Up to 50% of LGBTQ+ youth report having an eating disorder. The sobering statistic from Accanto Health, a national healthcare company treating eating disorders, mirrors the fact that LGBTQ+ people of all ages have higher incidences of eating disorders than heterosexual people.
The stats are particularly bad for transgender people, according to Ambre Emory-Maier, a certified yoga teacher with training in trauma and restorative education. Emory-Maier works with The Emily Program, an eating disorder treatment and education organization that’s a subset of Accanto Health.
“If you are a transgender college student, you have a four times greater chance of having disordered eating,” she said.
LGBTQ+ individuals are also less likely to get help for their eating disorders due to healthcare discrimination.
“There are barriers for care,” said Emory-Maier, who is also an assistant professor of dance at Kent State University and will present on this topic on February 28 at KSU’s LGBTQ+ Center. “There’s discrimination in the healthcare system. We are living this every day here in Ohio. And oftentimes providers that we’re working with don’t always have a lot of training in identifying and treating eating disorders.”
While there’s no available data correlating Ohio lawmakers’ seemingly non-stop onslaught of anti-trans legislation with incidences of eating disorders, it’s no secret that anti-LGBTQ+ legislation negatively impacts youths’ mental health. Furthermore, in Ohio, access to safe, LGBTQ+ affirming healthcare is difficult to find outside of major urban areas.
“From my own experience in working with patients that have eating disorders, there is bias in healthcare against the LGBTQ+ community,” said Emory-Maier. “Often eating disorders go hand-in-hand with other mental health conditions such as anxiety, depression or OCD. I think that all comes together for people that are suffering and creates a situation where they’re not getting quality care unless they’re in a large urban area.”
Emory-Maier pointed out that disordered eating is a form of complex biological-based mental illness that can stem from a variety of things—including genetics, one’s environment and psychological experiences like trauma, as well as external factors like body dysmorphia triggered by unrealistic beauty standards. And they’re by no means limited to female-identifying people.
But it’s not all doom and gloom —recovery from eating disorders is possible with professional help. The Emily Program offers residential and outpatient treatment in Cleveland and Columbus, as well as virtual treatment. Emory-Maier suggested a multimodal approach to treatment that can range beyond medication and behavioral therapies and include work with a specialized dietitian, movement, yoga, sleeping well, meditation and stress management.
“Just like anything else from a mental health condition standpoint, we need to remove the stigma [around eating disorders] so folx can get help,” she said. “We need to value people; we need to focus on health, not body types. And be aware of the systemic discrimination that happens in healthcare in general for the community.” 🔥
IGNITE ACTION
- Ambre Emory-Maier hosts an LGBTQ+ Eating Disorder 101 session on February 28 from 4–5 p.m. at the LGBTQ+ Center at Kent State University. For more information, contact Ken Ditlevson at kditlevs@kent.edu.
- For more information on eating disorders in the LGBTQ+ community, visit The Emily Program’s blog.
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