Orthorexia nervosa is an eating disorder that begins with good intentions. Many associate its roots to clean eating - a healthy eating trend that originally targets reducing or eliminating toxic, unhealthy food items and practices from day to day meals.
Clean eating has aided hugely in addressing the rising cases of such health problems as obesity, heart diseases and diabetes. Diets that involve organic, raw, green foods - and recently Buddha bowls and plant-based food and ingredients - are commonly found in a clean eater's diary.
The dietary practice becomes a problematic, even life-threatening mental disorder when an individual takes the practice and guiding principles too far and experiences negative mental and emotional repercussions in relation to slipping from, or skipping, clean eating. Celebrity chef Nigella Lawson stated the issue of problematic clean eating quite succinctly: "I think behind the notion of 'clean eating' is an implication that any other form of eating is dirty or shameful."
Dr. Steven Bratman, who developed the term orthorexia nervosa as recently as 1996, describes his own experience: "I pursued wellness through healthy eating for years, but gradually I began to sense that something was going wrong. The poetry of my life was disappearing. My ability to carry on normal conversations was hindered by intrusive thoughts of food. The need to obtain meals free of meat, fat, and artificial chemicals had put nearly all social forms of eating beyond my reach. I was lonely and obsessed. ... I found it terribly difficult to free myself. I had been seduced by righteous eating. The problem of my life's meaning had been transferred inexorably to food, and I could not reclaim it."
Health blogger Jordan Younger experienced this disorder similarly: "I started cutting out a lot of different types of fruits and then different types of nuts, and then quinoa and all kinds of grains. At one point I was just eating green vegetables."
"It was hard on everyone around me because we couldn't just go to a restaurant and enjoy the night and go out from there. It was like, 'Can Jordan eat anything here? Probably not.'"
Although Orthorexia nervosa is not yet part of the traditional clinical diagnoses offered in most clinics and medical establishments, as with anorexia nervosa and other eating orders Orthorexia can be addressed by much-needed counselling and therapy and a return to healthy, balanced eating habits.
Lawson gives this advice: "I think that food should not be used as a way of persecuting oneself and I think, really, one should look to get pleasure and revel in what's good rather than either think, 'Oh no, that's dirty, bad or sinful' or that 'eating is virtuous.'"
Besma Whayeb writes on The Huffington Post: I also want to add here that self-diagnosis is always a tricky business, so if you do feel like you're falling victim to orthorexia nervosa, please seek assistance from a doctor, or speak to someone you trust about how you really feel."
