Do books about eating disorders hinder or help teens?

May 12, 11:09 AMSeattle Books ExaminerDanielle Dreger-Babbitt

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In February I reviewed Wintergirls and questioned whether or not teens might use the Young Adult novel about anorexia as a handbook,

My biggest concern with the book is how teens who already suffer from disordered eating or even anorexia might use this as an eating disorder “Bible” or how-to guide especially with the calorie counts of everything Lia eats her obsessive compulsive tendencies. This book is very much in the same vein as Mayra Hornbacher’s Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia and Natasha Friend’s Perfect.

Apparently I'm not the only one.  Tuesday's New York Time's Health Section had an article (based on a Sunday Book Review) about eating disorder books acting as a trigger for anorexia or bulimia.  Now the Internet is abuzz with this question.  While many reviewers and figures in the eating disorder community are quick to say that yes, these books are a problem, Jezebel argues that teen girls aren't that fragile.

I agree with both sides to an extent.  I think that books like Wintergirls or Perfect might trigger something in teens (or even adults) already suffering from a disorder body image, but the books aren't the only thing that could trigger a reaction or relapse.  Magazines (especially fitness, tabloid, and beauty), too-thin celebrities and models, and peers are also triggers.  But I think that teens not already suffering from anorexia or disordered eating reading these books might not even register anything except that it is a good read.  I would really be interested in hearing what teenage girls (or boys) have to say about Wintergirls and the like have to say about this.  Perhaps they don't think this is an issue at all.  Maybe it just serves as a cautionary tale.  Laurie Halse Anderson certainly does not glamorize anorexia.

As someone who suffered from anorexia and bulimia as a teenager I would say books about eating disorders did not serve as a trigger for me.  Then again, there wasn't quite the selection of titles as there are today.  I was exhibiting symptoms long before I ever read Best Little Girl in the World or Wasted.  For me it wasn't about body image but control.  

I will say Anderson did her homework when writing Wintergirls.  She actually submitted her manuscript to experts in the medical field to see if the book would cause a trigger.  In her podcast she said,

What their response was, was that we have a culture that glamorizes this. The docs say, Yes, the book is going to trigger people. Turning on the television triggers people — looking at billboards, going to the computer, walking past a magazine rack. But the challenge in the book they felt I had met was to show the entire story. There is nothing glamorous or lovely about an eating disorder.

I turn this debate back to you.  What do you think?  Will this book serve as a trigger or is everyone freaking out over nothing and accusing Anderson of writing "anorexia porn?"  Have you read it?  What do you think?  Leave your comments below.

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