Disordered Eating and Athletic Performance: Where’s the Line?

If a person severely restricts his diet and exercises for hours each day, he has an eating disorder. If another does exactly the same but it is because she wants to make the lightweight rowing team (which has an upper weight limit), she’s a committed athlete. When the two overlap, and an athlete presents with eating disorder symptoms, how do we distinguish between the demands of the sport and the illness?....

....The review found that young elite athletes are no more at risk for disordered weight concerns or weight-control behaviour than the non-athletes; however, there was a lot of variation in findings among the different studies.....

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Bethany`s Notes
Notes: Where does one draw the line between performance enhancement and dysfunction? Can an individual or a family member see the mental illness? Sometimes yet many times the athlete is to defensive to admit the illness is present. As coaches, parents, and teammates we can praise effort and not only the outcome.