MovieChat Forums > Thinspiration (2014) Discussion > confused by the brother

confused by the brother

posted 10 years ago by padfootsbarkingmad
8 replies | jump to latest

i'm confused about why he would have an eating disorder and how it would have gone undetected long enough for him to die. my cousins wrestle, and high school wrestling is nothing like it used to be. you have to be in the correct weight range for your height and they are constantly weighed to make sure it stays the same. if their weight it too different a couple of times they are done for the season. so he wouldn't have been able to binge/gain weight or starve himself long term because they would have known. it would be nearly impossible to have "don't eat" carved anywhere on him because most wrestlers weigh naked for meets and just changing in the locker room ect. and the have to have checkups a physical at the dr before each season to make sure they don't have any medical problems so anything wrong with his heart would have been caught then. and you can't wrestle if you haven't eaten. if he really had an eating disorder that severe he would have been too weak to keep up. i suppose it could be state by state rules but idk

[–] JC_Aliss 10 years ago

I'm afraid some will give the sloppiness of the brother's story a pass because it's bringing up the topic of male eating disorders, so that's "good enough" to say it was realistic.

But honestly, for him to have damaged his heart enough for death by mid-teens, you are correct, it would have been picked up on by the regular physicals required for his sport. And if it's possible that he already had a heart defect that was exacerbated by the extreme dieting, it was not indicated. The idea was supposed to be he simply dieted himself to death in some way.

He'd have had many other physical ailments show up before the grand-slam of heart failure, at the very least.

[–] Djudd1990 10 years ago

I completely agree. That was not portrayed well at all.

[–] padfootsbarkingmad 10 years ago

the whole movie wasn't portrayed well at all honestly

[–] jnorgle 10 years ago

For a simple weigh-in he could have used cover-up. But the rest, yeah, it's sketchy.

http://i61.tinypic.com/2v3j8gp.jpg
http://i62.tinypic.com/2yjufbk.jpg

[–] teebabes25 10 years ago

Made no sense to me when the movie shows him at the dinner table eating healthy...smh love this movie but didn't get the anorexic brother part

[–] lindseyd310 10 years ago

He could've had heart failure due to BULIMIA. Thus him eating in front of his family. Most people with Bulimia also borderline with anorexia....But I do agree that it was kinda sloppy

[–] JrBorch86 9 years ago

He does eat in a few scenes but during the scene where the mom prepared 'organic pasta' and gets after Hanna for not having taken a bite....if you watch closely Leo never eats either.

He pushes his meat balls around on his plate but never takes a bite.

Ciao,

Peace & Love

"The brain doesn't need blood. It just needs to be kept wet."

[–] rpgdancer 10 years ago

I was the assistant to the high school wrestling coach for 4 years (2004 to 2008). I don't know if things have changed since then, but our guys would starve themselves for 2-3 days to make weight. I could never understand how they were able to wrestle after not eating!

In 2007, the powers that be in the high school wrestling world decided to "fix" this issue. They required a urine test with each weigh in. The urine test was supposed to help measure fat or something (it was a long time ago, I don't fully remember) and make sure that no one was water-loading before the meets. Unfortunately, it had almost no effect on the boys who were forced to starve themselves.

As soon as wrestling season was over, these boys would go back to eating normally, but I was always concerned that one or more of them would develop an eating disorder.