PSYCHOLOGY OF
COMMUNICATION
RESEARCH PROJECT 1
Name : Agatha Gabriele Indrajaya
ID :
009201100094
Major : PR
Class 1
2012
PRESIDENT UNIVERSITY
Jl. Ki Hajar Dewantara,
Kota Jababeka,
Cikarang Baru, Bekasi
17550 – Indonesia
I.
Introduction
1.1
Case
Study
Battled with Bulimia
Mary Black, 48 years
old, battled with bulimia for several years, but finally she can found the way
to recovery. She thought her bulimia may have had its roots in her
claustrophobic upbringing. Her mother had her when she was very young and was
very strict. Mary never thought it was right to express her feelings and kept
them to herself. As a result, she grew up thinking she was never good enough.
Even at school she felt like an outsider.
She was a normal size
when she was 12 years old, but by the time she was 17 she was convinced that I
was fat and unglamorous. She started to diet but she just ended up getting
larger. She used to starve herself for three or four days, then she would binge
on anything she could lay her hands on. This was usually bread, biscuits and
cereals. Then she felt so disgusted with herself that she would make herself
sick as fast as she could in the hope that she would get rid of the food before
she had time to digest it.
"I was still
living at home and this was my secret. My parents had no idea what was going
on. Even when I went into hospital with a ruptured bile duct from vomiting so
much, I managed to explain it away as appendicitis.” said her.
By the time she was 22
she decided to go on a healthy eating regime, which I managed to stick to
for two or three years, but then the bulimia started again. She had just come
out of a relationship and was feeling pretty low generally. She also felt her
life was running away and there was no purpose to it.
She existed like this
until she was about 28 but then she met someone who was a recovering alcoholic who
suggested that she had an eating disorder. “It suddenly dawned on me that my
problems weren’t about food, but about my whole attitude to life.”
She decided to look
for help and started going to an Overeaters Anonymous (OA) Wednesday-night
meeting, which took place about 50 miles from where she lived. “It was very
helpful and provided a framework for my recovery. But I quickly realized that
if I wanted to recover I had to do it myself.” said Mary.
"I was sick and
tired of feeling sick and tired so I decided to keep a diary. At the end of
each day I wrote down what had made me feel uncomfortable and the things that
had happened that I had tried to soothe with food. As soon as I
looked back at what I had written, I realized things weren’t nearly as bad as
they seemed. Gradually I stopped whining about things in my diary and started
to write about my achievements.”
Slowly she started to
eat normally again and lose weight. She also set up a local OA meeting and has
a massive attendance each week. She now feels that she is 99% free of her compulsive
eating and she would not dream of vomiting.
She is healthier now
than she has ever been and just so grateful that her bulimia didn’t destroy her
looks. She thinks than the body does heal itself and it's never too late to
start on the road to recovery. “Nothing is permanent and my recovery process is
ongoing every day."
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