As healthy living becomes a trend, more and more people are pursuing healthy eating and a perfectly balanced diet. However, extreme perfection in pursuit of a healthy life sometimes causes disease. That’s what ‘healthy food obsession’ is all about. Obsession with health leads to blind concern, which eventually causes problems in daily life such as eating disorders.
Dietary restrictions aimed at improving health can lead to adverse health outcomesㅣSource: Getty Image Bank
Looking for only ‘healthy food’ is also a disease, ‘Orthorexia Nervosa’
The scientific name for healthy food obsession is Ortheoexia Nervosa. It has been called various names such as ‘healthy food greed’ and ‘unhealthy food avoidance’, but it has not yet been classified as a mental disorder.
The word ‘orthorexia’ is a combination of the Greek ‘orthos’ meaning ‘correct’ or ‘accurate’ and ‘orexis’ meaning ‘hunger’ or ‘appetite’. It is a concept proposed by American surgeon Steven Bratman in 1997, meaning that dietary restrictions aimed at improving health can paradoxically lead to unhealthy consequences.
Orthorexia Nervosa, a type of eating disorder, refers to an excessive obsession with healthy eating habits, and has emerged as a new type of eating disorder that threatens the health of modern people along with anorexia. Orthorexia Nervosa is excessively preoccupied with eating healthy food, which can lead to underweight or an imbalanced effect, so caution is needed.
Strict diet management rather causes malnutrition, osteoporosis, and anemia.
People with orthorexia nervosa have severe self-restrictions on what they eat, such as excessive analysis and judgment of calorie counts and food ingredients.
They have an excessive rejection or aversion to foods that are generally considered unhealthy, such as meat, seasonings, processed foods, genetically modified organisms (GMOs), gluten-containing foods, salt, and sugar. They seem obsessed with practicing healthy eating habits, and feel guilty if they eat food that deviate from the standards they set for themselves.
However, eating habits that focus on a few healthy foods can easily lead to nutritional imbalance. Eating a variety of foods is as important as avoiding unhealthy foods. However, people with orthorexia nervosa only choose foods that they think are healthy, and this results in them missing out on a variety of nutrients. As a result, it becomes rather unhealthy, which is affected emotionally, such as deterioration of physical function and consequent decrease in self-esteem. Furthermore, it can interfere with interpersonal relationships, such as academic or work life.
People with orthorexia nervosa usually think of low-calorie, high-fiber foods as healthy, and believe that only expensive, organic foods are beneficial to their health. However, making up a diet centered on these foods is also a kind of unbalanced diet, and there is a risk of nutritional imbalance, osteoporosis, and anemia. No matter how good it is, biased eating habits can adversely affect your health. Since each person’s constitution and circumstances are different, it is beneficial for health to eat foods that are suitable for oneself.
Eat a variety of foods to avoid nutritional imbalances
According to a study by researchers at York University in Canada, published in the scientific journal Appetite, “Orthorexia nervosa is more likely to appear in people who have had an eating disorder in the past or who have a strong obsessive-compulsive tendency, and overly obsessive-compulsive.” Actions rather lead to side effects such as underweight and nutritional imbalance.”
The research team analyzed the association between orthorexia nervosa and psychosocial risk factors to investigate which risk factors created an environment vulnerable to orthorexia nervosa. As a result, it was found that psychological and social factors acted as the biggest factors.
The researchers found that other eating habits, such as vegetarianism, could also be a trigger for orthorexia nervosa, and that it was more common in women than men. The researchers argued, “As orthorexia nervosa causes serious physical and mental problems, it should be considered as an eating disorder along with anorexia and bulimia.”
In order to alleviate the symptoms of orthorexia nervosa, it is important to eat more than 40 kinds of food ingredients a day by adjusting the balance of carbohydrates, fats and proteins, and to regularly consume an appropriate amount even in a normal diet.
In our daily lives, it is almost impossible to completely avoid processed foods, meat, refined grains, foods with artificial sweeteners, and foods grown using pesticides. That’s why you should shake off the obsession that you shouldn’t eat these foods, and have a comfortable mind.
Even if you are not in the food industry, you should refrain from preparing information about certain foods for more than 3 hours a day, and you need to improve your eating habits rather than blindly believing in certain eating habits.
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