Psychoanalytic Approach to Eating Disorders
Suzanne Elsa Saji, 1830275
She lays there on the bathroom floor for a while, contemplating how she even got there in the first place. “Why can’t I just be normal?” she thought to herself. Food was supposed to be something that brought comfort but why is that not in her case? As her tired and restless mind tries to make sense of it all, she hears that oh so familiar voice from the back of her head, telling, urging, coercing her to do what she came to do. She makes relentless efforts to fight back, but she was exhausted with the shouting and screaming, so without another thought, she gives in to the bullying voice and does what she does best, she sticks her finger down her throat and forces it out.
Bulimia nervosa (binge eating which is later followed by purging), is a minuscule part of the broad spectrum of eating disorders we see in the world today. An eating disorder does not only have negative effects on the body and health but it is also emotionally and mentally consuming.
1 in 10 people are likely to develop an eating disorder in their lifetime, so chances are that most people have either personally experienced an eating disorder or know someone who has. To fully understand this rapidly increasing disorder, it is necessary to have a rudimentary knowledge of what they are and how it is caused.
An eating disorder can be identified as a mental disorder described by abnormal eating habits that have a detrimental effect on an individual’s physical and mental health. A person suffering from an eating disorder is often worried about their food intake, body shape and weight which they try to control through restrictive, binge-eating or purging behaviours.
For a long time, it was perceived that eating disorders were a result of pressure from society on gender stereotypes pertaining to physical appearances. Women were expected to be thin, with soft and clear skin, beautiful hair while men were expected to have a muscular body. Although these factors may have shaped the course of the illness it is far from the root cause.
Many attempts have been made to understand the nature and its causes through the lens of multiple perspectives, one amongst them is the psychoanalytic approach.
In this approach, Freud emphasizes the unconscious mind rather than the conscious. It is built on the primary idea that one's behaviour can be determined by experiences from their past that are stashed in their unconscious mind.
According to the psychoanalytic theory, an individual who suffers from an eating disorder often has a history of disturbances in past relationships which resulted into the lack of security, trust issues and finds it extremely difficult to accept themselves and be authentic. Due to these underlying emotions, individuals begin to develop problems with identity, fear of abandonment, inner emptiness which are deficiencies they express through food deprivation, purging and other eating disorder behaviours. When diagnosed people were asked how they felt while engaging in such kinds of behaviour, many anorexic patients said they felt a sense of control, depriving themselves of food almost felt like they were claiming power; bulimic patients felt like this was an appropriate way of punishing themselves for binge eating. Psychanalysts would call this as a solution to compensate for their core deficiencies.
Self-destructive behaviours are considered as ‘symptoms’ to the actual problem. Psychoanalysis often compares the treatment of mental illnesses with that of weeding a garden. While gardening, clearing away the weed is not the permanent solution, it is essential to get rid of the root to solve the problem for good. Similarly, food restrictions, purging and binge eating are just means of expressing the actual problem which is generally, internal conflicts. Although it can be their own unique past experiences that triggered it, most individuals with an eating disorder have certain commonalities, like difficulty in self-soothing, identifying and expressing emotions, negative relationship with their bodies and history of trauma.
Psychoanalysts believe that when patients are able to adopt techniques to soothe themselves, express themselves, and process their traumas in a healthy fashion, they no longer need the eating disorder to cope, express, or distract from their pain. From a treatment standpoint, all eating disorders cannot be treated the same way. Anorexic patients fail to think clearly or process information properly when their minds are starved. An anorexic mind often leads to delusions or psychosis, hence, in the beginning, they are given a strict food regimen which they are expected to follow in order to become healthy enough to dive fully into the psychoanalytical treatment.
People develop eating disorders for reasons just as unique as they are. An eating disorder, in the psychoanalytic context, reveals a persons inner world, their past, how their experiences have affected them and moulded them into the person they are. Eating disorder behaviours are a cry for help to set themselves free from the burden they carry, but do not know of.
References
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-forgotten-gender/201801/psychoanalytic-treatment-eating-disorders
https://iahip.org/inside-out/issue-45-spring-2005/considering-eating-disorders-within-the-context-of-addiction-a-psychoanalytic-perspective
https://www.edcatalogue.com/food-thought-perspectives-eating-disorders-interview/
https://mindandbodyworks.com/cms/2017/09/05/when-eating-disorders-our-world-a-psychoanalytic-approach/
Psychoanalytic approach although a compelling theory in explaining eating disorders seems to place extreme emphasis on childhood experiences. It does not account for any genetically inherited factor. Treatment in this form may or may not succeed depending on the analyst and the personality of the patient. Thus, perhaps this approach must be combined with others to be successful.
ReplyDeleteI second what Christine has to say about the combination of treatments, but regardless, it was a wonderful read. And our childhood accounts for more than we know, in terms of development.
ReplyDeleteMerin Mary Chacko 1830240
ReplyDeleteThe psychoanalytic approach in understanding eating disorders is something that I haven't heard of as I always connect eating disorders to social conventions. The fact that the individual's relationships in childhood can contribute subconsciously to the individual's insecurities for eating disorders is new information for me. But, there cannot be a generalisation of treatment or prevention for the disorder in the psychoanalytic approach as every individual differs in personality type and have different experiences in childhood. Even though the post gave a unique understanding of the concept, using a case study approach, the analogy of weeds in a garden and significant facts, I wish it was demarcated into different sections using headings so that I could better understand it.