Case Study-Eating Disorder

Sarah is a sixteen year old girl. She is in the tenth grade and until recently was an optimistic and energetic young girl. Sarah’s mother has began to worry about her lately. Her mother recently found a bottle of diet pills hidden in her room. She has also noticed that Sarah’s behavior has been changing in the past few months. Sarah’s mother is unaware that Sarah’s boyfriend has been reducing her to tears lately by commenting that she has been gaining weight. Her mother has also found her looking in the mirror a lot more than usual. When she looks in the mirror she often sucks in her stomach and is complaining that she is not beautiful. As a result, Sarah has been going off food for days to the point of starvation. Then after days without food she breaks down and eats nearly everything that she can find in her refrigerator. Sarah’s weight has significantly dropped in the past few weeks. It is important to intervene immediately in Sarah’s life and get her help. When individuals with eating disorders get help early on during the disorder there is a high success rate of long-term recovery. Sarah is part of one the highest rated risk groups for eating disorders. People between the ages of ten to twenty-five are at the most risk for developing an eating disorder. Sarah is entering her teenage years and is encountering a lot of changes with her boy and her emotions. Eating disorders are also usually referred to as female diseases. Eating disorders are not limited to females. Sarah is a young women that is starting to feel pressure from her boyfriend to lose weight. Sarah is just beginning to have issue with her weight and food. Individuals with eating disorders often do not recognize that they have a problem or will not admit that they have a problem. The two most common forms of eating disorders are anorexia nervosa and bulimia. They are similar to each other and are both very harmful to an individual. Anorexia is characterized by an obsession with weight gain