Anorexia is more common in women than in men but this is not to say there are not men who suffer, but there are few (no fewer than 100 cases described in medical literature before 1986).
Because there are few men who have it, has come to view women differently from anorexia. Comparisons have been made between clinical and developmental characteristics of boys and anorexic women:
The first review was in 1985 in the department of psychiatry at the University of Munich and the Max-Planch institute where the features were compared with 23 anorexic 29 anorexic. It concluded that the average age of onset is the same for both sexes. 95% of men expressed a denial of the disease, hyperactivity, ideal of thinness, weight and diet phobia. Bulimic symptoms occurred in 76% of them being regarded as restrictive as 24%. Vomiting occurred in half of patients. This symptom is equal in women but with more intensity than them, demonstrating more somatic complaints, more specific concerns, more anxiety related to sexual themes, more hyperactivity. It examined personality traits of each other and found no difference. The only other was found that the age of the mother at the birth of the patient was significantly lower in the case of anorexics. It is a fact difficult to interpret.
We conducted a second study which took place at St George Hospital in London in 1986 and compared 36 men with 102 women anorexic anorexics. It was the following:
- Fobia under the weight
- Ideal of slimness
- Average age of onset
- Socioeconomic class of source
- Characteristics of previous weight
- Duration of the disease at the time of the consultation
- Monitoring of dieting
- Order in the family, number of siblings
- Type of childhood relationships with peers
- Sexual activity premorbid
- Academic achievement
- Mental illness in parents
- Weight disorders in the family
- In some of the procedures used to combat weight gain, women use more laxatives.
- Males have practiced more sports than women.
- The controls follow-up between 2 and 20 years after the consultation seems to point to a more optimistic results in men, but without reaching significant differences.
There is an apparent existence of a sex ratio and more specifically of homosexuality in men anorexic.
In clinical practice shows that the male anorexic but that “being thin” want “not fat”, why care about get some muscles to “impress the girls.” Adolescent boys also experience a lot more social pressure to strenuous exercise, assuming and practicing what has been called “physicality”.
In short, while teenage girls, while in pursuit of thinness, are concerned about the manner of dress, cosmetics, hairdressing, the use of costume jewelry / jewelry … adolescent boys engaged, preferably in the construction and shaping of your body.
Noteworthy in the topic of male anorexics the use of anabolic steroids. These products, derived from testosterone, were administered to German soldiers during World War II. This was intended to increase their aggressiveness and their “fighting spirit”. Probably it was the first application of these substances outside the medical clinic. Following this were the athletes who ingest steroids began to develop non-fat tissue and increase muscle strength.
But steroids also produce these changes in the person have many negative consequences, such as hepatic cysts occur, reduce the variety of protective cholesterol, reduce sperm production and testicle size, reduce the production of sex hormones (in both sexes , etc.).
Fortunately, the use of steroids is not yet widespread practice among adolescents taking stimulants and anabolic usually to improve their musculature and athletic performance.
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