Anorexia Nervosa: Not for Women Only

Ta-dum! Dave--

I wanted to have the six-pack.

--a diagnosed anorexic.

Washboard abs. Done?

Thank you. Done.

And I wanted to have no body fat because I'd get Muscle and Fitness, and there'd be all these guys, and they'd be totally cut. And I'm like, OK, that's a good thing to do.

At the worst point, your diet consisted of what?

Carrots and club soda.

Dave weighed 105 pounds when he arrived at the hospital in August 2000.

Let me get a close-up of you. Too close.

That's when his wife Jo Ann shot this home video.

That looks like a man that has been rolled over by a steamroller.

As if that's not frightening enough, Dave, who's 5 feet 7 and should weigh around 140, had been secretly scheming to get down to 98 pounds. As an anorexic, I'm sort of a failure because I didn't get thin enough.

You don't think you look emaciated?

Pfft, not even close to it.

As a scientist--

Yeah, I got my PhD last year.

--Dave, who's a researcher in Marine Microbiology at Rutgers University, realizes his thinking is irrational. But it's still a struggle to try to break the grip his eating disorder has on him.

I was having a yogurt. My wife left the room. I just dumped half of it down the sink so she would think I had the whole thing.

You know, if I haven't gained, well, I'm a bad patient. And if I do gain, I'm a bad anorexic, you know? And it just-- it's kind of a self-defeating attitude, but it's hard to break out of it.

Good morning.

At facilities like Somerset, it takes a team of therapists--

Not the graph.

--launching an all out assault--

Just make your fist tight.

--with medication, food, and therapy sessions--

This is body image group.

--to tackle the toughest cases, both men and women.

Open up your journal, and write a letter to the part of your body that you're not happy with.

It's so hard to pick when they're all so bad.

You're your own worst enemy.

Well, whatever, I still--

Back home, Dave's wife Jo Ann doesn't find any of this amusing.

Dave, will you eat some polenta?

Probably not. Ah! Monster, monster, monster!

As Dave continues to refuse food--

I'll have some water.

--Jo Ann's frustration is mounting.

It's tiring. Tiring, tiring, tiring. There's part of you that wants to get better. There's a part of you that wants to continue to restrict your eating. I don't know which part of you is talking. It was going to talk to me or--

Yeah, honey.

--or be there at any given time.

If you don't change your behavior, it's very likely you'll die.

OK, that may well be true. Death could happen, but I'm still getting some kind of validation by losing the weight.

For Dave, it takes six months of hard work at the hospital. But he has finally gained enough weight to leave, as well. He's up to a healthy 130 pounds.

Bye-bye, good luck.

A 25-pound gain.

Oh, come on.

I'm just kind of nervous to be on my own. I mean, recovery is just starting really.