By Corwin Brown

Eating disorders afflict millions of people, thousands of which will die from them yearly. There is good news though, eating disorders can be beaten. You do not have to be a prisoner to this anymore. You have the power within yourself to beat this and you will. Recovery takes a lot of time and hard work, but in the end it is all worth it. You will finally be free and you will love yourself. When recovery happens you will be able to look in the mirror and say, "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the fairest one of all" and it will be you :)

A person with an eating disorder may have started out just eating smaller or larger amounts of food than usual, but at some point, the urge to eat less or more spirals out of control. Eating disorders are very complex, and despite scientific research to understand them, the biological, behavioral and social underpinnings of these illnesses remain elusive.

Up to 10 million teens develop eating disorders, abnormal attitudes and behaviors with foods, which include anorexia nervosa or bulimia nervosa. For most kids, eating disorders begin when they are 11 to 13 years old. While they are more common among girls, boys can experience eating disorders too. Unfortunately, many kids and teens successfully hide these disorders from their families for months or years.

Women are more likely than men to have eating disorders. They usually start in the teenage years and often occur along with depression, anxiety disorders and substance abuse.

Some research suggests that media images contribute to the rise in the incidence of eating disorders. Most women in advertising, movies, TV, and sports programs are very thin, and this may lead girls to think that the ideal of beauty is thinness. Boys, too, may try to emulate a media ideal by drastically restricting their eating and compulsively exercising.