eating disorders and asperger's / autism

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Hi Everyone,
Just wondering if anyone can tell me if eating disorders are common among people with autism/ asperger's?

yea i think so :0). just posted a interesting article in the news section about anorexia relates to aspergers/autism/ etc.

In my personal experience I've dealt with both.

I am a bulimic amnesiac,

I stuff myself then forget to throw up. . .

You're so funny! I remember once a classmate said, "Anorexia must a devastating, debilitating disorder. How tragic. I really feel sorry for them........I just wish I could be stricken for, you know, a couple of months or so."

I actually thought that way till I was.

It proved a little hard to shake and intensely disconcerting.

The real solution is that we quit demonizing body fat and the people who have it. . .

now

Fat is a Feminist issue is more than a title of a good book.

I think both go hand in hand, I know I was almost to the point of anorexia a couple times.

I don't know whether this is a symptom of my NOT having AS..or something...but I went from being a small child who could hardly eat, or would forget to eat....to a SERIOUS Overeater....I developed a very stong fixation/compulsioon towards food around the age of 8 or 9....and I got very fat for a while...still have issues with weight....am about 30 lbs overweight....
It also runs in my family..my dad is overweight and his mom was and so on...
My mom was more on the anorexic side when she was young.

Merle is one of the funniest and more upbeat people, her posts always bring me a smile


At a previous job I had, a girl fell sick and lost like 5 kilos (10 pounds?) in a couple of days, and looked very good after that. I remember telling her "I'd love to be sick for a week or two"

I was recently diagnosed with anorexia. My aunt and Uncle had troubles believing it though because they think the doctors mixed my eating habits with my AS. My aunt knows eating problems are common in autistics because she works with them so she is probabyly assuming I have eating problems too because of it but what does she know, she didn't raise me so she didn't see me very much when I was growing up but my mother has told her stories about me.

Thanks for the replies. I googled eating disorders/asperger's like jaydog said, and I found a Timesonline article which talks about eating disorders (anorexia, though they also mentioned bulimia) being 'the female asperger's. This actually makes sense to me, that the lack of being able to express yourself would need to come out somehow. The article was saying how they are just starting to recognize the link between the two.

Anorexia runs in my family. My dad regularly says he's fat and needs to lose half a stone, when he's fine as he is. He's never been fat, nor has any of my family. There was one member who died from it I think.

I go through phases of overeating, and under eating; my appetite just changes its mind. Luckily it doesn't affect my weight all that much. I still look in the mirror and think "ooh I could lose a few pounds", which I think is just the anorexia "gene" I picked up from my father, though luckily neither of us have actually acted on it. I'm naturally skinny (size 1-3 in the US, size 6 in the UK - depends on which places you buy clothes), and a lot of ppl in my life have told me I need to put weight on my bones. Which always annoyed me.. my bones have weight of their own.

I worry that my friend has it.. she doesn't starve herself but regularly complains about how fat she is. She's just got a bigger build than I have, and I keep saying how she can't lose bone. I think she has that body dismorphia thingy. Though it doesn't help that her boyfriend calls her "tubs".

People say Im a lovely weight and wish they could have my body.
I still think Im fat it really worrys my mum and dad
everytime I Look in the mirror I see this fat person
so everybody is worried

Thank you thank you thank you for posting this! This is interesting to me, because I was hospitalized for anorexia when I was in high school. I wondered if there was a connection to my AS in there, because I always thought the anorexia was symptomatic of a larger problem - me not being able to express my inner turmoil. The way I felt inside began to show on the outside (emotional starvation = physical starvation).

I have overcome the anorexia (it was sooooo hard) and have been diagnosed with AS since. Wow. It's amazing to me that there might be a connection.