I recently came across a research article discussing a phenomena (possible 'disorder') called drunkorexia. The term and what it means caught me off guard and to be honest, disturbed me. It disturbs me for a couple reasons. The first is that I am loathe to think that my advising persons - as a public health educator - to consider how they spend their calories in a given day might in some way suggest that I think people should drastically cut their calories in order to 'fit in' highly caloric (and dangerous) binge drinking. Of course, I expect that the primary audience for my blog and YouTube channel are not mostly college aged females - the group that engages in this behavior the most - and is instead, people doing their best to consume the right amount of calories to keep themselves at a health promoting weight. So when I say that I personally consider the 1 beer, glass of wine or alcoholic beverage (~ 100 cals) in my daily total, and thus have a smaller lunch or breakfast in order to have that drink, I am NOT advocating skipping meals or 'starving' in order to 1) drink on an empty stomach for a quicker high or 2) or to consume 500 or more calories in alcohol and not gain weight.
I am also concerned when people medicalize/diagnose behaviors, like the dumb one I just described, into psychological problems - at least too quickly. Labeling people, in my experience as a social worker (not a psychiatrist/psychologist or nutritionist), too soon or maybe at all, can cement the problem; the person becomes the problem - the illness manifests because someone said it was there.
My area of expertise and research is not eating disorders. The main point of this post, and the point I will reiterate and end with is: being smart about the calories you consume does not include - never includes - not eating. It is easy to reduce a breakfast and or lunch by 50 to 100 calories by changing its ingredients. I do not advocate any of the behaviors associated with this 'drunkorexia.'
