On World Eating Disorders Action Day, The National reports on how social media could be fuelling eating disorder fears, how one of the type, orthorexia, is still not medically recognised and the struggles a teacher faced when seeking help for her crippling bulimia in Dubai.
A Dubai teacher left on the "brink of self-destruction" by her struggle with bulimia has spoken of how she got her life back on track.
"Sarah", 31, moved to Dubai from Canada in 2011 to make a new start, only to find that her problems had followed her across the world.
She has struggled with eating disorders since she was nine.
"Food or the absence of it was the centre of my life," she says.
“I began to lose weight quickly in my teenage years. My family was very worried and I felt I was a burden on them.”
As a juvenile Sarah was in and out of hospital. She would gorge on food and then force herself to be sick to lose weight.
At her lowest point, aged 16, her weight dropped to 40 kilograms, and she was taken to hospital several times as doctors were concerned that her heart could stop due to severe complications.
"I was at the brink of self-destruction."
"I did grade 10 and 11 schooling when I was in and out of hospital," she says.
“The teachers were a big help getting materials for my exams and to study, but it was very hard to go through.
“I looked terrible, my skin was yellow and I was losing my hair.
“My teeth were going bad from all the vomiting. I had all the typical symptoms.”
In Canada, Sarah was pushed towards treatment by her mother and sister. When she became an adult, she refused help.
After graduating from university, she decided to go to the UAE to take up a teaching job, as she felt her mental turmoil was becoming too difficult for her family.
"I did not want to get better," she says. "It is a debilitating illness. You don't think rationally.
“I had no idea I was killing myself. It was not something I could comprehend.
“I continued to be the same for two years in Dubai before finally deciding to seek treatment and take my life seriously.
“The issue is very stigmatised here. I found I did not have access to the same services as in Canada, and it was not normalised or accepted.
“I almost lost my job, and I was at the brink of self-destruction.”
Doctors told Sarah she should just eat and get over her issues.
It took some time before she found a specialist psychiatrist who understood her problems.
Her therapy has continued since then.
"When I started putting my trust in someone else, things began to change," she says.
“I didn’t know how to help myself. It is not a choice to have this disease, but it is a choice to recover.”
World Eating Disorders Action Day, June 2, is a movement designed for and by people affected by an eating disorder, their families, and the medical professionals who support them. It aims to expand global awareness of eating disorders as genetically linked, treatable illnesses that can affect anyone.
Libya's Gold
UN Panel of Experts found regime secretly sold a fifth of the country's gold reserves.
The panel’s 2017 report followed a trail to West Africa where large sums of cash and gold were hidden by Abdullah Al Senussi, Qaddafi’s former intelligence chief, in 2011.
Cases filled with cash that was said to amount to $560m in 100 dollar notes, that was kept by a group of Libyans in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.
A second stash was said to have been held in Accra, Ghana, inside boxes at the local offices of an international human rights organisation based in France.
The biog
Favourite book: Men are from Mars Women are from Venus
Favourite travel destination: Ooty, a hill station in South India
Hobbies: Cooking. Biryani, pepper crab are her signature dishes
Favourite place in UAE: Marjan Island
Cricket World Cup League 2 Fixtures
Saturday March 5, UAE v Oman, ICC Academy (all matches start at 9.30am)
Sunday March 6, Oman v Namibia, ICC Academy
Tuesday March 8, UAE v Namibia, ICC Academy
Wednesday March 9, UAE v Oman, ICC Academy
Friday March 11, Oman v Namibia, Sharjah Cricket Stadium
Saturday March 12, UAE v Namibia, Sharjah Cricket Stadium
UAE squad
Ahmed Raza (captain), Chirag Suri, Muhammad Waseem, CP Rizwan, Vriitya Aravind, Asif Khan, Basil Hameed, Rohan Mustafa, Kashif Daud, Zahoor Khan, Junaid Siddique, Karthik Meiyappan, Akif Raja, Rahul Bhatia
Company%C2%A0profile
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TOUCH RULES
Touch is derived from rugby league. Teams consist of up to 14 players with a maximum of six on the field at any time.
Teams can make as many substitutions as they want during the 40 minute matches.
Similar to rugby league, the attacking team has six attempts - or touches - before possession changes over.
A touch is any contact between the player with the ball and a defender, and must be with minimum force.
After a touch the player performs a “roll-ball” - similar to the play-the-ball in league - stepping over or rolling the ball between the feet.
At the roll-ball, the defenders have to retreat a minimum of five metres.
A touchdown is scored when an attacking player places the ball on or over the score-line.
The specs
Engine: four-litre V6 and 3.5-litre V6 twin-turbo
Transmission: six-speed and 10-speed
Power: 271 and 409 horsepower
Torque: 385 and 650Nm
Price: from Dh229,900 to Dh355,000
The specs
Engine: 4.0-litre flat-six
Torque: 450Nm at 6,100rpm
Transmission: 7-speed PDK auto or 6-speed manual
Fuel economy, combined: 13.8L/100km
On sale: Available to order now
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
