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Disordered eating describes irregular patterns of eating behaviours, such as self-starvation, bingeing, purging and exercising obsessively. Although there may be some similarities between these behaviours and the clinically defined eating disorders (anorexia and bulimia), they are not diagnosed as such, and are instead considered to be atypical, or sub clinical.
This does not mean, however, that disordered eating is less serious or warrants less attention than anorexia or bulimia because it doesn’t quite fit a specific diagnosis.
For example, someone may binge eat and purge regularly, but not as often as is required for a diagnosis of bulimia nervosa. Or they may restrict their calorie intake to only a few hundred per day, but their weight has not yet dropped enough for a diagnosis of anorexia nervosa.
The above situations are clearly very destructive in many ways, causing a great deal of distress to the sufferer, placing their health in grave danger, and they signal deeper psychological problems.
Many people with disordered eating do not display all the symptoms of anorexia or bulimia or to the degree required for a diagnosis of one of these diseases. But they still have an eating disorder and may be given a diagnosis of Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified.
Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified - This is the description used for an eating disorder that has some characteristics of anorexia or bulimia (or both).
Binge Eating Disorder - Technically speaking, binge eating disorder is a sub type of Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified. A person with this disorder frequently consumes large amounts of food at one sitting while feeling a loss of control over how much food or the type of food they are eating.
Binge Eating - Binge eating is not the same thing as eating too much every once in a while (as most people with normal eating patterns do). It is distressing for those who do it, regardless of how often they find themselves in the grip of a binge eating episode.
Purging - Purging is when an individual tries to rid him or herself of food they have eaten by using inappropriate methods such as self-induced vomiting, abusing laxatives, diuretics, or enemas. Purging is not an effective way to lose weight, and the health effects can be very serious.
Crash Diets - Crash dieting, fasting, or living on tiny amounts of food in order to lose weight, is not a practice recommended by medical doctors.
Orthorexia - Orthorexia is a term used to describe someone who has an obsession with particular types of food. They will only eat foods they perceive to be 'pure'.
Chewing and Spitting - Chewing and Spitting literally involves chewing food, enjoying the taste of it, and spitting it out instead of swallowing it.
Compulsive Exercise - Compulsive exercise is also known as obligatory exercise, excessive exercise, exercise addiction and anorexia athletica, and it describes a compulsion to exercise for longer and more vigorously than what is considered ‘normal’.