to combat it"

3. Bulimia

Bulimia is a condition similar to binge eating disorder. However, in this case the symptoms include a strong feeling of guilt after binge eating, and regret for having eaten too much without needing it, which leads to purging behaviors such as self-induced vomiting, to try to “compensate”.

• You may be interested in: "Bulimia Nervosa: Binge Eating and Vomiting Disorder"

How do you help patients with eating disorders in therapy?

There is no single way to offer treatment to all people with an eating disorder, since each of these disorders has its peculiarities and its typical symptoms. Furthermore, even among patients with only one type of disorder, there are many individual differences based on the person's personality, age, life context, etc. Therefore, psychological intervention is always based on the principle of examining case by case and offering personalized solutions.

However, beyond this, there are some strategies and techniques that are frequently used in psychotherapy when dealing with eating disorders. These are the most important.

1. Incorporation of specific dietary guidelines on a daily basis

Psychotherapy helps people with eating disorders to internalize a series of very specific feeding routines that leave little room for ambiguities, making them approach their avalanche from the discipline but without falling into a pathological obsession with the way they eat. For this, it is common to use action triggers, which help to structure meal times without taking a lot of effort to go from wishes to practice.

2. Emotion detection training

In the case of the psychological treatment of eating disorders, training in emotion detection has to do above all with enhancing the ability to recognize the emotional hunger, that is, the desire to eat without being really hungry, only to escape or "cover" a form of discomfort that usually has to do with anxiety or anxiety. stress.

In the case of anorexia, it also works to help recognize times when self-sabotaging thoughts emerge in the patient's consciousness, so that they can be viewed from a critical perspective that limits their power.

• Related article: "How to make an emotions diary, step by step and with examples"

3. Cognitive restructuring

This front of psychotherapy consists of helping the person to detect those aspects of their identity that make them feel very vulnerable and that he tries to control at least in part through food, to give them resolution in a functional way demonstrating that he can overcome their fears. Helps you boost your self-esteem, causing them not to fall easily into pessimism when assessing their appearance and behavior (and even their ability to overcome the disorder).

• You may be interested in: "Cognitive restructuring: what is this therapeutic strategy like?"

4. Family conflict management

Since eating disorders especially affect young people and even adolescents, it is common for problems to arise in the way they relate to the family. Therefore, in therapy we work on conflict management skills.

Do you need to go to psychotherapy?

If you are looking for psychological therapy services, I invite you to contact me.

I am a General Health Psychologist with extensive experience in caring for adult and adolescent patients, and I offer online sessions by video call or in person in my office located in Almería.