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Fearful Symmetry: Anorexia and Autism

Over the last few years, I have noticed more women with eating disorders reporting early memories of obsessive-compulsive behavior. New research now links anorexia to a different area of rigidity: Autism.

Trichitillomania (compulsive hair pulling), too, is associated with perfectionism and OCD. Perhaps these behaviors and thoughts do all start with a delicate and finely tuned sensibility to textures, shapes and symmetry. Body Dysmorphic Disorder, one of the least overlooked disorders, may be next to consider as part of the colors that make up the autistic spectrum.

To read about this research, please see the April 22,  2009 article "Anorexia linked to 'autistic' thinking" by Linda Geddes in The New Scientist.

Here's a short excerpt:

... "Eating disorders and autism spectrum disorders are obviously not the same thing, but they do have some things in common," says Janet Treasure of the Institute of Psychiatry in London.
    Anorexia and autism are obviously not the same thing, but they have some things in common
Treasure had already discovered that anorexia was associated with extreme attention to detail and a rigid, inflexible style of thinking traits also associated with ASD.
    To investigate further, her team used neuropsychological tests to measure central coherence, or the ability to see the big picture as well as the finer details, in 42 women with anorexia and 42 without it. Women with anorexia had weaker central coherence, with a bias towards local, rather than global processing (International Journal of Eating Disorders, vol 41, p 143).
    In a separate study, Treasure and her colleagues found that 45 per cent of people with anorexia or bulimia have problems "set-shifting" , or modifying their behaviour in response to changing goals, compared to just 10 per cent of healthy people. ....

"Female Nude" by Alberto Giacometti, MOMA
Photo credit: kiddharma Creative Commons

Injured Warriors: What Happens When Girls Have to Leave the Game

Is hope a muscle? Do girls have more of it than boys?

Lots of people think so. We know girls have hope and determination. Since Title IX, we've been thrilled to see girls play team sports. The extraordinary achievements of the Amherst, Massachusetts' girls basketball teams, the Williams sisters who changed tennis, the skaters and gymnasts, but also the soccer players and track stars. Girls' soccer made soccer moms of many reluctant women. It is no surprise now when girls want in the game and to be taken seriously as athletes. We've started to believe anything is possible for our daughters.We are supposed to be proud. We are not supposed to be afraid.

But there are other things we know about girls that make them take to sports differently. Girls like to please. Girls also know how to ignore their bodies. Little girls can break bones  or get tendonitis. And girls often get too thin.

Recent studies suggest that female athletes are more likely to injure their knees, for example, than men and to ignore the doctor's and coach's instructions to rest. Anxious to please teammates, the affilliative nature of girls means they run a high risk for re-injuring themselves.  Rather than being worried, we exult in their strength.

What I see now is that when girls are injured, their athleticism screeches to a halt and causes mental anguish. Girls gain weight without exercise. Girls grow depressed and blame themselves. Girls do not have other outlets for the feelings they are used to releasing through the daily grind of training. A sense of worthlessness sets in.

Injuries in girls and women athletes are often the start of depression and an accompanying distortion of body image. A strong swimmer hates her shoulders. A ballerina cannot see her hip bones and panics. Some athletes may also enjoy losing their periods for months at a time—not understanding the danger.

We have got to prepare girls, as we would boys, to succeed in sports, but also prepare them injuries they may sustain. Sports injuries often have different meanings for girls—and different complications.

For more on this subject, I recommend Warrior Girls: Protecting Our Daughters Against the Injury Epidemic in Women's Sports by Michael Sokolove.

For information on girls and knee injuries and what girls need to know to prevent knee injuries, please visit ACL Prevent.

Please email me if you are interested to know when I may be speaking on this topic.

info@harvardsquaretherapy.com

Photo credit: GT Rams, Creative Commons

You Go Girl—Rhianna and Chris Brown

I have tried to listen to all sides of this story. I have tried, I suspect, to be politically correct. But when Oprah speaks out I think we can relax. Incredulous we have followed the story of these performers—this strong stunning girl whose career had begun well. Now, assaulted by her 'boyfriend' and sporting bruises under fake bangs Rhianna welcomes her abusive boyfriend back. Perhaps she needs to talk to Jennifer Husdon who recently lost family members to a terrible tragedy based upon just such an abusive man who retaliated one more time. But what frightens me more than Rhianna's mistake is that many teenagers support her. As a ninth grader told the New York Times, "She probably made him mad for him to react like that, you know, like, bring it on?” She hit first- or she provoked him, they argued. Teens are speaking words which echo an old sexist belief: If you wear a short skirt and walk in the city you are 'asking' for trouble. Is this some hideous inversion of "You Go Girl?" Has a slogan for female strength become a way to egg on our ability to endure pain? As I tell my clients when they ask about the difference between illness and regular sadness: There is necessary and unnecessary suffering. Life will hand you plenty of the first kind. Your job is to recognize the second and pass it by.

Photo credit: Arnooo, Creative Commons