Is there really no word / phobia for a 'fear of becoming fat'?
Is there really no word / phobia for a 'fear of becoming fat'?
All I can find are things like 'Pocrescophobia' and 'Obesophobia', which don't even show up in any dictionaries from what I can tell.
Do phobias normally not show up in dictionaries?
I am a health care professional and I would like to answer your query.
Pocrescophobia or Pocresophobia is the morbid and irrational fear of gaining weight. This is also comparable to Obesophobia, the fear of becoming fat or being obese.
Yes, list of phobias normally not show up in normal dictionaries because most phobias are medical jargons. It means that it can only be seen in medical dictionaries like Taber's Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary, especially those phobia cases that are rare and uncommon. However, some list of phobias can be seen in Merriam-Webster like acrophobia, hydrophobia, and claustrophobia because the incidence of individuals with this specific type of phobia are high. Thus, including them in normally used dictionaries.
But I tell you that, you cannot find a full list of phobias in medical dictionaries. Maybe you can view some lists of phobias in the Internet but I can guarantee that those sites aren't reliable and not even recognized by the medical community. Even in medical books, there are no full list of phobias. Acrophobia, hydrophobia, pyrophobia, obesophobia, and other phobias fall in the category of Specific Phobia in most medical books.
You can visit this sites for more information about specific phobia:
- http://www.psychiatry.org
- http://www.adaa.org/understanding-anxiety/specific-phobias
- http://www.mentalhealth.com/home/dx/specificphobia.html
- http://psychcentral.com/disorders/specific-phobia-symptoms/
or download these medical books in pdf in the internet:
- Psychiatric Mental Health Nursing: Concepts of Care in Evidence Based Practice 8th edition
- Psychiatric-Mental Health Nursing 5th edition
Anorexia nervosa, often referred to simply as anorexia, is an eating disorder characterized by a low weight, fear of gaining weight, a strong desire to be thin, and food restriction.