For those of us who celebrated Thanksgiving with a family feast or have begun this season of overindulgence, dieting has been thrown to the winds for what remains of this year.

We've resigned ourselves to the fact that our diet will resume in January 2007. As we consider our own challenges with weight loss, it's hard to imagine people who are so fearful of gaining weight that they can no longer eat enough to survive. 

While many Americans are obsessed with diet and the need to be thin, some in our society take this to the extreme. You probably read or heard earlier this month about a young Brazilian model, Ana Carolina Reston, who died from complications of anorexia nervosa at the age of 21.

This was a tragic situation that could have been prevented with intense therapy. When she died, Reston weighed only 88 pounds and had a body mass index (BMI) of 13.5 compared to the 18.5 BMI that is considered underweight. 

According to the National Eating Disorders Association, approximately 1 percent of American women suffer from this potentially life-threatening condition at some time in their lives. 

The pursuit for thinness is all-consuming. Treatment of anorexia is most effective when the problem is identified early. If you think that someone you know or love may be suffering from this disorder, take a few minutes to visit the Web site of the National Eating Disorders Association. It will help you to understand more about the problem and where to seek help.