This weekend, today Saturday, November 30, the international day of the fight against Eating Disorders (TCA). These disorders are not to be taken as a joke, the affected person feels very dissatisfied with himself, becomes obsessed with weight control and food. There is great suffering on an emotional level.
In this article we want to help families, mothers and fathers, that one of their children is going through this difficult disease.
We will propose you camps and other alternatives that help you, But first let's dismantle some erroneous beliefs. One of them, for example, is that it only affects girls. The imposition of beauty stereotypes in society means that more and more men are affected by eating disorders, who do not go directly through anorexia, which does affect women more.
Dismantling false beliefs
- As I was saying, the first is to believe that it only affects adolescent women, not like that, it also affects the boys already All ages.
- La buliminia and anorexia aren't the only ones Eating disorder. There are also others such as: binge eating disorder, or unspecified eating disorder. More cases of bulimia and unspecified eating disorder are diagnosed than anorexia.
- Not all people who are very thin suffer from TCA, or vice versa. That is, you can have an eating disorder and not be thin.
- The illness it is not chronic. With good psychological and medical treatment, between 50 and 60% of cases recover completely.
- Binge eating is not a matter of willpower. We are talking about mental disorders, the affected person you do not have the ability to control your intake. It is not about lack of will, nobody likes to suffer. These disorders have a multicausal origin in which individual, family and social factors intervene.
Therefore, any treatment for eating disorders has to be carried out by a multidisciplinary team of different specialists, such as psoicologists, social workers, nutritionists, educators, who address all the causes and consequences of the disease. In this relationship, and even if they are not professionals, the support and training in many cases from family and friends.
Camps for people with TCA
Camps are a complementary therapy to the treatment followed by people affected by eating disorders. These camps unfold in summer and winter, and they are done in a structured environment. The girls and boys who collaborate in the camps, as workers and also as volunteers, have experience both in the activities and in the disorders themselves.
The objective of these camps is to achieve resocialization of the person. Therefore, recreational and training activities are used, which improve the quality of life of the participants. There are sports activities, games and workshops in a natural environment. During the seven days During the duration of the camp, they are taught that they can eat without being overwhelmed, and at the same time they carry out both physical and intellectual activities. Although most of the people who attend are young women, there is no age limit.
These activities are very beneficial, since they get the patient to break with the environment associated with the problem for a few days. Of course, the professionals who have already worked in these camps warn, that you have to be careful so that they do not exchange tricks to continue losing weight.
adaner It is one of the associations at the national level that organizes this type of camp, in fact it is the pioneer. On their website you will find a way to get in touch with them and the schedule they have planned for next year. Just, in Catalonia, is another of the pioneering associations, with a very complete website, that are working for good information and support for people and families with eating disorders.