Saturday, June 28, 2014

Activity Anorexia

As I read the chapters and information needed for quizzes (going back and checking my answers after first attempt) and what not, I noticed something that sounded familiar.  Anorexia Nervosa. Can seem weird knowing the medical term for anorexia, however my ex had suffered from bulimia, and it sparked me to learn a bit about eating disorders. I never heard of Activity Anorexia, probably because it exists in a control for rats. everything seemed to make sense and then it hit me. When I was in Iraq a fellow soldier had lost weight  (about 15 lbs) and as the medic I had taken notice and brought it up to him a few times. He however wasn't in my platoon so the other two medics and I took a chance by just telling his squad leader that he should stay behind for a few days as the patrols had become pretty monotonous. Same thing day in day out. They were gone for a few hours came back and rested went out again came back and rested and so on. This was normal for us, however usually we were out for certain amount of times to prevent patterns, which seemed different from the story of the rats.  I didn't think anything of it at the time because I wasn't knowledgeable beyond my own training and what the more experienced medics told me.  One of them mentioned that he could have an eating disorder or he wasn't getting enough sleep.  After a brief meeting with his superiors the other medic assigned to his platoon requested that not only did he stay behind but gave him some meds (basically tylenol pM) to help him sleep.  We did this for 4 days, which I NOW belief may have broken the pattern his body faced in only having a certain amount of time to eat and rest.  Subconsciously I would hypothesise that he suffered from activity anorexia.

Please if anyone has input feel free.

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