Wasted Lives: In Italy, 300 adolescents suffer from drunkorexia.

La drunkorexia It is a pathological behavior that combines voluntary food restriction (skipping meals or drastically reducing calories) with alcohol abuseThe aim of those who practice it is often “save” calories to be able to drink without gaining weight.

In practice: you eat little or nothing during the day and then you drink a lot of alcohol, risking malnutrition, alcohol intoxication and serious health problemsUnfortunately, the phenomenon is spreading rapidly in Italy and now affects 300 adolescents, mostly between the ages of 14 and 17, 80 percent of whom are female.

Who strikes

Extremely thin, if not skeletal, and drunk. Teenage girls afflicted by drunkorexia they drink to lose weight, but at the same time they lose weight to drink: a vicious cycle that allows them not only to keep their fear of gaining weight under control but also to exorcise the insecurities typical of adolescence and better experience social relationships with their peers. A madness, that of drunkorexia, which It comes from Anglo-Saxon countries and mainly from the world of fashion. As Emanuele Scafato, head of the National Observatory on Alcohol at the Italian National Institute of Health, points out: "Models were the first to discover that drinking can help you lose weight, providing a sense of satiety and the minimum calories needed to survive, thus avoiding nutrients. At the same time, having fasted beforehand, they can allow themselves to drink during various events, without fear of gaining weight." This craze, however, has become particularly widespread even among young girls who don't model but who, at that age, would love to be like those models.

The causes

Drunkorexia also arises from some rituals that have now entered the lifestyles of the new generations.

• La smartphone addiction which is combined with the consumption, on an empty stomach, of alcoholic beverages and spirits.
• The cult of thinness.
• Eating disorders pre-existing (anorexia, bulimia, calorie restriction).
• Peer pressure: desire to fit into drinking groups.
• Ease of access to alcohol and environments where consumption is common (parties, clubs).
• The aperitif, or even the apericena: which then means drinking a lot and eating little.

But why is drinking on an empty stomach worse than drinking with meals? Food ingested with alcohol reduces its toxic effect and increases its absorption. Hence the weight gain that occurs when you drink heavily and combine alcohol with food.

Binge drinking

Binge drinking among young people is increasing exponentially il rischio di ictus hemorrhagic or ischemic in early adulthood, both in terms of the amount of alcohol consumed and the duration of the excess. These are the conclusions reached by researchers at the University of Seoul, led by Eue-Keun Choi, in a study published in the journal neurology. The study was extensive, which makes it even more reliable: it involved, for six years, 15 million young people between the ages of 20 and 30, most of whom were heavy drinkers (drinking at least 15 grams of alcohol per day). Those who had consumed alcohol for at least two years had a 20 percent increased risk of stroke compared to non-drinkers and a 19 percent increased risk compared to those who drank moderately. After three years of heavy drinking, the risk rose to 22 percent, and after four years of heavy drinking, it rose to 23 percent.

Symptoms

Unfortunately, it is quite rare for the disease to be recognized in time. Sometimes it happens that one notices the malaise of the girl only when she becomes so malnourished that she needed a feeding tube or worse when it ends in an alcoholic coma.

The only symptoms we can consider valid warning signs for drunkorexia are quite similar to those of binge drinking. Specifically:

• Threw up
• Irregular and labored breathing
• Mental confusion, loss of clarity and memory
• Anxiety or guilt food or alcohol related
• Mood swings, irritability or depression.

The damages

Aside from the main damage, which is concentrated in the liver area, drunkorexia also causes other damage. Specifically:

• Malfunction of the stomach's entry and exit valves
• Problems with sexual function of man and the regularity of the period of the woman
• Memory loss
• Ulcers
• Risk of internal bleeding
• Poor functioning of the muscular system

Prevention

• Do not consume alcohol, not even a sip, before the age of 18. and preferably little or nothing before age 25
• Intervene at the first symptoms, still in the phase of discomfort, when the adolescent often skips meals and eats in a listless and irregular way
• Make sure you check your weight
• Consult with an experienced professional
  
• In the meantime, try to convince the teenager to do a lot physical exercise and some sport he can become passionate about
• Give alternatives to a sedentary lifestyle.

Read also:

• How are anorexia and bulimia treated?
• Orthorexia: Causes, Symptoms, Remedies, and Prevention
• Pet therapy for anorexia and bulimia