Julie’s Health Club: Orthorexia: A new eating disorder?
Orthorexia supposedly is an emerging eating disorder marked by extreme devotion to healthy food.
People suffering from the addictionusually those righteous raw foodists, vegetarians and vegansobsessively check labels, avoid junk food, plan menus and often eat a healthy diet so they can feel "pure." Some even make fun of McDonald’s customers.
It gets worse. While an anorexic tries to severely limit calories, an orthorexic might shun foods with artificial ingredients, trans fats or high-fructose corn syrup. Orthorexics also are generally unconcerned about their weight and do not feel fat. Their diet may make them feel virtuous.
Treatment is tricky, however, because orthorexics will consider drugs such as antidepressants to be ‘impure’ and unnatural, wrote Dr. Steven Bratman, who is credited with coining the term in the 1990s but no longer maintains orthorexia.com.
"The same goes for weight-gain aids such as Ensure, because they contain verboten substances such as sugar, artificial colors and artificial flavors, Bratman wrote in "Health Food Junkies" (Broadway, $22).