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A perfect storm leaves young people "out of control" and causes serious, life-threatening eating disorders

2021-05-26T15:27:16.309Z


"When you are at school, you have classes, you have a specific time to eat," explains a young woman. She had to be hospitalized, and now she says, "You have to get up and say, 'I'm going to make this decision."


By Erika Edwards - NBC News

Just a month after the start of the coronavirus pandemic, Dr. Tracy Richmond, director of the Eating Disorders Program at Boston Children's Hospital, learned that something bad was happening among young people.

Richmond said his team was receiving an unusual number of requests for help with eating disorders in mid-April 2020. "By the summer," he said, "we were bursting."

The problem is not limited to the Boston area.

The National Eating Disorders Association reports a

more than 53% increase in the volume of calls

to its helpline since the start of the pandemic.

Slightly more than a third of these patients are between 13 and 17 years old, and about 36% between 18 and 24 years old.

Also, the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders has registered a 50% increase in calls from adolescents and their parents since the pandemic began.

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Experts attribute the increase in unhealthy and potentially dangerous eating habits of adolescents to a combination of social confinement during confinement and the feeling of losing control.

"

Isolation affects adolescents most

because so much of their life experience is socializing with other people," said Lynn Slawsky, director of the National Association for Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders.

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When the COVID-19 quarantine shutdown occurred, the kids "didn't have their sports teams if they were athletes, or they didn't have the theater shows if they were actors," Richmond said.

"Suddenly, they felt really out of control," he added, and "a lot of our patients, when looking for something to control, they look at food and food."

"Many of the patients we see would never have developed an eating disorder if it weren't for the pandemic," he added.

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Natasha Burgert, a pediatrician in the Kansas City, Missouri, area, found the problem particularly affected her young, high-achieving patients who were otherwise used to thriving in school or sports.

"

This pandemic has left them unsettled,

" he said, "they don't have the routine of school to comfort themselves."

Burgert said that in many cases "

the control of eating behaviors

becomes a representation of the loss of control in other parts of your life."

Often times, this results in a severe limitation of food intake.

Isolation was the trigger for Chloe Melton's problem eating last year.

Isolation was the trigger for 16-year-old Chloe Melton's problem eating.

Courtesy Chloe Melton - NBC News

Melton, a 16-year-old from Atlanta, Georgia, said it was easier to have healthy eating habits when she took classes at her school, in person.

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"Normally when you are in school, you have classes, you have a specific time to eat," Melton said.

Once the pandemic hit, their environment changed, creating a perfect storm for an eating disorder to thrive.

"He could control all the meals

," Melton said.

He resorted to restrictive eating behaviors, particularly fasting.

During an interview with NBC News, Melton declined to share how much weight she had lost, but in the summer, her heart rate dropped dangerously - less than 40 beats per minute - and she was hospitalized.

An extremely low heart rate, known as bradycardia, is a common problem in people who lose too much weight or lose it too quickly, Richmond said.

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"It's an extreme marker of malnutrition," he

said, "your body is saying, 'I have so little nutrition on board that I'm going to slow my heart down to the minimum rate that will sustain life."

Melton spent six weeks in a treatment center, where he was diagnosed with anorexia, and is still in the process of recovery.

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"You

have to get up

and say, 'I'm going to make this decision" to be healthy every day, she said.

"That's why it's so difficult. And that's why so many people relapse," he added.

The young woman continues to work weekly with a dietitian and therapists.

Burgert said many of his young eating disorder patients tend to be upper-middle-class white girls, simply because that group makes up the bulk of his patient population.

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But Richmond warned of stereotypes.

"

We see children of all kinds of racial and ethnic backgrounds

, of all kinds of socioeconomic backgrounds," as well as a spectrum of ages and genders.

"Think of someone whose family has lost a loved one or has been really hurt financially," Richmond said, "that's a perfect setting for an eating disorder to develop."

If you or someone you know needs assistance on these issues or wants more information, you can contact the National Association of Eating Disorders in Spanish at this link. 

Source: telemundo

All news articles on 2021-05-26

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