"Männer hungern sich aus, um wie die Fotos in Magazinen auszusehen"

Bulimia, anorexia nervosa and other eating disorders, long thought to be serious problems for many women, are showing up among surprisingly large numbers of men, some of whom are starving themselves or exercising obsessively to look like the pictures in men's magazines.

(...) The stigma, isolation and confusion around suffering from what has long been perceived as a "girl's problem" can make men so reluctant to come forward that many arrive in treatment sicker than women. "For men there is still such a stigma attached to the idea of having an eating disorder and reaching out for help," said Joanna Anderson, clinical director at Sheena's Place in Toronto. "If you go for treatment and you're in a group with 10 or 12 women and you're the only man, it's very difficult to feel like you're not different."

(...) But there can be a strong cultural component as well. Men, like women, are under pressure to conform to the "ideal" body type, and for men, that body tends to be linked to perceptions of success, control and power, said Merryl Bear of the National Eating Disorder Information Centre, which has launched a poster campaign to raise awareness of eating disorders in men.

(...) Both sexes experience the illness in the same isolating, "very painful, very difficult ways," Woodside said. The difference with men is that when they tell family or friends they have anorexia or bulimia, people initially don't believe them. "They say, 'that's an illness of girls.'"

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