Anorexic woman

A serious problem in our actual society

    What means to be a beautiful woman? Perhaps it means to have a beautiful thin body, but not being healthy? A lot of young women have this thinking, but none of them have the knowledge about the sickness caused by this thought. This illness is acquaintance as nervous anorexia. It consists in the fear of being a fat person and having a distortion imageof the body (Body Dysmorphic Disorder). The result of this disease is a heavy slimming caused by an exaggerate diet and the excess of exercise. This is a serious problem in our society and we need to do something to promote knowledge and prevention of this matter. Because of this, many people, including famous artists, entertainments and models, have died or have suffered nervous anorexia. Iconsider that this problem is the main issue that affects young girls worldwide, not only because of the physical cruelty they inflict on themselves, but the psychological and emotional violence. The statistics reflect that girls of nine years old are suffering of this disease and in many countries, including Puerto Rico; it presents a lot of these cases. Nervous anorexia it’s one of the main socialissues in Puerto Rico, because it affects all economical status, ages and cultures.
    Many models suffer anorexia because of the requirements of their jobs. These models want a “beautiful body”, putting their health under a series of risks. Some examples of these models are: “Luisel Ramos, de 22 años, se sintió indispuesta tras desfilar en la pasarela, se desmayó camino a los camerinos yfalleció pese a recibir auxilio de una unidad móvil sanitaria, según explican las mismas fuentes. Los médicos que la atendieron, quienes diagnosticaron paro cardiorrespiratorio, manifestaron que el padre de la joven declaró a la policía que la modelo llevaba varios días sin alimentarse.”(www.cronica.com) 1, “Según sus allegados, Valentina Fernández, que sólo consumía manzanas, agua y lechuga en losúltimos días, fue trasladada por amigos al hospital, donde expiró.” (www.cronica.com) 2. The statistics of death caused by anorexia worldwide are less than the statistics of death caused by anorexia in the model environment. This can be founded in: “Sin embargo, subrayó que, aunque la tasa de muertes en el mundo por anorexia es del 8 por ciento, en el ambiente del modelaje ‘sube a entre 18 y 20 porciento.’”(www.cronica.com) 3. Moreover, the models aren’t the only that suffer from anorexia. Anahí, Karla Álvarez, Linda, Vanessa Guzmán, Angelina Jolie, Nicole Richie, Sasha Kokol, Mary Kate Olsen and Lindsay Lohan, are some famous people that also suffered of this sickness or have passed by this situation. It’s clear that getting a thin body is the major cause of this disease, but here are otherscauses that also implicate this illness: motherhood obesity, death or sickness of somebody dear, parents divorced, failures at school and accidents.
    The general statistics show us that of each 100,000 younger women between the 15 and 24 years old, 30 to 40 of them suffer nervous anorexia each year. These quantities are increasing each more time. Almost in the 90% of cases, the patients arewomen between 10 and 29 years of old. Also, this disease can do that the 5% of the young people affected commit the suicide. During the last 20 years the nervous anorexia has increased between the women of 15 and 25 years old. Maybe these numbers aren’t high enough, but still I consider that this problem should be address before it is too late. This problem affects all of us, from the person whosuffers the disease, to their family and friends.
    The quantities are impressive, but more impressive are the ages of the persons with anorexia. When anorexia began to appear, many people thought that this disease was of “rich girls”; furthermore, this disease can affect any person including girls of nine years old. Mae Lynn Reyes Rodríguez, of Psychology Department in the University of Puerto...