Free Bang Bros Account

now modest wisst'a - (found somewhere ...)

thin, thinner, thinnest

"starving to death" "Pro-Ana "get-websites in the headlines in the mass media. But what is really behind this eating disorder? The FH-Magazine talks with interested parties.

mean

pearl bracelets in the color red anorexia, bulimia, those in purple. This indicates the wearer that it the "Pro-Ana's" heard of an Internet community whose purpose in life is the eating disorder.
The word "Ana" means anorexia: the medical term for anorexia. Pro-Ana's rise thinness, so size zero - the equivalent of the German dress size 32 - the desirable goal. The girls who visit these sites on the Internet starve together for the bet to come close to that supposed ideal. Ana and her sister Mia (the acronym stands for bulimia addiction bulimia) sound here so do not like names of basically life-threatening diseases, but more like good friends.


"Pro-Ana's," as members call the forums themselves of anorexia are not always recognizable as such. Some wear a red bead bracelet. Or they use symbols with elves, fairies and butterflies. But most girls and young women who meet regularly on a pro-Ana sites act in real life quite "normal." The pudgy from the lecture at the university or the petite redhead whose dress is always a bit too large for her thin body, could be two members of such a forum. Not all users must necessarily be underweight. The inclusion criterion for a Pro-Ana Forum is not underweight, but the attitude towards eating disorders. (All names and pseudonyms of the author) "Silk" is a member of such a web forum. It reports to the FH-magazine about her illness: "Being Pro-Ana means for me to have another way to deal with my eating disorder. I know I have an illness, but I have decided not to fight it right now, but to live with it. "


The Ana forum as a retreat


Contrary to popular opinion, the media is in such forums the eating disorder but not glorifying a lifestyle. The so-called "10 commandments" (for example: "If I'm not thin, I can not be attractive" or "thin is more important than good health") appear at first glance to outsiders like a macabre perversion of the cult of slenderness. Nevertheless, the members are well aware that they are sick and really need professional help. But the Pro-Ana Forum is often the only place where young girls are honest about their problems and worries can and feel understood. In real life, lacking in most social contacts and few can talk about their eating disorder and outside of the strictly protected forum. "Silke" writes about her life forum: "We are not deluded sect. Most of us lead a normal life doomed from outside. . Must be so here also arise normal friendships, but in the context that one lie is not nothing to conceal and hide "your friend" Sky Flower "she agrees," My forum means to me an awful lot, because it is the only place which I really, I 'may be. I can man confide everything here. The forum helps me to feel not so alone and it is an incredibly comforting feeling that people here always has to be there for a ". The 18-year-old "Crying Tear" from Austria has even met her best friend on a pro-Ana site.


spend several hours most of the Pro-Ana's Daily in its forums. In addition to the eating disorders is of course also discusses about everyday things. As in a good personal friend tells "Skinny" proud of how she met her new boyfriend, or "Teardrop" and "Sky Flower" chat on the results of the World Cup: Germany was the best team just yet, there is agreement.


Lifestyle Pro-Ana?


-media "horror stories" like "The Hunger delusion on the Internet" (Journal Laura, March 2005), "thinness as a lifestyle" (ZDF, 2006), or "starving to death" (Frankfurter Rundschau, January 2007) are in the eyes of the affected users "nonsense". This would be "drawn in the public a false picture" and "even more young girls in the Ana-cult involved," says "lonely_dancer. The 19-year-old schoolgirl and her friends from the forum are aware of the dangers of Ana aware, and never want to make advertisement for eating disorder: "If someone is too thin in our forum, we encourage those to do a treatment and assistance to . fetch While there is an 'Ana-till-the-end-range' to die, but I will not at my Ana. . For me it is and remains a disease, not a lifestyle "



book:" Ana's Girls "describes the hungry world. Photo: Teresa boxes Bauer

The condemnation of the Pro-Ana community through the media and the closing the forums by the operator welds the Pro-Ana's only closer together. They are a tight-knit community that outsiders rarely in itself can be approached.

The goal of most girls in such forums is to be healthy and live a normal life. What advice "lonely_dancer 'relatives, who fear that could be her daughter or girlfriend Pro-Ana? "Talking to her, listen and try to raise understanding for their situation. For that we want most, but so rarely get it out of our forum. And please, dear journalist, write the same way in your online magazine.

As long as these girls have any friends in the have real lives, they will be in the Pro-Ana-world on the Internet at home. The anorexics offer support, friends to be found outside of the web forums would therefore be a first step, hear their cry for help and help them achieve a healthy and happy life.