Legendary actress and political activist Jane Fonda has revealed startling details about her decades-long struggle with eating disorders, including bulimia and anorexia, in an interview while promoting her new film at come 80 for Brady.
“I was bulimic and anorexic” during her rise to Hollywood stardom in her 20s and 30s, Fonda, now active at 85, said in a podcast interview call her daddy host Alex Cooper. She added, “I’m becoming a starlet, and there’s so much emphasis on how you look, and that was a constant…trigger for me.”
“It seems so innocent at first,” Fonda said, adding, “You don’t realize…it becomes a terrible addiction that takes over your life.”
It wasn’t until the age of 40 that Fonda realized the consequences of her addiction. “It becomes impossible to have an authentic relationship,” she said. “When you do this in secret, your day revolves around food and then eating it, which requires you to be alone and no one to know what you’re doing. …And that happens when your life is inauthentic: When what you should do and who you should be or who you really are, those things are betrayed.”
“As you get older, the toll it takes on you gets worse and worse,” she said, adding: “It happened at a point in my 40s when I was just thinking, … ‘If I keep doing this, I’m going to die.’
Fonda gave up cold turkey at a time when eating disorders weren’t widely discussed or addressed. “I didn’t realize these were groups you could join,” Fonda said. “I didn’t know anything about it yet, and nobody was talking about it. I didn’t even know there was a word for it.”
“And so I just went cold turkey, and it was really tough,” Fonda said. “But the thing is, the more distance you can put between yourself and the latest frenzy, the better. It gets easier and easier.”
Health professionals now know a lot more about eating disorders, how to diagnose them and how to overcome them. Here’s what you need to know.
“Eating disorders are serious, complex and life-threatening mental illnesses,” according to the National Eating Disorders Collaboration in Australia. “They are characterized by disturbances in behaviors, thoughts, and attitudes toward food, eating, and body weight or shape. Eating disorders have adverse effects on life of a person and lead to serious medical, psychiatric and psychosocial consequences.”
They include special conditions such as binge eating disorder, bulimia nervosa, anorexia nervosa, avoidant restrictive food intake disorder, and other disorders “where there is some kind of behavioral disorder” says Dr. Deborah Glasofer, associate professor of clinical medical psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University.
Bulimia is characterized by uncontrolled episodes of overeating, called binge eating, followed by purging by vomiting or laxative abuse, according to Johns Hopkins medicine. “Over-purge cycles can occur anywhere from several times a day to several times a week,” the school explains. “Often, people with bulimia maintain a normal or above normal weight. This allows them to hide their problem for years. Many people with bulimia do not seek help until they are in their 30s or 50s. By then their eating behavior is deeply ingrained and harder to change.”
Eating disorders typically affect women and girls, starting in adolescence, says Johns Hopkins. But boys and men can get it too.
Up to 60% of adolescents exhibit behaviors associated with eating disorders, said Jocelyne Lebow, a Mayo Clinic child psychologist who specializes in the treatment of eating disorders. “They either don’t eat enough to allow them to grow or to allow them to have the energy to do what they need to do, which impacts their mood,” says Lebow. “It is a problem.”
“People with bulimia are more likely to come from families with a history of eating disorders, physical illnesses, and other mental health issues,” says Johns Hopkins. “Other illnesses, such as substance use disorders, anxiety disorders, and mood disorders, are common in people with bulimia.”
“While there are recognizable warning signs, what you are really looking for is change,” says Dr. Ovidio Bermudez, a psychiatrist at the Eating Recovery Center in Denver. “Change in attitudes or behaviors related to food, height, weight, really their self-perception.”
Emotional and behavioral symptoms include focus on weight loss, dieting and food control, according to the National Eating Disorders Association.
The five signs of an eating disorder include excessive dieting or a bad mood about food; excessive exercise; withdrawal from friends, family and activities that a person normally enjoys; young; and hiding food or eating only when no one is around, Lebow says.
A person may also experience weight fluctuations, gastrointestinal symptoms, menstrual irregularities, sleep problems, dental problems and immunity issues, according to the association.
Treatment should help a person change their behavior, Glasofer says. If it doesn’t, “then it’s not hitting the target it needs to hit to help you recover,” she says.
This includes modifying symptoms such as eating less restrictively, improving eating habits, and reducing the frequency of purging or over-exercising or binge eating in measurable ways, she says.
“The strongest evidence-based treatment for eating disorders is behavior-focused treatment,” says Glasofer. “So these include family treatment for teens with eating disorders, individual cognitive behavioral therapy for bulimia nervosa and binge eating. And behavior-based treatments will spend a lot of time really talking normalization of diet, normalization of weight for people who need to improve their weight to a physically healthy place.”
If you are concerned that you or someone you know has an eating disorder, consult a doctor, psychiatrist or National Eating Disorders Helpline (800-931-2237).
THE National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders also has a list of groups, resources and other services to ask for help.
