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The pernicious troika
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Women who push themselves too hard for a hyper-thin body tend to suffer from eating disorders and illnesses
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Watch yourself grow slimmer. — Photo: Shaju John
THREE ILLNESSES are common among women who push themselves too hard for weight loss: malnutrition, menstrual dysfunction and osteoporosis.
These three conditions feed off each other, and together they form a triad every bit as pernicious as the underworld triads of Hong Kong. The female triad is everywhere, especially in fashion magazines that glorify the waif-thin body type and athletic competitions featuring women who look more like men.
Malnutrition: Women are ten times as likely as men to suffer from eating disorders, and female athletes fare even worse by comparison. Anorexia nervosa, which is nothing but voluntary starvation in sophisticated terms, and bulimia (binge eating followed by forced vomiting) are especially common in athletes, models and women who long to be waif-thin.
The craze to be thin encourages dangerous practices like misuse of laxatives, diuretics ("water pills"), and diet pills containing amphetamines that suppress appetite.
The hyper-thin body comes with a price. Malnutrition damages muscles, heart, kidneys and bones and plays havoc with hormone secretion. The latter usually brings on menstrual dysfunction.
Menstrual dysfunction: A few female athletes see menstruation as a hindrance to athletic training, and some even welcome the halt to periods caused by intense exercise because they view it as an indicator of training intensity.
In fact, missing periods is a cause for concern because it signifies a lack of bone-strengthening oestrogen produced in a normal menstrual cycle. The oestrogen deficiency is brought on by a combination of physical and emotional stress, poor nutrition and low body fat. Lack of oestrogen makes stress fractures more common in the female athlete.
Osteoporosis: Malnutrition and menstrual dysfunction predispose pre-menopausal women to osteoporosis by depriving the body of oestrogen. This has long-term effects because bone density peaks by the age of 30 in most women, and disruption of bone building in youth worsens the outlook for the post-menopausal years.
Prompt diagnosis and treatment of the triad are essential, because the effects of doing nothing last for a lifetime.
Women with eating disorders need to see a psychiatrist or a counsellor to deal with the underlying issues of poor self-image, depression and peer pressure that drive most eating disorders.
Athletes who suffer menstrual dysfunction need to ease up on their training loads, consult an endocrinologist to correct hormonal imbalances and also consult a dietician to match nutrition with training requirements.
RAJIV. M
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Metro Plus
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Chennai
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