The first book to identify the eating disorder orthorexia nervosa-an
obsession with eating healthfully-and offer expert advice on how to
treat it.
As Americans become better informed about health, more and more people
have turned to diet as a way to lose weight and keep themselves in peak
condition. Anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa-disorders in which the
sufferer focuses on the quantity of food eaten-have been highly
documented over the past decade. But as Dr. Steven Bratman asserts in
this breakthrough book, for many people, eating "correctly" has become
an equally harmful obsession, one that causes them to adopt
progressively more rigid diets that not only eliminate crucial nutrients
and food groups, but ultimately cost them their overall health, personal
relationships, and emotional well-being.
Health Food Junkies is the first book to identify this new eating
disorder, orthorexia nervosa, and to offer detailed, practical advice on
how to cope with and overcome it. Orthorexia nervosa occurs when the
victim becomes obsessed, not with the quantity of food eaten, but the
quality of the food. What starts as a devotion to healthy eating can
evolve into a pattern of incredibly strict diets; victims become so
focused on eating a "pure" diet (usually raw vegetables and grains) that
the planning and preparation of food come to play the dominant role in
their lives.
Health Food Junkies provides an expert analysis of some of today's
most popular diets-from The Zone to macrobiotics, raw-foodism to food
allergy elimination-and shows not only how they can lead to orthorexia,
but how they are often built on faulty logic rather than sound medical
advice. Offering expert insight gleaned from his work with orthorexia
patients, Dr. Bratman outlines the symptoms of orthorexia, describes its
progression, and shows readers how to diagnose the condition. Finally,
Dr. Bratman offers practical suggestions for intervention and treatment,
giving readers the tools they need to conquer this painful disorder,
rediscover the joys of eating, and reclaim their lives.
