Anorexia Nervosa

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Have you heard about Anorexia Nervosa? It is a serious mental health condition and potentially life-threatening eating disorder. Today, I noticed a tragic write-up about a boy named Samin who died from this eating disorder. He was only in the tenth grade. But he ended up dying from this disorder due to SOCIAL BULLYING. How pathetic! 

Social bullying is a social disease and unfortunately, it's on the rise and there's no headache to stop it. Sometimes we can not reply to those people due to the fear of breaking social relationships. But it is continuously affecting us both socially and individually. The boy who died from this disease was mocked by his pals and even teachers because of his weight. He even told his mom that he wanted to die. Imagine at the age of fifteen or sixteen, a boy is telling his mom to die! Feeling highly insulted and insecure, Samin became highly desperate to lose weight and started the keto diet. Within a very short time, he lost 40 kg weight! But soon he started suffering from an eating disorder and could not eat because he was in fear of gaining weight again and whenever he'd force himself to eat, he'd throw up. Doctors prescribed to go abroad for better treatment but it was quite tough to fly in this lockdown situation. He ended up passing away.

However, Anorexia Nervosa often involves emotional challenges, a realistic body image, and an exaggerated fear of gaining weight. In some cases, an individual may lose a significant amount of weight and demonstrate the characteristic behaviors of anorexia. It often appears during a person's teenage years or early adulthood, but it can sometimes begin in the preteen years or later in life.

But there are also fallacies about this disease. People often think of Anorexia Nervosa in connection with females, but it can affect people of any sex or gender. Research suggests that the risk of these disorders may be higher among transgender than cisgender. But, it is now crucial to talk more about this eating disorder. In Bangladesh, we can hardly find treatment for this disease but recovery is possible. Don't be panicked. 

All we need to do is stop both social and in-person bullying. We should reply to the bulliers. We should protest to stop it as early as possible. If needed, we should give lessons to our children to speak up against the bullier whoever he is. Sometimes, we step down due to the fear of breaking social norms. Because we all grew up hearing this- "Respect the elders". But if it is hard to explain to them how this bullying affects the people, then it is better to stand up against it. It should be stopped.