Marla Guloien, 21, sees them every day. The svelte professionals
who come in and pound the stairmasters and treadmills
like relentless Energizer bunnies. They're the exercise-obsessed
folk who frequent Kitsilano Workout, a gym in one of Vancouver's
most trendy neighbourhoods, where Ms Guloien works as
a sales rep. And they keep going and going.
"We have a lot of people here who
work out every day, and some twice a day," she observes.
"It's very common here for fitness to be a huge part
of their life — to the point where it consumes
their life."
UNHEALTHY
BEHAVIOUR
In a society where weight has become a national issue
— according to the Canadian Fitness and Lifestyles
Research Institute's most recent survey in 2002, 33%
of Canadians aged 20 to 64 are classified as overweight
— it can be difficult to understand that what Ms
Guloien describes isn't healthy behaviour.
But some in the medical field are
starting to worry that the pressure to get healthy and
be thin could be leading to health problems more serious
than carrying a few extra kilograms. These can include
stress fractures and overuse injuries, amenorrhea and
longterm effects like arthritis and osteoporosis. In
fact, exercise obsession — also known as anorexia
athletica or exercise bulimia — is being recognized
by many as a psychological disorder with its own unique
symptoms.
Dr Kathleen Martin Ginis is an
associate professor of health and exercise psychology
in the Department of Kinesiology at McMaster University
who has researched compulsive exercising. She explains
that while there are not yet any definitive criteria
for diagnosing exercise obsession, researchers do agree
that it's distinct from eating disorders, and manifests
itself behaviourally, psychologically, and physiologically.
"We're talking about people who
exercise every day, in sickness, in health, injured,"
she says. "They exercise at the expense of social relationships.
From the psychological perspective they're often not
enjoying it, because it's often motivated purely by
trying to avoid guilt or trying to get back a euphoria
or pleasurable state that they've experienced in the
past."
ADDICTED
TO EXERCISE?
If these compulsives don't get their fix, says Dr Ginis,
"they might have sleep disruption, experience a lot
of heightened physiological symptoms, like sweats and
a pounding heart, often in the same way that drug addicts
will describe what they feel unless they get a fix."
But is it addiction? The jury's
still out on whether these physiological symptoms are
the result of a true addiction to the endorphins released
during exercise — sometimes called 'runner's high.'
Some researchers insist compulsive exercising is a way
of having control over their lives — much like
eating disorders (the two disorders are frequently linked).
However there are those who relieve the strain of high-pressure
careers through compulsive exercising. Dubbed 'stressorexics,'
they have looked for perfection in their jobs, not found
it, and taken out the ensuing frustration at the gym.
For doctors concerned that a patient
may be taking fitness to the extreme, Dr Ginis cautions
that it is not necessarily the amount of exercise that
a person does, but how they think about the exercise
that is the most important indicator of a problem.
"If you see patients exercising
a lot, don't take that as a red flag," she advises.
"Probe it a little further. Make sure that the exercise
isn't interfering with other aspects of their lives,
and that they're not exercising if they're injured.
If they think about exercise at all costs, despite injuries,
despite family and work obligations, that's the number
one sign of a problem."
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