According to one news source, 50% of women with anorexia are teens. Although women of all age groups are prone to anorexia, as a teenager, you’re at a high risk. Anorexia is the resistance to maintaining an acceptable body weight, specifically by refusing to eat. The amount of food an anorexic girl consumes varies—she may not eat anything for days, or she may maintain a diet with a minimal amount of calories. Anorexia may also involve compulsive exercise and other behavioral changes.

Anorexia is characterized by an intense fear of weight gain and a severely distorted body image. Often, girls with anorexia might be obviously underweight but still think that they are “fat.” Anorexia is also characterized by denial, and many anorexics refuse to acknowledge the danger of being underweight, or that they have a problem. In this way, as in others, anorexia is like addiction to drugs or alcohol. Anorexia is a lifelong condition that does not go away over night. It is treated with help from doctors, support groups and, in extreme cases, through hospitalization and at intensive overnight therapy institutions. In rare cases, an anorexic may become so obsessed with losing weight and controlling her calorie intake that she may starve herself to death.

Girls may not realize that there are many serious long-term effects that come from starving yourself. For a teenager with a developing body, anorexia is especially dangerous. Many times, women with anorexia stop menstruating. If this continues for long enough, a woman can stop menstruating for life and become infertile (unable to become pregnant). Other effects include hair loss, dry and brittle bones, kidney failure and muscle loss.

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Introduction
Anorexia Nervosa
Compulsive Overeating
Bulimia