Coined by Dr. Steven Bratman in 1997, orthorexia nervosa, is a condition characterized by fixation with healthy eating. It is often described as "a disease disguised as a virtue."
Orthorexia Nervosa and other disorders like anorexia and bulimia are different. With orthorexia, patients do not want to become thin; in fact, sufferers are motivated by a desire to be well, and to consume pure, "clean" foods. Anorexia and bulimia are characterized by the desire to achieve the ultimate figure.
New York food blogger Jordan Younger is a believer of "clean eating" and she propagated the idea among her social media followers. But instead of glowing with health, Younger realized that she was becoming lethargic and anxious about her routine. Younger would start panicking when confronted with a situation that didn't fit in with her self-imposed rules or when faced with the prospect of eating a meal she hadn't planned.
"I had developed many fears surrounding food. I was becoming more and more limited in what I was comfortable eating. I even joked about it with friends, calling certain foods, like eggs, 'fear foods' because I had stayed away from them for so long. It was easy to hide behind the shield of veganism when I was at a restaurant with friends or even grocery shopping for myself. Anything not clean, oil-free, sugar-free, gluten-free and plant-based I dismissed because it wasn't within my dietary label," Younger told The Independent.
A bout of illness that left her unable to walk led to TV presenter Carrie Armstrong from Newcastle, becoming orthorexic. "The only thing I could control was what I put in my mouth. You get a physical high from restriction - I was craving purity. I cut out meat, then dairy. I went vegan, but I wasn't seeing the miraculous results I'd expected," said Armstrong, according to 790 Talk Now. "I switched to a raw food diet, then just fruit. By the end I was only eating organic melon. I was six stones, my teeth were crumbling and my hair was falling out. I didn't control food, food controlled me. Imagine being terrified of food - it consumed me for eight years."
"Orthorexia eventually reaches a point where the sufferer spends most of his time planning, purchasing and eating meals. The orthorexic's inner life becomes dominated by efforts to resist temptation, self-condemnation for lapses, self-praise for success at complying with the self-chosen regime, and feelings of superiority over others less pure in their dietary habits. It is this transference of all life's value into the act of eating which makes orthorexia a true disorder," wrote Bratman in his 1997 essay, published in Yoga Journal, reported the Daily Mail.
Though not yet recognised as a disease in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), experts feel that due to the similar emphasis on control and ritual, orthorexia could be linked to obsessive-compulsive disorder.
