Eating disorders misconceptions

To make up for my absence, here is another post!

This post intends to be informative, but it's also a bit of a rant about how mad ignorance about eating disorders make me. So forgive me when I start to rant, but do read it since you may find it interesting!

It is no secret that there are a lot of misconceptions about mental health in general.

Eating disorders are one of the most recognized mental health issues in today's society. And still there are so many misconceptions about it that it seems hard to believe.

Eating disorders can come in all shapes and sizes (and gender!).

Even though eating disorders are generally associated with girls, it is wrong to assume that it's only girls who suffer from EDs, since although. We can't ignore all the guys who are going through an eating disorder. There is more stigma for boys and it is less recognized, it may be harder for them to admit it and come forward about it.

It pisses me off a lot when people assume that in order to have an eating disorder (and for it to be serious) you have to be a certain size. It's like: Hello? Is someone even paying attention?

Yes, of course being VERY skinny is very dangerous. But someone can be any size, any weight and have an eating disorder that's threatening their life.

The center I am at is both for people with personality disorders and/or eating disorders. When I tell my dad that there is a new patient, he always asks me “Oh, is she very skinny? Or very fat?” And I just feel so frustrated that I feel the urge to start breaking things. Because no matter how many times I explain it to him, he keeps thinking like that.

I remember when a friend of mine finally decided to speak up about the eating disorder she'd been suffering for years. She went to counseling once and she never went again. The counsellor gave her few options and told her that “Anyway, you can tell that your ED is not too bad”. Where the hell did that counsellor get his license for counseling if that is even a thing? And if it's not, then it should be. Because you can't go around saying that sort of things to people.

That is what people with EDs think, sometimes when they start to realize that they have a problem, they think “I'm not skinny enough to have an ED”. I know that's what I thought.

But eating disorders is not just anorexia, there is bulimia, and there is EDNOS. And there are subcategories.

Also eating disorders aren't simply about food, which they obviously are. They are also about someone's self-esteem. Depression is inevitably linked to EDs. So it is frustrating (and a bit infuriating) when someone thinks that people who suffer from eating disorders are being vain. An eating disorder is mainly a mental health issue - which has an effect on a person's appearance. But it's definitely not simply about one's image.

I know there are many more misconceptions, but these are the main ones that I wanted to talk about today. So I will very probably be doing another post about this sometime in the future. 

Are there any other misconceptions about eating disorders that especially frustrate you?