THE FIGURE THAT EATS AWAY AT ME

It's Eating Disorders Awareness Week and I gave this speech last night at an Open Mic Night event last night in Vancouver. If you know someone you think may have an eating disorder, read up on the facts, have a heart-to-heart conversation and let them know you care.

1 in 10.

That’s the number equation I grew up with.

I out of 10 people was purported to be gay or lesbian. (We didn’t have the term LGBTQ or any of its incarnations back then.)

I’d sit in my high school government class and look around. So who are the other two?

Sadly, I couldn’t even count on another one, much less two.

I was alone. 1 in 10 be damned.

And this is how I grew up. Alone. Lonely. A lost lamb in search of his flock.

That was back in East Texas. I had to move to Malibu to finally feel some camaraderie. Two hundred fifty in my year at law school. Twenty-four others then? No. Two. But two more than what I was used to.

Now I deal with another fraction: 1 in 4.

Not my math. It comes from Miami, Florida, from an organization with the acronym, NAMED: National Association for Males with Eating Disorders.

1 in 4 persons with an ED is male.

I cited my source because I figured people would doubt the prevalence. Back when I first struggled with obsessive dieting and it evolved into an eating disorder, back in the time when Karen Carpenter was the only person I’d heard of having an eating disorder, the figure I read—somewhere--was 5%. 1 in 20 people with an eating disorder was male.

Even that seemed like a stretch. Back then, I didn’t know of any places where I’d find a room full of persons with eating disorders so I couldn’t check if 1 in 20 had any basis in reality. It seemed high. After all, as I began to read articles about eating disorders—the topic has long been of personal interest for obvious reasons—every “client”, “patient” or person with an eating disorder was given a pseudonym like Amy or Mary. Never Bob.

Really, how could it be 1 in 20?

But let me repeat the current figure: 1 in 4.

In fact, on the home page of the NAMED website, a study is cited and a range is given—25-40% of people with Eating Disorders are male.

Still, now that I am involved in eating disorder groups with Vancouver Coastal Health and with St. Paul’s Hospital, I look around and the figures don’t mesh with what I see.

I take tonight’s theme, I Wish You Knew, and rework it to what suits me and my journey: “I Wish I’d Known”. If it’s really 40%, or even 1 in 4, I wish I’d known someone else, another male struggling with an eating disorder.

The first case study involving eating disorders was in 1690 when Robert Morton considered one man and one woman with symptomatic behavior. 50/50. A nice start.

But over time, eating disorders became known as something women struggled with. It became gender stigmatized. Even as recently as a year ago, when I went through a Coastal Health orientation regarding the eating disorder program, I fought back tears—and some anger—when a PowerPoint slide showed the physical harm to the body that can occur due to an eating disorder. I couldn’t even take my usual stance of denying the facts. The body on the screen was that of a woman. Much of the harm mentioned was female-specific. My first exposure to eating disorders in a room of newbies—myself the only male—was a sense once again of being alone. Something was wrong with me for having an eating disorder. But something even greater was wrong with me for being the only guy. Last month, I completed a questionnaire for a University of British Columbia study about eating disorders. There were questions about how much I worried about my thighs. Nothing about any obsession with muscle mass. When the questionnaires and presentations slant toward one gender, it’s no wonder male cases are under reported.

I speak tonight to provide a male voice. I’m on a bit of a mission, you see. It’s often said that men are taught that they are supposed to handle things themselves. Be tough. Deal with it. It’s why many men resist going to the doctor for a physical ailment. The resistance—and denial—is even greater for mental health issues. Admitting that one needs help and actually seeking it out is even more challenging for a man when it involves a struggle associated with women or, when there’s also the perception that, if it’s a man, it’s a gay man (yes, like myself). (I can only debunk so much as I speak.)

I don’t think I’m saying anything earth-shattering. And I know there are many more poignant, more emotional speeches, recitations and performances tonight. But I ask you, if anyone should wonder how tonight went, that you include mention that there was a guy with an eating disorder who got up and spoke. It’s not about anything I said. It’s just getting the word out there. A guy with an eating disorder. Other guys need to know it’s not some freak occurrence. Because, if it really is 1 in 4—or, just imagine,...40%--then it should be clear to everyone here that there are a lot of guys out there who aren’t getting the help they need. And just knowing that is what got this extreme introvert of a guy itching to speak tonight. 1 in 4.

Where are they?