Essay on The Three Elements of the Female Athlete Triad

Women in professional sports fits into the Sex and Power: Global Gender Inequality class because many female athletes have experienced the inequalities in a professional sports setting. Female athletes are being put down by gender inequalities, causing less females participating in athletic programs. Women athletes are being paid less than their male counterparts. Along with being paid less, female and males are receiving unequal benefits in the form of scholarship, media coverage, transportation, and stadium conditions. The professional sport’s world is filled with the obsession of body image and sexuality. Through this obsession, female athletes have been abused from the people they trust the most. There is an increasing inequality in women’s professional sports in the form of pay, sexuality, and abuse.

It is important to distinguish between normal eating and the behaviors that typify eating disorders or disordered eating. Even among those attempting to lose weight or maintain a lower percentage of body fat, normal eating is “flexible and not obsessive.” (Dunford and Doyle 455). Although athletes have a stricter nutrition plan versus the general population, their eating should actively support training through moderate levels of restraint yet should still allow for healthy eating patterns such as eating when hungry, not feeling the need to punish oneself after an indulgence through excessive caloric restriction or exercise, and the ability to participate in social events. Dunford and Doyle term this as “discipline, not…obsession” (456). While the eating disorders of anorexia nervosa, bulimia, and binge eating all have clear-cut clinical definitions, disordered eating is a more nebulous term that can define a wider array of

1,445 student athletes from multiple different Division 1 schools participated in order to see the prevalence of eating disorders in a variety of different sports. The student athletes were asked questions about their athletic involvement, eating behaviors, drug and alcohol behavior and attitudes about their body image. The first set of results showed that 16.19% of females and 12.57% of males binge ate monthly (Powers, 1996). 81% of females reported feeling out of control of eating while only 45% of males reported feeling out of control. 23.9% of females reported vomiting as a form of purging but only 5.93% of males reported vomiting. When it came to diet pills, 14.30% of women reported usage while 2.16% of males reported usage. Although males’ results were always smaller than women, they are still at rise and suffering from eating disorders. With this study it is obvious that all athletes experience demands that push them to turn to abnormal and dangerous eating patterns.

How is it fair that a men’s college basketball team is able to be transported on planes and dine on steak, while a women’s team from the same college, travels in a van and eats fast food? It’s not, but this occurs often nowadays even with laws passed preventing this type of discrimination. In 1972, Congress passed Title IX, which prohibits discrimination against girls and women in federally funded education, including athletic programs (Kiernan 3). Many schools and colleges have not been able to comply with the Title IX standards mostly because of money. Some of the problems in high schools and colleges consist of insufficient scholarships for girls, not enough coaching jobs, a lack of equipment, and a limited amount of supplies. Not only

Numerous studies have shown that athletes are more prone to developing eating disorders than nonathletes, as well as female athletes being more at risk than their male counterparts. Disordered eating is seen in athletes of all sports. (Johnson, 1994). The prevalence of eating disorders in the female athletic population ranges from anywhere between one and forty percent, depending on the athletes questioned, and the methodology used (Sundgot-Borgen, 1994). Rosen and Hough (1988) found that 32 percent of athletes practiced at least one pathogenic weight-control technique(141). A study done by Sundgot-Borgen, in 1994, controlled for the possibility that self-report data could be unreliable in numerous ways, including not informing coaches of their intentions, and assuring 100 percent confidentiality to the athletes who participated. It found that the risk for eating disorders is increased if an athlete's dieting is unsupervised, if there is an early start to sport-specific training, and/or extreme exercise (Sundgot-Borgen, 418).

Aside from having the same basic influences, men usually develop the same kinds of eating disorders associated with women. Many people think that, given the muscular appearance of the male ideal, "male" eating disorders would be different from what are considered to be "female" eating disorders. The most common eating disorders in men, however, are anorexia, bulimia and binge eating (in which the person uncontrollably eats large quantities of food but does not purge after eating), which are also very common among women who have eating disorders ((1)). Like women, men who are involved in weight-conscious sports, such as wrestling, swimming and running, are more likely to develop eating disorders than those who do not participate in such activities ((3)). The only notable difference found between men and women with eating disorders thus far is that "while women who develop eating disorders feel fat before the onset of their disordered eating...typically they are near average weight. Men are more typically overweight medically before the development of the disorder" ((3)).

Bulimia and anorexia have found their way into the sport of elite, or Olympic-level gymnastics. In a 1992 University of Washington study of 182 female college athletes, 62% of college gymnasts have practiced at least one form of disordered eating. This percentage was higher than that of any other sport. Many elite gymnasts have come forward to admit that they suffer from eating disorders. These gymnasts include: 1970 world medallist, Cathy Rigby, 1972 Olympian Nancy Marshall, 1984 Olympic medallist Kathy Johnson, 1989 junior national champion Erica Stokes and Christy Henrich.

According to Laing, “The sexualization of female athletes reduces their self-esteem and identity by dehumanizing and pressuring them into an unhealthy obsession with body image” (page: 3). This leads to the media making women self-conscious about their bodies. Athletes often hear people say of other athletes, “She is too big, she’s not muscular enough or she is too skinny about female athletes.” Because of the way in which the media portrays a particular set of females, all females tend to strive for this “perfect physique”. This can lead to serve cases like dissatisfaction with their appearance and eating disorders. Some may argue that women like the sexualized manner in which they media portrays them because it increases their self-esteem

Female athlete triad is a condition where bone loss, irregular menstrual cycles, and energy deficiency occur in athletes. Occasionally referred to as the triad, this condition is seen mostly in female athletes, although in rare cases male athletes can suffer from it as well. It occurs so often in today 's female athletes however, due to distorted body expectations, common menstrual irregularities, and the already lower bone densities of women. When these symptoms combine, it creates a very serious and life-long health risk.

         Coaches today have trained their gymnasts to maintain the so called “proper weight” that they feel is right for their athletes. Christy Henrich’s coach “claims that gymnastics and its emphasis on slimness are not responsible for Christy’s illness and death. He claims her intense drive to win contributed to her eating disorder. The gymnastic training system encourages young female athletes to keep their weight down, and many gymnasts live on diets of fruits, laxatives, and painkillers” (93). This coach’s statement is not unusual. Many gymnasts go through this kind of training throughout their gymnastics career. We have the ability to change what goes on in gyms like this one. As a lot of psychologists suggest, we as a society have to “inform” our athletes and coaches about the dangers of eating disorders. I don’t think that coaches ever talk to the athletes about the importance of healthy dieting. Most of the time they encourage them to cut down on eating, not to just reconstruct their

The interrelated factors of the female athlete triad are energy availability, menstrual function, and bone mineral density each of which develops along a continuum. Each factor may progress to a point where it is a clinical condition such as an eating disorder. The three factors may be present together and have developed in sequence, low energy availability due to low energy (caloric) intake and high energy expenditure leads to amenorrhea that leads to osteoporosis, although each of these conditions can occur independently of the others. Whether alone or in combination with each other, when energy availability, menstrual function, and bone mineral density are comprimised they represent substantial health risks for the female athlete. Low

This study reveals much about the attitudes that persist in society today regarding sport and gender. Early on, sport was created to serve men, evolving as a celebration of maleness, valuing strength, power, and competition. It idealized, promoted, and rewarded successful, elite athletes, established “the dream” as a professional career in sports, and viewed mass participation in sport as a tool to weed out the weak (Hill, 1993). In contrast, women’s sports originated to “address the expressed need for healthful exercise” (Huckaby, 1994). Unlike the competitive warrior mode

Race, gender, history and sexual orientation play major roles in women's participation in sport. Through out the history of women in sport, opportunity has increased. Many athletes and coaches are presented with the issue of sexual orientation throughout their sporting career. Regardless of sexual orientation, all female athletes are affected by heterosexism. One's racial or ethnicity background greatly shapes the experience they may have in sport. This essay explores the many issues women in sport face today.

As women, we’ve come a long way in pushing past society’s judgements, or so I thought. Within the Olympic Games, women are still not seen as equals with our male competitors but rather criticized on body image rather than talent and dedication. In the past, women were seen strictly as a reproductive purpose in life, and although now we are seen as much more, our bodies still seem to hold the most priority over everything else we have to offer. Even in things like when a woman can lift twice the weight of her own body over her head, or break world records in swimming at the budding age of seventeen we seem to be

Since the beginning of this century women like Babe Didrickson and Billy Jean King have brought female athletes into mainstream acceptance. In earlier times women had not only not been encouraged to be physical it was thought to be harmful for