When Eating Healthy Becomes Unhealthy

We’ve all heard of anorexia, bulimia and binge eating. These are disorders usually afflicting young girls and women, but can also afflict males, that manifest themselves in severely limiting the amount of calories consumed or purging of calories consumed. Anorexia and bulimia usually afflict young girls and women who are obsessed about losing weight. But for some people eating healthy can become unhealthy when they obsess not about calories or losing weight but by the purity of the ingredients that go into the food.

For treatment of Orthorexia Nervosa in the Chicago metropolitan area please contact

Coined Orthorexia Nervosa by Steven Bratman in the 1990s, orthorexia is what happens when people restrict their diet to exclude artificial ingredients, colorants, preservatives or anything that’s been genetically modified.

Orthorexia can start out simply enough. A person starts out by trying to eat healthier, maybe cutting out junk food or incorporating healthy shakes or smoothies into their diet. Eventually they become obsessive and compulsive about the food they eat. They create self imposed restrictions that can lead to very unhealthy diets.

Patients who have been diagnosed with Orthorexia can be malnourished – low sodium levels, low potassium levels  and metabolic acidosis. Diagnosis is currently make through self-report. Orthorexia is not recognized as an official psychiatric diagnosis in the most recent edition of the DSM-5 but is instead considered disordered eating.

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