How Eating Disorders Affect Your Life

The effects that eating disorders have on our brains are becoming more present and alarming. Some effects are that the brain doesn’t get enough nutrients and oxygen because of the decreased heart rate. Also, nerves in your brain are damaged and cause you to have numbness in your feet. Damaged nerves can also cause seizures. Lastly, there are disruptions in the chemicals that send information from one nerve to another. A study done by Yale researchers proved that gray matter from your brain was significantly lower when a person is underweight, meaning that your brain shrinks when you have an eating disorder. Grey matter allows you to control movements, have memory, and feel emotions (“How Eating Disorders Affect”).

Eating disorders have many side effects aside from just becoming thin. After weeks of starving yourself your hair starts to fall out in chunks. Then, if you’re a woman, you will stop having a menstrual cycle. After losing your menstrual cycle, it can make it harder for a girl to have a successful pregnancy. Occasionally, the heart muscles will shrink causing a heart murmur which puts extreme stress on your body. Then, once your body has no fat left, it starts to eat away at muscle tissue and your bones become much thinner. You won’t have any energy, you’ll constantly be in a bad mood, and you’ll get very dizzy and pass out. As stated before, when your heart tissue shrinks, your actual heart size will grow and create abnormal blood flow (Harris).