Project «Who's that in the mirror?»

Project carrier

•	Association PET PLUS
•	"Dr.Andrija Štampar" Institute of Public Health, Health Promotion Service Institutions supporting the project

Institutions that support the Project

•	City Office for Health, Labour, Social protection and War Veterans
•	Ministry of Health and Social Welfare
•	Ministry of Science, Education and Sports

Project overview

The “Who's that in the mirror?“ project is a food dependency prevention project - anorexia, bulimia and unspecified eating disorders. The Project is intended for secondary school students in Zagreb. Students who re partaking in the project will attend 10 consecutive workshops. Up to now, 500 students has been a part of the project.

Schools that took part in the project (2009-2011): I gymnasium, VII gymnasium, IX gymnasium, X gymnasium, XVIII gymnasium, Classical gymnasium, The Lucijan Varanjanin gymnasium, Gornjogradska gymnasium, First economy school, The Slava Raškaj Centre for Education and Upbringing, Secondary Economy School and Vrbovec gymnasium.

The “Who's that in the mirror?“ WORKSHOPS – content covers topics related to shaping the female identity, gaining self-confidence, rejecting female beauty stereotypes created by the media, improving nutritional habits, developing a positive relationship with their body, etc.

FORUM – The Association PET PLUS and the "Dr.Andrija Štampar" Institute of Public Health are regularly holding public discussions with the leading experts in eating disorders and with the celebrities participating as guest speakers.

The project was recommended by the Education and Teacher Training Agency of the Croatian Ministry of Science, Education and Sports.

THE RESULTS INSPECTION – has shown the high efficiency of the “Who's that in the mirror?“ program. Statistics show that after participating in the workshops, the participants have gained higher self-esteem, started putting less emphasis on the role of thinness in living a good life, and to a much lesser degree perform actions related to developing eating disorders (self-induced regurgitation, misuse of laxatives, following drastic diets, obsessive exercise, daily weighing, etc).

Anorexia, bulimia, compulsive overeating
Food is necessery for life and eating disorder is hard to diagnose. Anorexia, bulimia, and compulsive overeating are no longer womens „secret disease“ and public is more open to talk about this subject in the past few decades. Psyhologicaly, food addiction is connected with the lack of self esteem, lack of feeling safe and having no self control, tendency to depression, mood changes, fellings of frustration. The facts shows that in European countries and USA next to Alcoholics Anonymous and Drug Addict Anonymous there are groups called Food Addict Anonymous. Eating disorder usually affects women. 20% of young women age 16-25 in Great Britany have eating disorder and also 65% of women between 25 and 45 years old ( Croatian statistics are similar).

People usually develop eating disorder in their childhood or adolescence – in Croatia 50% of girls population are on diet, 1-3% have anorexia and 3-5% have bulimia. The shocking fact is that a a young girls are preoccupied with their appearance, for example in Croatian primary schools (8% of 11-years old girls were „on diet“. The most vulnerable group are girls adolescence age (14-17) in urban cities.

Psychologicaly, people with eating disorder also have a lack of self-esteem. Disease is an attempt to avoid physical revulsions in adolesence and food addiction is an attempt to avoid social demands in adolescence. Girls are feeling insecure during adolescence changing, they feel different because their body is changing and they think that they need to keep those changes under control so they refuse to eat, go on a diet, exercise, etc. In other cases girls with compulsive overeating problems are trying to repress strong emotions such as insecurity, disturbance and sorrow. These girls are inclined to self-harming because physical pain in overeating or self-harming is easier than emotional pain.

Social factor – social factor in food addiction is conected with cultural concept of beauty and thin figure is usually one and only criteria of beauty. Media take very important part in this issue, they are sending to young girls massage that with thin body comes success, career, love, respect and happiness. Girls today are bombarded with all kinds of messages such as weight loss, diet, plastic surgery and working out, which implies that womens body is an object. Real female bodies became almost invisible in media and young girls judge themselves through cosmetic and fashion industry.

Symptoms of anorexia:

• weight loss under 85% of expected weight (Body Mass Indeks BMI≤17,5)
• strong feeling of getting weight despite of loosing weight
• disturbed body image
• balancing weight and self worth – If I am thin – I am worth, If I am fat – I am worthless
• denying health problems that are related with thinness
• absence of menstrual cycles

Symptoms of bulimia:

• Frequent attacks of overeating that include intake of large amounts of food in very short period of time. In this attack a person is loosing control and feels unstoppable.
• Risky behaviours that prevent getting weight such as vomiting, use of laxatives, diuretics, enemas, starvation and excessive excercise
• Overeating followed by different forms of „cleaning“ usually two times a week through three months
• Person valuate themself through body weight and body figure (I am only worth if I am thin)
• Attacks of bulimia disorder are not necessarily happening juat during the anorexia nervosa

Symptoms of compulsive overeating:

• episodes of overeating
• overeating is related with three or more of following phenomenons:
• eating faster than usual
• a person is eating untill it feels nuisance
• a person is not hungry but still eating large amounts of food
• a person is feeling embarrassed and is usually eating alone
• suffering is associated with overeating
• overeating is usually two days a week during the period of six months
• overeating is not related with usual „ cleaning“ ( vomiting, laxatives, etc.)

If you recognize or know anyone with these syptoms please contact us at Net + Association. Net + Association is providing consultation group for people with eating disorders.
Contact us on: 01 4840 619; 01 4828 401 or E-mail: pet.plus@petplus.hr