Eating disorders: how are they addressed by psychotherapy?

These are the keys to psychotherapy applied to eating disorders.

Eating disorders are among the most severe psychological disorders.

In fact, they can lead to death either through the wear and tear suffered by the body or by a cardiac collapse due to a drop of potassium in the body by vomiting or by the relationship of these disorders with suicide attempts, relatively frequent in people who develop them.

That is why, in the face of disorders such as anorexia, bulimia and similar, it is important to seek therapy from qualified professionals as soon as possible. In this article we will see how psychotherapy works to manage the symptoms of eating disorders and overcome them. and overcome them.

What are Eating Behavior Disorders?

Known as Eating Disorders (ED), also called eating disorders, are psychological disorders in which the person who develops them adopts pathological ways of eating. Within this category we find, mainly, these EDs.

1. Bulimia

In bulimia nervosa, the person experiences irrepressible uncontrollable urges to binge eat, after which he/she engages in behaviors to try to compensate for the binge eating.After binge eating, the person performs behaviors to try to compensate for this intake, such as vomiting or exercising to burn off at least part of these extra calories.

2. Anorexia

People with anorexia perceive that they have an overweight problem that obsesses them.Therefore, they avoid as much as possible the food intake that their body needs.

3. Binge eating disorder

This is an eating disorder similar to bulimia, but with the difference that no purging or compensatory behaviors are carried out after binge eating (except for a more restrictive or rigid diet, thus building up to the next binge).

4. Other disorders associated with obesity

There are other psychological problems linked to eating, such as the tendency to eat too much on a regular basis or even the perception that one is too thin when this is not the case.. However, in these cases, there is less consensus as to whether these phenomena constitute alterations comparable to the Eating Disorders we have seen so far.

The treatment of eating disorders in psychotherapy

Let us now look at the key ideas that help to understand how to intervene in Eating Disorders in psychotherapy.

1. Accompanying the therapeutic process

Psychologists we deal with problems that arise from the very fact of being aware of having a disorder and the changes in the day to day life experienced by those dealing with this problem.. For example, fears and insecurities related to the use of psychotropic drugs and new foods and quantities to which it is necessary to adapt.

2. Adoption of healthier habits

In psychotherapy, strategies are proposed strategies to adopt new habits that make it easier to have a healthy diet. It is not a matter of learning to cook certain dishes, but of implementing behaviors that help to have a healthy relationship with food as opposed to compensatory rituals (running to lose weight, vomiting, etc.).

3. Learning to recognize emotions

Many times, people with certain eating disorders try to override an unpleasant emotional state by eating food that they feel like eating. For this reason, in psychotherapy they are helped to become more skillful in correctly identifying their emotions and their psychological states in general, which enables them to apply appropriate solutions for these forms of eating disorders.This makes it possible to apply appropriate solutions to these forms of discomfort, instead of "covering up" them with food without "covering them up" with food without being truly hungry.

4. Learning to recognize behavioral patterns

Another task of psychologists is to help patients better understand their behavioral styles on a day-to-day basis. To do this, they are encouraged to make self-records on a regular basis, and are given the keys to learn to detect trends in the patterns of thought and behavior that they write down and describe.

5. Setting goals and committing to improvement

In psychotherapy patients are encouraged to motivate themselves to meet the goals that will lead them to overcome their disorder.. In addition, they are taught to adopt the appropriate predisposition to achieve goals without getting discouraged and throwing in the towel.

6. Prevention of suicidal behavior

Suicide attempts are a much more common phenomenon among patients with ED than among the rest of the population, which does not mean that most of these people will attempt to take their own lives. This is why these issues are explored in therapy in order to act in time and propose alternatives.

7. Prevention and intervention of other problems

Eating disorders favor the appearance of other psychological disorders or in many occasions are the cause of them, for example trauma, depression, addictions or generalized anxiety..

That is why in addition to preventing the onset of these, improving the mental health of the patient by intervening in their Eating Disorder, psychologists must work the signs of other possible behavioral disorders harmful to the person and that do not have to do directly with food. There is much more than we think, underneath that visible part associated with food, in an eating disorder.

Looking for professional psychological support?

If you think you may be experiencing symptoms associated with an eating disorder and would like to attend psychotherapy, we invite you to contact us. At the Miguel Ángel Psychology and Psychotherapy Center we have a team with decades of experience helping people with this type of problems, both in online therapy and in face-to-face therapy in our facilities in Bilbao. You will find more information about us on this page.