THE EXCLUSIVE Treatment for Eating Disorders

Heal the Roots of Anorexia Nervosa

Anorexia nervosa or anorexia as it’s commonly known is an eating disorder where there’s a severe restriction of food and you develop and maintain a very low body weight. Anorexia can be treated successfully and 80% of those who have chronic anorexia are able to recover when they receive cating disorder treatment. Statistics show that this psychological illness has the highest mortality rate of any mental disorder. Anorexia is also the third most common illness in adolescents.
Some of the signs of anorexia nervosa include:
• Repeatedly referring to oneself as “fat” even when you are at normal weight
• A fear of gaining weight
Feeling guilty over eating and also suffering from body image distortion An over focus on calories, weight, and food Refusal of meals or reporting that you just ate” to get out of meals
Withdrawal from family, friends and activities
• Compensatory activities like using laxatives, diet pills or exercise

Heal the Roots of Bulimia Nervosa

Bulimia nervosa involves binging on large amounts of food and then compensating for it with some other behavior like vomiting, laxatives, exercise, etc. According to the National Institute of Health, 19% of women in college have bulimia. Some signs of bulimia include: negative self image, severe self-criticism, low self-esteem, guilt about eating and weight.
Binging includes a preoccupation with food and what happens is that you feel guilty after eating and then you purge. These feelings of guilt are very difficult to process and oftentimes what occurs is an obsession or constant thinking about food. This can be a heavy burden for bulimia sufferers to carry around. Typically you experience weight fluctuation of 10-20 pounds.
Purging signs: they have a sore throat, calluses or wounds on the back of the hands, swollen neck glands, stained teeth, decay of teeth due to stomach acid, visiting the bathroom after meals, food goes missing, and participating in secret eating.
There are also other compensatory behaviors that you may participate in when you have bulimia:
• Taking diuretics
• Diet pills Laxatives
• Excessive exercise

A Holistic Approach to Binge Eating Disorders

Binge eating disorder occurs when you eat a large amount of food in a brief amount of time (usually 2 hours) without compensating for it. Binge eating disorder is the most common eating disorder in the United States. It is estimated that 10% – 15% of overweight dieters have binge eating disorder
Signs of binge eating disorder:
• Gaining weight quickly
• Eating large amounts of food regardless of whether or not you’re hungry Late night eating is very common in people with binge eating disorder Experiencing guilt and shame over overeating Hiding food and eating when nobody is looking • Self-medicating/self-soothing with food You don’t purge to get rid of the food You often eat to the point of pain and discomfort You hide any evidence of binging (throwing away the wrappers, hiding them in the bottom of the trash so nobody can see it, etc.)
• Depression and anxiety are out of control feeling around food Extreme weight fluctuations
Reclaim your relationship with food and your body with our holistic eating disorders treatment program in Hawaii.

Resolve Food Addiction or Compulsive Overeating

Food addiction, also called compulsive overeating, is a very real behavioral disorder and it involves an addiction to junk food, comfort foods or highly palatable foods that are usually fatty, sugary, and salty foods. You experience a loss of control over eating and the eating behavior eventually starts to impair other parts of your life.

Just like alcohol and drug addictions, food also triggers the release of dopamine in the brain which creates pleasurable feelings in the body. The dopamine reward pathway, along with blood sugar metabolism and hormones like ghrelin are part of the body’s natural hunger and satiety regulation cycle. The problem that develops is related to man-made, manufactured food or food-like substances that cause a reward or dopamine trigger that is much more powerful than the reward that’s available in nature – eating an apple versus a bowl of Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Fudge Brownie ice cream.

This massive and incredibly rewarding dopamine release begins the addictive cycle where food addiction often results in an obsessive compulsive relationship with food where you obsess about food – what to eat, what you shouldn’t eat, etc. The only compulsion that makes you stop thinking about food is the act of eating,

When you suffer from compulsive overeating or food addiction you experience powerful feelings of shame and self-loathing following overeating episodes. You also find it extremely difficult and embarrassing to admit you have a problem with uncontrolled eating as you may fear being labeled as being lazy or lacking willpower by society. At Exclusive Hawaii Rehab treatment for food addiction is available and we encourage you to step out of the overeating cycle and seek treatment for the underlying issues.

Healing Other Specified Feeding or Eating Disorder (OSFED)

Not all disordered eating behaviors fit the diagnostic criteria of anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, or binge eating disorder (BED). Many people have variations of symptoms that are overlooked and sometimes rare. Other specified feeding and eating disorder (OSFED), formerly known as eating disorder not otherwise specified (EDNOS), is a category that includes atypical eating disorders. There are many of these atypical eating disorders and some are not official diagnoses. Many of these are recent additions, because there are increasing incidences of these disorders particularly body dysmorphia, orthorexia, pregorexia, and drunkorexia.

Even though some of these issues may not meet traditional criteria for an eating disorder it doesn’t mean they aren’t serious and potentially life threatening.
Some of these other specified and unspecified eating and feeding behaviors the following examples:

• Bulimia nervosa (with less frequent behaviors)
• Binge-eating disorder (with less frequent occurrences) Purging disorder (purging without binge eating)
• Night eating syndrome (excessive nighttime food consumption)
• Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID)
• Pica (mostly in children, eating of non-food substances that do not have any nutritional value: hair, paint, paper, etc.)
• Rumination Disorder (when you voluntary or involuntary bring back up and re-chew partially digested food that’s already been swallowed)
• Unspecified Feeding or Eating Disorder (UFED) – UFED is diagnosed when an
an individual’s symptoms do not line up with those of another disorder, or when there simply is not enough information to determine a more specific diagnosis.
• Body dysmorphia (obsession with a perceived physical defect or slight imperfection that may be imagined)
• Orthorexia (when you’re righteous about food choices and obsessed with healthy eating Bigorexia (men are most susceptible, you worry about not being muscular and use extreme workout methods to attain the perfect physique, also known as muscle dysmorphia).
• Pregorexia (extreme exercising and dieting while pregnant.)
• Drunkorexia (when you reduce caloric intake from food so that can spend it on drinking instead).
• Anorexia athletica (compulsive exercising using extreme exercise regimens).
• Diabulimia (when Type I diabetics manipulate insulin doses to lose weight).