Hi @Mazarita
Thanks for your interest and vote of confidence.
Yes, eating disorders are a very broad topic and, I think, becoming broader still.
If you find the subject stressful, please don't read beyond this point ... ❣
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My husband spent the best part of 30 years as a workaholic and gained an enormous amount of weight in that time. We all put it down to the stress of working the long hours seven days a week, and the high stress of the job requirements.
Since then I have learned that that was his first form of eating disorder. It's called BED or B*n*e Eating Disorder (asterix's mine - I think there's a forum boundary on that word ...) It has a relationship with Bulimia, in that both have a rapid over-eating component, but BED doesn't involve trying to rid oneself of the consequences. @Mazarita it sounds like this is what your friend is struggling with. Help is available through EDV, EDAqld, and other services in each state.
WH has lost a lot of weight in the past in a rapid and very focussed manner, but he doesn't have a comfortable relationship with food and was relying on an iron will to try to maintain his new body size, which was a little too thin for my liking at the time, but I was supportive in that he felt good about himself, and was certainly healthier in terms of medical results. The first major round if new work stress, and increases in work hours saw it all slide away though, and a return to his excessive size.
This next attempt has been similar, but somewhere within the first year the balance tipped somewhere in a wrong direction - mentally, emotionally, both, I'm not sure, but the extreme and rigid focus, obsessiveness, behavioural and mood changes, personality and values changes started to kick in. I have since learned that these are the identifying features of the range of eating disorders associated with the anorexic/bulimic types. I believe it is triggered by nutritional deficits in the brain (simplistic explanation).
There are other aspects to his regimen that make me suspect atypical bulimia, however he is still in the first stage known as Pre-contemplative, the hallmark of which is denial to the point of hostility. All we can do is love him as best we can in this state, and set boundaries over what we can and can't accept behaviourally, while we wait for break-throughs in awareness and diagnosis.
The illness is heavily disguised by seemingly high levels of weight management success and fitness goals. It mimics good health standards to such a degree that even medical people have missed it ........
Truth doesn't stay concealed. That's all I can say. Slowly but surely the true nature of our circumstances is stating to reveal itself, but this battle has been on for around five years now. It is very hard to live with at times, but we have had to find compromises in order to survive with it.
Sorry, another long post .......... thanks for listening.
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