Living With Food: The Science Supporting Eating Disorder Treatment

There are a great number of therapists and programs that treat eating disorders. Since there is no national qualification to be an expert, it is crucial that the patient and family know if therapy is working as soon as possible.

When you first meet a therapist or talk to a program, find out why they think they know how to treat eating disorders. If they say they’ve had training, ask where and when their training was obtained. If they say they have treated other patients, ask how many and if the therapist has tracked their progress. Training and experience are crucial. Expert care for eating disorders is almost always needed to see improvements.

It is important to remember that all effective eating disorder therapies involve changes in behavior. If treatment for your eating disorder is working, your eating disorder behaviors should be lessening. The behaviors that should be decreasing may include:

• Restriction
• Binging 
• Purging 
• Over-exercise
• Pill use 

People may be surprised to learn that talking about your family and the cause of your eating disorder are not effective ways to reduce behaviors. These are things to discuss after your behaviors have ceased. Because nobody really knows what causes an eating disorder, therapies that look for causes before symptoms are under control are likely to be ineffective. If you are being told that you have to know why you have an eating disorder before it will get better you probably are not getting effective therapy.

Next week: The importance of getting treatment early on. 

Contributions by Sarah Emerman