it’s well known that dancing as a hobby has many health benefits. It helps with your mental and physical health. People who have been diagnosed with Parkinson’s use dance to help them with their posture or use it as a form of physical therapy.
Additionally, doing dance can help your cognitive function as well as train your body to become stronger. Dancing can help someone with mental health problems due to them having an opportunity to leave the house and mixing with other people.
However, growing up in the dancing world and even in the professional world has been damaging to a wide number of dancers. Studies have shown that dancers are three times more likely to have an eating disorder than the average person.
Kathryn, a seventeen year old ex dancer, developed body dysmorphia at a young age. “It made me feel like I didn’t look as great insecure when wearing costumes.” with the constant comparisons, it would send anyone into a spiral.
Dancers are also well known to be self-critical and fixate on their flaws. Sometimes it stems from being under scrutiny from their teachers, however sometimes it just stems from the pressure that they’re under.
credit – dancers are deeply engraved in the toxic body shaming culture.
“If we danced with mirrors, I felt less great about myself and my dancing… I was comparing myself to others so much.” Kathryn, though she wasn’t under scrutiny from her teacher, struggled with her own self-image.
Through dancers being under constant critique from their teachers or themselves, it leads to them having disordered eating and can cause them to over exercise. This leads to 90% of dancers gaining an injury every year.
Millie, an 18-year-old ex-dancer, thought she had to “look a certain way or be a certain thing” and found herself “blaming my weight” during lifts in dances. This will feed into many dancer’s body dysmorphia as if they feel like they cannot be lifted, they will skip meals, purge or over exercise to make it ‘easier’ for other people.
Dancers who grew up in the dancing world are more proned to be under the influence of more gender specific body types. This leads to disordered eating in both boys and girls from an early age due to them wanting to fit into a specific stereotype, and so they don’t stand out from the dancers around them.
Ex-dancer Ellen Elphick ended up suing her old ballet school after the institution left her with psychological damage.
The phycological effects of body dysmorphia are directly links to obsessive perfectionism, anxiety and depression. This leads to over 25% of dancers needing psychological support.
Professional dancers have a high risk of having anxiety and depression, with 21% of dancers experiencing mild to severe symptoms due to burnout and injury.
If you are struggling with eating disorders, anxiety or depression:
Text SHOUT at 85258
Call beating eating disorders at 0808 801 0677
Call Samaritans at 116 123