Eating disorders are one of the most common chronic illnesses of our time. Most research focuses on the time of the actual eating disorder, which is why I have decided for my qualitative research to center on life after the eating disorder. In the theoretical section I started off by defining the term eating disorder and the different types it encompasses. I then continued to summarize findings on self-esteem, interpersonal relations and ways of treatment concerning eating disorders. Lastly, I added a chapter on synergetics, which describes the process of changing habits. In the research, I focused on individuals in Slovenia that have had an experience with eating disorders. I interviewed 10 individuals with the help of a partially standardized questionnaire and enquired about how the past experiences affected their life today. I touched on the subject of help, food, self-esteem, course and organization of the day and interpersonal relations. I found out, that there are still some strategies and habits present today, that the girls already had during the eating disorder. Each one of the girls, under different circumstances, finds herself in a situation where they wish to return to the destructive strategies and habits they once had. During these occurrences, they developed varying strategies of solving problems and protective mechanisms, which in turn enables them to avoid destructive behavior. From what I have gathered, interpersonal relations have significantly improved after the eating disorder. Help during the eating disorder however, was reported to be negatively experienced in most cases. After presenting my findings, I continued with a discussion in which I connected them with already existing research. At the end I added a chapter focusing on propositions, concerning social work and the need to implement social workers into the process of helping individuals, struggling with eating disorders.
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