"People with bulimia nervosa have episodes of binge eating. This is followed by self-induced vomiting or other measures to counteract the excessive food intake. Treatments include cognitive-behavioural therapy, and sometimes medicines and self-help measures. Many people with bulimia get better with treatment.
Bulimia nervosa (often just called bulimia) is a condition where you think a lot about your body weight and shape. It affects your ability to have a 'normal' eating pattern. Bulimia is one of the conditions that form the group of eating disorders that includes anorexia nervosa. There are important differences between these two conditions. For example, in anorexia nervosa you are very underweight, whereas in bulimia nervosa, you are most likely to be normal weight or even overweight.
Bulimia mainly affects women aged 16-40. It most commonly starts around the age of 19 years. It affects around 8 in 100 women in the UK. Bulimia sometimes develops in men and children. Women are 10 times more likely to develop bulimia than men. However, bulimia is becoming more common in boys and men. Bulimia is more common than anorexia nervosa.
There may be some genetic factor, as the risk of developing bulimia in close relatives of people with bulimia is four times greater than in the general population.
Bingeing and purging are the main symptoms and are usually done in secret.
- Bingeing means that you have repeated episodes of eating large amounts of foods and/or drinks. For example, you may eat a whole large tub of ice cream or two packets of biscuits even if you are not hungry. You feel out of control and unable to stop eating. Binge eating is often done very quickly until you feel physically uncomfortable. This happens not just on one occasion, but regularly. Eating patterns typically become chaotic.
- Purging means that you try and counteract the 'fattening' effects of the food from the bingeing. Self-induced vomiting (making yourself sick) after a bout of bingeing is the most well-known, but not all people with bulimia do this. Other purging methods include taking lots of laxatives, extreme exercise, extreme dieting or even periods of complete starvation, taking diuretics (water tablets) or taking other medicines such as amfetamines.
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