Eating Disorders and Underrepresented Communities

Today is World Eating Disorders Day, a day to help raise awareness for eating disorders of all kinds, throughout the world. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who will be ignored on this day. The typical face of eating disorders will be a young, white, very thin, girl, likely with anorexia or possibly bulimia. And yes, these people exist. This post is not meant to deny or invalidate those experiences because they are very real and very deadly. But while people are offering support and resources to these young women and girls, people of color, fat people, men, trans, and nonbinary people fly under most people's radars.

Let's start with the fact that studies show in 6th and 7th grade girls, Hispanics and Asians showed significantly more body dissatisfaction  more, than white girls. Similarly, Native American girls were attempting weight at a greater rate than white girls. Despite the fact that eating disorders are seen as a white person's issue, ED's affect all races in the US at about equal rates.

Another group that's rarely, if ever, talked about, is older people. Yep, you read that right. Eating disorders among older people are on the rise. There's been a steep rise in the increase in body disatisfaction in people past midlife- a 31% rise in the past few decades and we don't even have statistics on this past 1997 (almost a decade ago!). We do know that over a third of outpatient treatment for eating disorders was for people over the age of 30. And, even though weight loss can be harmful, especially as you age, 20% of women who were 70 years or older were actively trying to lose weight.

Boys and men are not only often ignored when it comes to the ED community, but face added stigma in that eating disorders are seen as a feminine quality. There aren't really many statistics on men and eating disorders and more research needs to be done, but we do know that, though eating disorders affect women and girls more often, cases for boys and men are catching up. And there aren't even statistics on boys and men with muscle dysmorphia or "bigorexia", a condition in which someone is obsessed with the idea of getting bigger with muscle.

Sexuality plays a role in this too. For boys and men who were queer, they were significantly more likely to have starved themselves (fasted), used laxatives or diet pills, or vomited to try to lose weight.  Queer teens were also twice as likely to report incidences of binge eating with queer girls and women being twice as likely to binge. (Binge Eating Disorders is another under the radar, stigmatized, ED that we'll talk about later) Keep in mind that we don't even have a vague idea about eating disorders in the trans community. Among trans and non binary people, eating disorders exist, but we don't know how common they are or how their identities play into their eating disorders. We do know that fat is often associated with femininity, especially when it appears in certain spots in the body (such as the hips or chest). Here's a story about a trans man with an eating disorder where his curves made him feel fat and, ultimately, lead to anorexia nervosa.

And, speaking of fat.. let's get onto eating disorders in fat people. We know that being "overweight" or perceived as "overweight" puts you more at risk for an eating disorder. That's right folks, fat people are at a greater risk for eating disorders than thin people. And fatphobia- convincing thin people that they're fat or need to lose weight- puts them at greater risk too. I don't think we can pretend that fatphobia has nothing to do with eating disorders when thinness is often the goal. Wanting to be thin and body dissatisfaction are the most well known risks for eating disorders, and yet, we like to think that fat shaming not only is good for fat people, but doesn't affect thin people. In reality, fatphobia is deadly. Eating disorders are the deadliest mental illness with people with anorexia nervosa having a mortality rate six times higher than the general population which includes suicide. Bulimia also has a high suicide rate and mortality risks for Bulimia and EDNOS (eating disorder not otherwise specified) were similar to those with anorexia.

We should not that fat people are most often diagnosed with EDNOS and that EDNOS is the most common eating disorder. (Though people with EDNOS can fall anywhere in the weight range from average to fat, they just don't meet the low weight requirements of AN or BN)

Unfortunately, we don't know the suicide rate among those with BED (Binge Eating Disorder) because, let's face it, no one cares. People with BED tend to be fat (Though not all are. You can have BED and be thin) and we don't really care about fat people. Or BED. Binge Eating Disorder is highly stigmatized. If you're thin then the general thought is that eating a lot is cute, adorable. Despite the fact that BED sufferers face extreme emotional distress including guilt, feeling of internalized fatphobia, and self hate. Fat people with BED are thought to just be overeaters who brought their fate on themselves and they could "simply stop eating so much" and they'd be cured.

And please, let's not forget that none of the statistics in this blog cover disordered eating (such as dieting or other methods of weight loss that do not fit the criteria for an eating disorder). When we factor in the percentage of people who are dieting to lose weight, it's clear that eating disorders and disordered eating affect a massive number of people. In adult women, over half say that eating holds no pleasure and they often feel guilty- think about that. Guilt for doing something you have to do to survive, something we've evolved to take pleasure from. Only 20% of women are instinctive (intuitive) eaters, meaning 80% had some kind of disordered eating.

This is a serious public health concern. I know people like to spout off that "obesity is an epidemic!" but this? This is the real epidemic: fatphobia.

So, today as we look at all of the personal stories of people who have struggled with eating disorders or who still struggle, let's remember the marginalized and underrepresented people who struggle as well. Challenge the stereotype and educate people, because ignorance is killing the most vulnerable among us.

Fat Anorexics

I weigh almost 300lbs and I have anorexia. Technically it's designated as atypical anorexia because I, obviously, don't meet the weight requirements for the more commonly known form of anorexia which requires a low body weight. I have fat anorexia, or, the type of anorexia that you have when you either don't lose weight or don't lose as much weight as it would take to gain an anorexia diagnosis.

I want to talk for a moment about resources for fat patients with eating disorders.


Well, that was short.

In other words, aside from a facebook group which I created for fat people with eating disorders (Body Love Through Struggle), there aren't really any resources specifically for fat people. So why not visit regular ED resource groups and be a part of the rest of the recovery community? Because ED resources are typically designed in a way that's incredibly fatphobic. Fat acceptance isn't a common or welcome philosophy and, let's face it, our fat bodies? They're the worst nightmare for most recovering eating disorder patients.

Eating disorders are entrenched in fatphobia. In fact, fat people, specifically young girls, are more at risk for eating disorders than their thin counterparts. That's because fatphobia drives eating disorders for most people. To get a little personal, my eating disorder started with stealing ephedra diet pills from my mom's purse because of her own internalized fatphobia. When my bipolar symptoms began, I gained weight. A lot of weight. About 100lbs in just three years. What that taught me was that fat was the worst thing a person can be. That you have zero worth as a fat person. I was popular as a thin girl and the punchline and punching bag as the fat girl. This is what drove me to restrictive eating which, soon after, turned into anorexia.

Everyday Feminism published THIS article on fatphobia in eating disorder communities. I saw it posted on facebook and made the mistake of reading the comments. What I saw was a lot of thin people getting really defensive about their own fatphobia. "You can't tell me how to recover!" was an overwhelming current in the thread. To this I replied, "fuck that".

Let's be honest, you don't get to recover on my back, on my life. Fat people are excluded from every eating disorder conversation, recovery program, and resource for ED patients. We're almost always excluded from ED recovery blogs or posts or tumblr memes. Even the picture that I found for my own facebook ED group for fat people doesn't have any body that looks like mine, is as fat or rolly as mine. Being able to get treatment and help and find resources for your eating disorder is a part of thin privilege because when I talked about my eating disorder I was congratulated! Thin privilege is having people recognize and be horrified at the way you're harming yourself instead of wondering what you did so they can do it too. Thin privilege is surviving an eating disorder because fat people end up dead before anyone says something was wrong and, even then, admitting that what fat people do in the name of thinness is fucked up is rarely recognized.

Let me tell you something, you aren't entitled to your recovery when it costs me my life. When you're stepping me and people like me to climb that mountain isn't recovery, it's oppression. You aren't entitled to the resources that we're not allowed to have. If you think you're allowed to hang on to your bigotry because it soothes you then fuck you.

I wanted to include a list of resources that were specifically fat friendly ED resources at the end of this post. Unfortunately, other than the facebook group mentioned at the beginning of this post, I couldn't find anything. If you have a resource, please post it in the comments!

Thinspiration *trigger warning*

So, just for kicks I decided to visit some pro-ana websites and seek out some 'thinspiration'. Okay, admittedly it wasn't just for kicks. I wanted to get an idea of what these people were aspiring to after browsing through a photograoher's portfolio on model mayhem. Browsing portfolios often elicits this kind of reaction. The problem isn't that these women have bones that show- some women are naturally thin and naturally bony. I've worked with models like this- no biggie. The problem, of course, becomes when that one body type becomes something that is held up as a social ideal- a body type that everyone should aspire to. For those who don't have that body type naturally they often resort to disordered eating such as chronic dieting and, for millions of Americans, eating disorders. There are enough Americans with eating disorders to make up New York City- or L.A., Chicago, and Houston combined.

So what prompted this foray into the world of pro ED sites? The photo was black and white. A tall, very thin model, twisted and arched, her ribs visible down her back and hip bones that jutted out from a slightly concave stomach- not unlike this photo (which I found on a thinspo/pro ana site, by the way). I can't post the actual photos that got me thinking about this, but I'll tell you that bones are incredibly common on modeling sites and in photograher's portfolios.. and that the pro ana pro mia sites that I visited had photos very similar for their goals. I can't begin to say how disturbed I am that the photos of photographers I know and have worked with resemble (and in some cases are more extreme than) those used on pro ED websites.

Even photographers I've worked with have posted photos of women with bones sticking so far out it seems painful. I really wish I could post some- just for reference, but I won't. Instead I'll share some actual photos that I found on pro ana websites:

Kate Moss who said
"nothing tastes as good as skinny feels"

photo very similar to many I see on
modeling sites

I see photos like this often in photographer's portfolios

again- something similar to the photos
that promoted this post

victoria secret model

some male thinspo

As you can see, bones are pretty popular. Rib bones and hip bones being the most common. And these photos are actually not as bony as some of the photos that I'm referring to. So this is what I found out by visiting pro ana and pro mia sites: the people they use for thinspiration? The people they're aspiring to? They're not what you think of when you think of anorexia. They're not this. Did I find a few of those images on pro ana sites? Sure I did, but very few. The vast majority of photos, of thinspiration, were of people that society as a whole considers ideal and beautiful (you'll notice that most, if not all of these are from ads, celebrities, or professional models). And if these sites ever find some of the photographer's ports that I've been looking through? Well they'd have a field day. 

Again, I'm not saying that people who look like the people in the above photos should be considered bad, gross, unhealthy, or anything else. If that's their natural body type then it just is. The problem comes from the fact that we want everyone to look like them regardless of what they have to do to get there. And as the beauty ideal is pushed thinner and thinner it seems that bones are getting more and more popular. At the same time we seem to have more and more people speaking out against models being ultra thin. It seems like a common reaction- for an extreme to get even more extreme as they're being phased out. Despite the massive amount of fatphobia we still have to fight, I do believe that we're moving towards body acceptance overall. There are still plenty of fatphobes who, while they think fat is bad, they also recognize the problem with idealizing the ultra thin and setting that as a standard and goal. I just wish more photographers would catch on. 

As it is, right now, bones are the beautiful and artsy thing to photograph. So what do I do? Who's going to listen to a fat model who tells them "hey, your photos look like thinspo and you're contributing to an unhealthy social ideal".  Like most activists, there are lots of times when I feel like things are never going to change. This bone trend thing? Yeah.. it feels like that.

"The Industry Standard"? YOU are what I'm fighting.

Have you ever come across a sizist that just made you want to rage? On Model Mayhem, the main site that I currently go through for shoots, I was browsing images (and there are some truly stunning ones) when I came across a very interesting one. I clicked.


Begin rageface.


Not only did the photographer, in his profile, come across as very rude,but his ideas about beauty embody everything that is wrong with the industry. Embodies everything that I fight against when it comes to the media's abuse of women and young girls. His requirements for working with models? 5'9" or taller and no more than 120lbs- he stressed that this was the absolute max he would take a model at. More so he stressed the need for 100% flawless skin, "politely" informing us "don't waste your time if you don't fit the description".

size 4 model

Okay, for a moment, let's ignore the flawless skin comment. While it's beyond moronic to require flawless skin for an image that you're going to retouch anyway (and he does retouch his photos, of course) the weight and height requirements which, he points out, are the industry standard, are what really got me going. Just for fun I decided to type in his minimum requirements of 5"9 and 120lbs into a BMI calculator. While I don't advocate using one of these on yourself as they are, by and large, pretty useless on measuring health, it was interesting to see that it came in at a status of underweight. Of course, he prefers models who are thinner and taller so let's try 110lbs and 5'11" and you begin getting severely underweight,.

Ana Carolina Reston Marcan size 0 model
who was still modeling until her death due to
 complications from anorexia. 

Now, I want to take a moment to point out that some people are naturally very tall or very thin or both. They eat well, they exercise, and they are healthy. Their bodies are simply no good at storing energy and they should, in no way, be belittled for their natural shape or size. However, the problem here is that the occurring of people like this naturally is fairly rare. The average size of a woman in the US is 14. That means that half of all women are over this and half are under this. I don't know the statistics on just how many people are a size 0-4 (extra small and "the industry standard") but I can assure you, it's not most women.


There is just something a little disturbing about a photographer who requires his models to be underweight and contributes to the attitude among female models that they must starve themselves in order to achieve this magical fantasy of thinness. In 2006 Uruguayan fashion model Luisel Ramos finally reached the coal of size zero and, shortly after a fashion show, died of a heart attack as a result of her extreme dieting. 

size 12 model

Add to this that 80% of elementary age girls feel like they're too fat or need to lose weight and that eating disorders are becoming an epidemic in this country and you have to wonder how people like this can sleep at night.  Seven million women and about a million men in the US are estimated to have an eating disorder such as anorexia nervosa or bulemia. These numbers don't even count disordered eating like over eating or binge eating which have less severe physical effects but similarly severe psychological and emotional effects (especially when considering these tend to be dismissed and even mocked leaving the victim feeling more at fault and less likely to seek help). 


This is exactly why I decided to try my hand at modeling and why my profiles all say that I'm here to knock down societal walls. Women need to be evenly represented in the media. They need to know that they should not try to attain anything more than health and happiness and that this "standard" is impossible, ridiculous, and unattainable. More so, they need to know that all bodies can be beautiful and sexy and wonderful.


I'll end this post on a more comical note- the photographer in question also refers to himself in the third person. Yes, you can feel free to laugh and commence eye rolling.