Eating Disorders and Athletes
In a sense, eating disorders are diets and fitness or sports programs gone horribly wrong. A person wants to lose weight, get fit, excel in his or her sport, but then develops obsessive thoughts about food and training, ultimately losing control and ending up with body and spirit ravaged by starvation, binge eating, purging, and frantic compulsive exercise. What may have begun as a solution to problems of low self-esteem has now become an even bigger problem in its own right.
Several studies suggest that participants in sports that emphasize appearance and a lean body (e.g., figure skating and cheer leading) are at higher risk for developing an eating disorder than are non-athletes or folks involved in sports that require muscle mass and bulk (e.g., football and weight lifting).
Eating disorders are significant problems in the worlds of ballet and other dance, figure skating, gymnastics, running, swimming, rowing, horse racing, ski jumping, and riding. Wrestlers, usually thought of as strong and massive, may binge eat before a match to carbohydrate load and then purge to make weight in a lower class.
The above paragraphs come from an article on the ANRED website. the article goes on to discuss statistics, male and female athletes, risk factors, special concerns ans specific sports such as wrestling. Here’s the link to the full article.