Bulemia

[fatpossum]

Hi Chaps,

I was at a 2-day conference in London earlier in the week and during the first evening I spent a bit of time talking to a woman who told me that she had been on a VCLD about two years ago. She looked great but told me that she had developed Bulemia as a result of the diet!!

She said that she lost her weight quickly and successfully but for months afterwards couldn't get the hang of eating healthily and took to binging and purging in order to maintain her weight loss!! She said that she was a lot better now but still had a tendency to throw up if she ate a big meal e.g. Christmas time or after a celebration! (I did notice that she left the table after the presentation meal and wondered .............?!)

This really worries me! Has anyone else heard of this happening? Or is it likely that this is just tendency that this woman had as opposed to being a condition likely to develop as a result of being on a VLCD?

 

[Karen]

i dont think thats a common thing at all. if she had been following ANY kind of healthy diet, its likely she may have purged after returning to unhealthier food. i think it depends on the persons mindset that start them on that road rather than what diet they come from. obviously, after mindset i reckon then then forms a habit. course, i may be talking codswallop but i dont see how a particular diet can make someone start making themselves sick unless they want to do it. then it comes down to the person, not the diet. imo anyways

 

[fatpossum]

That's what I thought Karen but she presented as a really bright and intelligent woman and was adamant that the VCLD was responsible. She told me that she had been referred to a psychologist as a result of the problem and that the psychologist had confirmed her belief!!!

I don't think she was trying to put me off - in fact she was really encouraging but was telling me to be careful .

 

[Karen]

she may believe the diet did it cos of what it did to her mindset.... and phsychologically made her not want to digest food, and the phsycologist may confirm that...but i still reckon it had to be her mindset about coming away from the diet, not because of the diet if ya know what i mean. its good for people to think about tho when they are going into an extreme diet. forewarned is forearmed.

i just dont see there can be a physical reason to no longer be able to eat after a period of not eating...it HAS to be all in the mind, surely? hence, a phsychologist, being a head doctor would look at it like that. i would be really interested in hearing a medical doctor confirm that it was the diet...that would hold more weight with me than the phsycologist.

I dont know much about being a medical doc or a head doc so will be interesting to see what others think. good thread...u got me thinking and thats near impossible on a weekend lol. xx

 

[Karen]

ummm...thinking on it...a medical doctor may say that reflexes kick in and make u resist food after a while but again, surely that would just be retraining the body/mind and i find that quite unlikely. hmmm...im getting a headache now...OVERLOAD lol xxx

 

[KD]

There is research that shows a person who diets is more likely to end up with an eating disorder than a person who has never dieted. This includes non-vlcds and vlcds.

The people who tend to do VLCDs are more likely to have a food addiction than others IMO, which is why they chose to eliminate food from their diet.

We all know addicts have a tendency to blame everything else other than their own behaviour and choices. That's what an addict does.

Perhaps the psychologist did blame the VLCD, but he might just be blaming any diet. Perhaps she used the tale of the psychologist to reinforce the fact that she 'obviously' wasn't to blame

If the psychologist did blame the fact that she had dieted, then as karen says, he is suggesting that it has changed her 'mindset', in other words feelings of deprivation and an overwhelming desire to stay slim, thus focusing on self image rather than health, has made her 'chose' to purge.

I'm not saying that she means to, but that she misunderstands what addiction is about and feels this is the only way to control her weight.

Anything physical and they would have just refered her to a specialist in digestion.

She may well have looked good at the moment, but I bet she feels crap

 

[DawnC]

I lost a lot of weight about 9 years ago through just watching what I ate but as soon as I started eating what I then thought was normal (i.e. the same as before) my body just made be throw up during the night. The urge to throw up woke me up and I literally had to run for the bathroom. I couldnt control it for weeks. It had to be the type of food I was eating but unfortunately at the time I carried on eating in this way even though it made me sick and have rancid smelling burps. I must have been mad. At no point did I deliberatly make myself throw up, it was my bodys reaction to the change of diet. The same thing happened when I first started Lighterlife but thankfully not as bad and only lasted about a week. I'm guessing that I must have a very sensitive tummy???

Dawn xx

 

[Karen]

yeah i reckon its likely someone can feel ill or vomit naturally when they have not had grease or high fats...then to all of a sudden have lots would sit badly on the tum i imagine. i just meant that so long after a diet, to throw up anything u eat...sounds more like behaviour to me. KD says it all much better than me tho lol

 

[fatpossum]

The woman I met was clear that she had developed an 'eating disorder' as opposed to having developed an inability to digest food - she said she was making herself vomit and also using laxatives and occasionally diuretics!!!!

It sounds awful. I think I read somewhere that Princess Diana was a closet bulemic too and some of the current 'Size Zero' models/actresses also suffer from the problem.

I have never before linked it to VCLDs though and prior to choosing the diet I didn't come across anything about it in the literature I read.

Did I miss anything?

Don't get me wrong - I'm not worried that I will become bulemic but having been without proper food for a few months now it is a bit of a worry to think about eating again and how easy or not easy this will be to manage. I know that when I have fallen off the wagon during the diet I have been drawn to high carb foods and this will be something I will need to balance when I go back to normal eating, particularly as I don't eat meat (fish, yes but not meat).