This report contains details that some listeners might find upsetting.
Marine veteran Chandler Rand has struggled with various eating disorders since she was a child. She said she鈥檚 healthy now, but she describes her recovery as an ongoing process. She still has to fight off negative thoughts about her body image and weight.
鈥淚t's basically like walking a tightrope is what it means for me day to day,鈥� Rand said.
Back in 2016, Rand was a Marine. She was successfully treated for anorexia as a teenager, but after boot camp, she began to binge eat and became bulimic.
鈥淚 don't think I saw that as part of my eating disorder at the time,鈥� Rand said. 鈥淚 think I just saw it as part of being a good Marine.鈥�
To Rand, that meant meeting the strict military standards for weight and body fat percentages. At the same time, she was coping with a sexual assault that happened while she was in college.
She said the assault affected her eating habits.
鈥淵ou just want to obsess over something other than fear and panic or sadness and guilt,鈥� she said. 鈥淪o you try to place this moral high ground on food and fitness.鈥�
People like Rand, who develop harmful eating habits during their service, have not received much attention from the Departments of Defense or Veterans Affairs. But a by the VA in Connecticut shows that veterans experience bulimia at about three times the civilian rate.
Some develop eating disorders while they鈥檙e in the military, and others grapple with eating habits after they鈥檙e out.
Robin Masheb is a research psychologist and the founder of the Veterans Initiative for Eating and Weight. It鈥檚 one of the few programs that studies eating disorders in veterans.
鈥淚 was seeing very high rates of binge eating disorder in the veteran population, but I also wanted to know about these other disorders,鈥� Masheb said, noting that there isn鈥檛 much research available.
She said risk factors unique to military service go beyond the strict weight requirements.
鈥淧eople talked about being in very chaotic eating situations where one had to either go for a long period of time without eating anything or having to eat very quickly under certain conditions,鈥� Masheb said. 鈥淭hose types of things also seem to be risk factors for setting people up for problems with their eating later in life.鈥�
She also said veterans who were sexually assaulted are more likely to develop eating disorders.
For Chandler Rand, the ex-Marine, it was all of the above.
鈥淚 think the military environment, aside from height and weight requirements, can be a perfect storm for an eating disorder," Rand said.
She said that鈥檚 because so much of military life is based on numbers and rules.
鈥淵ou're scored on your fitness tests and your combat fitness tests, and there's point systems for conduct and proficiency and the rifle range,鈥� Rand said. 鈥淵ou always want to be in that perfect score range, and so to me, that was just another score I had to meet.鈥�
Masheb鈥檚 new study is focused on how VA doctors can screen veterans for eating disorders. She鈥檚 experimenting with different ways to ask veterans questions about their relationship with food.
鈥淭ypically, men 鈥� and more typically, our veterans 鈥� are uncomfortable with that language of being out of control,鈥� Masheb said. 鈥淏eing in the military is about being in control.鈥�
Masheb received a Department of Defense grant to test virtual therapy to help veterans with eating disorders. But she said they face other challenges, like busting the myths that eating disorders only occur in young women, or that patients who are overweight can鈥檛 have an eating disorder.
In March, the department released new that grant more leeway for the service branches to loosen the restrictions on weight and fitness standards.
Masheb and Rand agree that鈥檚 a small step in the right direction. But the guidelines still leave it to each branch to decide if they want to continue to rely on body mass index, a measurement that uses height to determine weight goals.
Rand said the height and weight standards don鈥檛 make sense to her.
鈥淚f people see that you don't have to meet this number, or be less than that number, I think that will hopefully not make so many people at higher risk," she said. 鈥淚 think it would ease the mindset.鈥�
This story was produced by the American Homefront Project, a public media collaboration that reports on American military life and veterans. Funding comes from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
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