Well, you should ask whatever you feel like you’d want a reply to. Don’t ask for my sake. Ask for yours.
Well essentially I’m looking to understand how eating disorders feel. What drives your behaviour at these times?
I went through a phase of undereating myself, but it was an entirely logical in that I wanted to look good and I believed that’s how I could do it. What I can’t quite wrap my head around is people who know its counter to every goal and yet still do it.
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I’m off to bed now so I’ll return with a more elaborate response tomorrow (maybe, if there’s something to add) but undereating, as you’ve pointed out, can be and often is a means to an end. It becomes a disorder when the behaviour remains even if the goals have changed or it is causing one harm.
I’m not sure what drives it. I’ve been on this train of thought a few times when writing in Anna’s log that it’s deeply ingrained behaviour. Say you are putting yourself through a deficit but you haven’t reached your goal yet but your body is actively resisting you at this point through metabolic down regulation and other mechanisms and you will yourself to do more and eat less — going against your intuition, and instincts.
I wonder if something happens in the mind as you power through at these stages, and when done repeatedly one’s mind finds a way to reconcile this behaviour and irrationality thereof by changing one’s view and value system to allow for said behaviour to continue.
While the following might seem insensitive to some, and I do apologise if that’s the case, I’ve found (as a layperson) that Stockholm syndrome feels like a good analogy for explaining the counter-intuitive situations that arise when one continues to suffer from the disorder while also having a goal that lies antagonistically to the behaviour one actively exhibits.
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That’s a valid analogy, but usually eating disorders are likened to addictive behaviors.
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There’s no one thing that can drive an eating disorder. Sometimes it can be a combination of things, and sometimes it can start off as one thing, and develop into another. To be honest. However there’s usually the incentive of wanting some sort of control over oneself or their life. This is usually seen in young girls or guys who don’t have much say so in their lives. They feel as though if they can control what they eat, how much, and how they look, then they’re at least accomplishing something. But it isn’t something entirely Dependent on age. Often times older individuals can develope eating disorders for the same reasons as younger individuals.
Eating disorders can also develope from something akin to OCD. After a while, it’s like the individual gets stuck to the point of obsessing over food. One mechanism that’s involved in that, as I’ve come to understand is called Rumination. It’s a mental process by which an individual will turn over a certain thought or experience again and again and again in their minds. Often times the individual will either just succumb to that, or they will compensate. It can manifest itself as many things too. There’s varying degrees to this aspect, with some individuals usually being able to push through, and some individuals who legit can’t function properly in life.
There’s also an entire community that dedicates eating disorders to a life style. I used to be a member of one the most popular websites that has millions of users on it, who more or less, “support” one another. Thing with that is, if recovery isn’t the one and only main goal, “support” just translates to “encourage”. They share tips on everything from figuring out how many calories are in a tube of toothpaste, to figuring out how to get out of doctors visits. At that point it’s purely just finding reward in being mentally ill.
There’s also individuals who end up developing eating disorders because its become romanticized to that individual. Being sick is seen as attractive, it’s seen as having “will-power”, it’s seen as beautiful in their eyes. At the root of that, it’s the sense of self-inflicted helplessness that people become attached to, or just comfortable with. On the other hand, there’s the notion that hurting oneself, is seen as something that is “deserved.” Deny yourself the right to eat, because you deserve it, type of thing. If I had to compare it to something, loosely it would be akin to BDSM type of stuff.
There’s also the aspect of eating disorders concerning using them to cope with things, and this one lines up with addictive behaviors very well. Think of an alcoholic, but replace the liquor with food.
That’s not to say @Voxel fits into any of these categories, as he is his own person, and I wouldn’t want to make it seem like I would have even the first clue of what he’s going through either, but just on a general note. I don’t know if this helpful, but hopefully you did.
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Had to Google that, never before have I heard of fika
Not to the extent that you guys seem to take it, we just go out for coffee and to chat for an hour of a couple of them. And if you’re visiting someone you’ll surely be offered coffee
I’m down if you want to go and talk stuff over coffee while you’re here
Man this log moves fast! Very interesting topics though.
I wanted to touch on integrity as well in regards to the internet argument. I’d go a step further than @T3hPwnisher.
I agree that an ‘online person’ is the same as an ‘offline person’ but that the anonymity of the internet actually reveals ones true integrity/ charakter.
Lack of anonymity includes fear of repercussion. You would maybe not insult me in a bar when I have 50 kg on you. On the internet you can insult me without fear of me reacting violently. This is a simple example but you get my point. Some people act decent because they don’t want to deal with the consequences of their behaviour.
The internet takes that away in large parts. So if you are still decent, polite and helpful, you are because you want to not because you have to.
It’s a little bit comparable to a position of power. We all know people who act like arseholes towards people when there is a power difference, just because they can. They get to walk all over people because they won’t have to fear much repercussion to their behaviour. Truly good charakter is not letting that power difference affect your behaviour.
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I very much did, thank you.
For me, the window that helped me understand better is the section that mentioned
Because I think many, many people do this to an extent, hence the phrase comfort food. I’ve certainly eaten contrary to my goals many, many times and that feeling right there where you do it is probably a bit of a glimpse into how people with eating disorders feel. Would that be fair?
Edit: just to clarify, by contrary to my goals I also mean that it is not even for enjoyment or social interaction. Purely eating because it’s there or because there’s emotional connections to food there.
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Good addition to the topic. And I can vouch for its validity.
I believe I have gone through this phase,
although it was unrelated to a sense of autonomy in life but I lacked control in another sense (being an adult, the teenager scenario does not apply here).
I believe that while the disorder can be an expression of OCD it can also manifest as an OCD,
and I feel that for me I continuously encouraged behaviours in myself that supported the disorder until the enactment of these behaviours eventually became the predominant cause of me exhibiting them.
I’m sorry that I have failed to observe your background with regards to this topic. But I did notice a scale pic recently that had me wondering if there was some background there.
I understand this angle too, and can resonate with it to a certain extent, but the BDSM-analogy is not something I agree with as I don’t see the parallel in how it feeds into the behaviour of either a dom or a sub (having been a dom in more than one relationship). Asceticism is a better fit.
The following two statments together,
are somewhat concerning as I for one feel like the addict analogy is the least applicable one. But maybe it depends on the specific disorder?
No worries, I’ve fit into the labels to a certain extent to varying degrees. No system that tries to categorise human behaviour will ever be perfect and I don’t see a reason to take it personally as to how neatly one either fits or doesn’t fit into any attempt to such buckets.
@dagill2 to highlight how it can work, this minor change in physique,
Jan 24
Feb 11
Can be enough to cause a spiral. There’s some fat gain (and muscle gain). Objectively I look less good, but not bad.
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You look healthy/lean compared to the average male, just my perspective
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I never understood this line of reasoning. How is this an active choice? I have to select to be anything other than decent, polite and helpful.
I appreciate the rest of your reply though. It made me think about the difference in which various internet denizens I know behave themselves at- and away from keyboard.
Blessed with the good fortunate of interacting with people of different subcultures both online and offline and being able to juxtapose their behaviour in between these two realities I’ve come to observe that “who” someone is online can be informed by knowing that it’s usually very easy to trace back with adequate data who is behind an avatar or entirely liberated. The internet security folks I know actively try to obscure the real them, going as far as even sharing accounts to make for confusing trails, and people with gender dysphoria having a liberation in being completely liberated from their physical self. But one thing that I see consistently plays into how someone behaves online is their age and if someone grew up with or without the internet.
Coffee is a part of it, but it doesn’t qualify as fika on its own.
Whichever is your preference? I don’t think I’ll have time for both!
I wonder if fika is more common in the north of Finland. Do you know? Like in Österbotten?
I know Kaj is from there, and a lot of their jokes resonate well in Sweden,
Being behind a computer screen negates repercussion stemming from our words, our actions… it induces a state of disinhibition, people say things they’d otherwise never say, particular threats of violent action, insults, racist and/or homophobic comments (hence the birth of the ‘troll’). Action pertains to internet behaviour, I get the feeling you’re still a decent individual, treating others the way you’d like to be treated (I abide by the same philosophy). I feel not many stop and think about actions behind a computer screen as they see a screen name, the absence of a picture… thus a sense of disconnection is present. If more people cared, stopped to think “how does saying this make the person on the other end of the screen feel”, I firmly believe the internet would be a better place
Then again, some people are just… assholes, as @T3hPwnisher stated earlier “I don’t think very highly of humanity”… he’s not exactly wrong, inherently we are a cruel, selfish and inherently ruthless species… many a times I notice when going gets tough, when it gets to the nitty gritty, people tend to be out for themselves and no one else… hence when people speak badly online, sometimes they legitimately just don’t care, they speak badly because they can get away with it… it’s one of the things I dislike the most about the internet, social media and distanced interaction.
Granted I wouldn’t go as far as to say misanthropy is the ideal ideology to abide by (granted opinions differ, I judge no one for their harboured principles so long as they don’t hurt others and/or instil hate within the populace). While humans are incredibly destructive, we destroy what we inhabit, to the point that earth is becoming gradually less inhabitable as time progresses… I don’t believe this confirms the ideology that we shouldn’t exist. It exactly isn’t our fault we’re here, that pertains to something we don’t understand to begin with … we can however try not be dicks and try mitigate environmental destruction inflicted by our presence and actions
I try to keep my identity secretive because I willingly admit to engaging in illegal activity (smoking pot, AAS possession aside from what I’m prescribed to treat legitimate medical ailment)… I worry had my identity been public on here future employment opportunity could be obstructed… not to liberate myself from my physical self. For those who I trust very much, my identity has been revealed, then again it’s difficult to trust one behind the mask of an unknown avatar
I don’t think I’ve ever partaken in fika
I’m deloading hard that week, so I think we’d get more out of going out and grabbing coffee and socializing
I don’t know, but I’d speculate so, as Northern Finland is more rural and in General people seem to be less busy there
I’ll have to check that video out, seems interesting
As fair as fair can get
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I wouldn’t make that equivalence comparison but I cannot speak for the qualia of your experience.
I very much agree.
I too have the same reasons for encouraging this type of disordered behavior. For me it all starts with my thinking. I’ll entertain the thoughts for so long until I can no longer suppress the urge to see my thoughts physically carried out in action.
Nah it’s okay. There’s not much background other than what I let be known on this site. I’m always open to inquiries though.
Yeah I would liken it to that as well. Just really couldn’t find a general word for it.
I used BDSM in terms of pain being something that’s involved in that whole aspect of pain-pleasure dynamic. Not so much dominant and submissive dynamics.
Definitely. I try my best to not categorize and compartmentalize everything when talking about stuff like this, because these aspects are so fluid in nature, so I try to just observe the behavior. If they are similar, independent of stressors, triggers, or both, I’ll kind of group them together just to simplify. Not to say that they’re the same, but also not saying they’re mutually exclusive of one another. Again, very fluid aspects. There’s a lot of “yes and no” all over the place.
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Well it isn’t for me and you (and many others here).
@unreal24278 did a great job summarizing what I meant in his first paragraph.
Basically the internet, or the anonymity it gives people brings out the worst in some people. Those people are obviously cunts offline but they are limited by the fear of repercussion to their behavior. So there is a limit for how much of a cunt a person can be offline (for most there is at least). That limit seems to be raised tremendously if said cunt person interacts online.
The best examples are the following:
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Have you ever followed any political or social debate online? I am always in awe of the tone some people chose (including racism, sexism and hate speech). A lot of this is even on happening on Facebook which mitigates the anonymity part. These people would still raise their shitty opinions in an offline debate but I am pretty sure that they would phrase differently.
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Have you ever talked to a female athlete that has a considerable Instagram following about her experience with male sexism? You wouldn’t believe your ears if you haven’t! Including very violent, very aggressive and perverted messages that would understandably frighten a lot of people. Still not everyone of those disgusted cunts runs around raping people, assaulting women or anything along those lines. The feel of anonymity and lack of fear ‘empowers’ them to their behavior.
In Germany we are currently discussing stricter laws to fight assault, hate speech and insults
on the internet towards private personas, institutions and especially (since it has a growing need for it) government officials/ politicians. Basically right now it is kind of a law free zone. There are laws obviously but they are hard to enforce, rarely result in punishment and the police is
hopelessly overwhelmed.
I think you mean something different than awe but I understand your meaning.
I feel as if my earlier post lacks a certain nuance, as I seem naive with regards to the ill behaviour of man online (and, by extension, offline). I’ve observed it many times across several subcultures, it’s not something I have not been exposed to. But, I do not believe the people to engage in such behaviour to be, away from keyboard, pleasant individuals.
To be painfully clear, I understand this view,
but what I focus on is this,
and I don’t believe that the internet brings out the worst in these individuals, but rather think they mask and facade their real selves as they navigate society because the trade-off between expressing their own heinous views face-to-face would inevitably negatively impact the life society otherwise affords them. And so, I trade it for,
The comforts of society brings out bearable behaviour out of most
I have not.
From a technical perspective, this is only feasible with putting in place a policing and monitoring infrastructure that makes me concerned to my core. That infrastructure will be there when someone wants to use it for more malicious intents.
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