Читать книгу Anxiety Toolbox: The Complete Fear-Free Plan - Gloria Thomas - Страница 37

People’s preoccupations are largely dictated by the society that they live in so it’s hardly surprising, given western society’s preoccupation with appearance, that Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD) is becoming more common. This disorder is characterized by a fixation with perceived flaws in physical appearance and the belief that these are in some way repulsive.

Like all anxiety disorders, individuals can suffer in a mild or chronic way, although to receive a diagnosis the sufferer has to experience a great deal of distress and disruption to their daily life. The disorder is thought to affect around one per cent of the population and both men and women can suffer from it. Although it often starts in the teenage years with hypersensitivity about self-image, it can also begin in midlife when we begin to age.

We construct our image of ourselves largely from what we see in the mirror. Of course very few of us like everything we see and may worry to a certain extent about the bits we don’t like, but we can usually interpret what we see fairly honestly. However, those with BDD may construct an image of themselves that is hugely distorted. With the more chronic forms of this disorder, the sufferer is preoccupied with their self-image and develops a heightened perception of their ‘deformity’. This can be intensely painful, to the point where their life becomes dominated by self-consciousness.

Anxieties about the body typically focus on unhappiness at the shape or size of body parts and can include anything from the feet to the stomach, breasts and hands. However, most anxieties apparently concern the face – noses, eyes, eyebrows, mouth, teeth and lips. Bodily hair is another preoccupation, as are birthmarks and other such imperfections.

It is thought there are a number of causes for this condition. Genetic disposition is one possibility, as this can make an individual more hypersensitive to the disorder – this is likely if another member of the family suffers in a similar way. In more general terms, the roots of a disorder like this lie with the societal expectations that we should all look a certain way. In buying into this and striving to reach those ideals, people often fall short of them and begin to look on themselves with dislike and self-loathing – and this can grow into obsession and preoccupation with the body. The only ones to gain from this are the beauty, health, fitness and dieting industries, which make a fortune out of our anxieties.

Worries and anxieties about self-image can become irrational to the extent that the person develops behaviours such as mirror checking, excessive grooming or shaving, ritual washing, skin picking and wearing wigs, sunglasses and camouflaged clothing. Undergoing plastic surgery is another aspect of this, as are disordered eating behaviours such as food aversion (which can result in anorexia) or binge eating and vomiting (bulimia nervosa), or simply binge eating that results in obesity.