Binge Eating Disorder Case Study

Shelby has struggled with eating since she was 22 years old and in college. She has had a history of this when under stress and dealing with sadness. Now, she regularly exercises and is said to be living a “healthy” lifestyle. Then Shelby had a similar recurring event when she went home for her sister’s wedding. During the wedding rehearsal, she became so overwhelmed being surrounded by so many people that she snuck away to a dark place by herself where she consumed a large plate of food, more than a normal person would which is Criterion B4 in the DSM-5. Shelby continued to eat for the next several hours with another large plate of food, desserts, and appetizers, basically everything that hadn’t been finished earlier in the day, even though she was not physically hungry (Criterion B3). After she would eat she expressed guilt and shame, and even suicidal thoughts (Criterion B5). She continued this eating habit 2-3 times a day for the next 2 weeks. She began worrying
When she was 22 and in her senior year of college, a boy she had been dating since her junior year of high school broke up with her. Growing up she was involved in strong friendships, family relationships and this was her first boyfriend. She experienced a great deal of emotional stress. Shelby depended on him for everything, including driving her to class every day. This is when she had her first occurrence of bingeing. According to research when one experiences a traumatic and stressful event, a person experiences difficulty with regulating their negative emotions. So when she was going through this, Shelby used binge eating to cope and relieve herself from the pain she was experiencing. These memories came back to her when she went home for her sister’s wedding when she ran into her ex-boyfriend. He was now engaged to another woman. This is where she began eating several large plates of food at the rehearsal dinner when her stress levels elevated once