strange eating habits? Iron deficiency maybe?

May 24, 2020

Iron deficiency food cravings

Have you ever seen someone with odd eating habits? What about eating disorders? There are differences between eating habits and disorders. In this article, we are going to talk about eating habits and conditions, which may lead to iron deficiency, or they may be caused due to iron deficiency.

Eating habits:

Eating habits are the way a person or group eats, considering what types of foods are being eaten, in what quantities and when.

According to statistica, 61.58% of the UK population, are under the category “I eat everything”. Others are vegetarian, flexitarian, pescatarian or vegan.

Vegetarians are the ones whose diet involves abstaining from eating meat, fish and poultry. Flexitarians obtain a more flexible diet, eating mostly plant sourced foods, but won’t cut animal products from their diet completely. A pescatarian is someone who is a vegetarian but eats fish and seafood as well. And the vegan diet is devoid of all animal products, including meat, eggs and dairy.

No matter what your dietary habit, while you eat healthy and nutrient rich, you’re safe. However, individuals who are vegetarian are more prone to be iron deficiency due to lesser amounts of iron in plant based foods in comparison to animal based foods.

Funny eating habits

Talking about eating habits, there are some which are more specific from person to person. Likes and dislikes are part of these habits. Some of them are easy to understand and some of them are just hard to get. For example, one may break their KitKat to eat it or bite the whole thing.

In a more odd way, there are people who eat their Fries with milkshake, or chocolate bars with ketchup all over them. There are even rumours of people eating pickles with their tea.

As long as these eating habits do not have any harm to your digestive tract, they are ok to follow. But some of these eating habits may cause indigestion or stomach problems. For instance, drinking a very hot tea is a risk factor of oesophageal cancer. In another example, if you eat dairy foods with iron rich foods, you are lowering the chance of iron absorption. To avoid this problem, try iron supplements which won’t interact with other nutrient absorption and do not get affected by them.

Eating disorders

Eating disorders are a combination of mental and physiological problems. There are several factors in causing these conditions. Genetically factors, personality type, exposure to media standards, thinness for example, are some of the underlying causes of these conditions.

Now let’s take a brief look at each of these disorders:

Anorexia nervosa

Generally developing during adolescence and early adulthood, anorexia nervosa is more common in women than men. People with anorexia nervosa see themselves overweight, even though they have a normal weight or are even underweight. Individuals with anorexia nervosa are constantly overthinking about their meals, how many calories they have and they refuse to eat to keep themselves thin! The ones who are suffering from anorexia nervosa, have a great chance of having nutritional deficiencies. Iron deficiency, calcium deficiency, zinc and magnesium deficiency are some of the most common ones in this group.

Bulimia nervosa

In this kind of eating disorder, one will eat in large amounts, with no control on their eating, until they are painfully full. Then they will purge in order to relieve the pain and compensate the calorie gain. Purging techniques include forced vomiting, fasting, laxatives, diuretics, enemas and excessive exercise. In people who suffer from bulimia, because of repeated vomiting and use of laxatives, the food they have eaten will not have had enough time to be absorbed. As a result they suffer from severe nutritional deficiencies like iron deficiency..

Binge eating

Binge eating is a subtype of bulimia in which short periods of excessive eating happens. However, it does not contain purging behaviours

Pica

If someone suffers from pica, he or she would eat substances which are not considered food. For example, they may eat dirt, chalk, paper, soap, hair, detergents etc. There are different underlying causes for this matter. Aside from psychological reasons, iron deficiency is one of the main reasons of pica. That is why monitoring iron levels of someone who is suffering from pica is important.

Rumination disorder

Affecting all genders and in every stage of life, this type of eating disorder is one of the oddest types. In this disorder one will regurgitate the food they’ve recently swallowed. Then, they chew it again and either swallow it or spit it out.

What do you think about these eating habits and disorders? Fo you have a specific eating habit? Have you suffered from one of the disorders? Do you know anyone who is still suffering? In order to help yourself or your loved ones overcome these disorders, book a visit with your doctor and psychologist. Be sure you do not have any deficiencies like iron deficiency, and then with a help of a nutritionist you can have a nutrient rich diet to follow.

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