It’s a Friday and you ask your friends to go grab a bite to eat before getting ready for the party that night. However your friend refuse. Why is this? Everyone knows you have to eat before drinking to prevent yourself from getting totally wasted and to avoid alcohol poisoning.

The same pattern repeats every weekend until you notice a trend: People are not eating the day they plan to go out to reduce the calorie intake and to help them get drunk faster, a new trend known as “drunkorexia.”

Students seem to like the idea of being able to drink without worrying about gaining weight. Girls see this as an opportunity to get drunk without having to hit the gym twice as hard the next week.

As a person who has experienced the drunkorexic side effects, I must advocate that this practice is not something that should be supported or experimented with. When I came to college I was excited to get out and have a social life. However, I would not eat anything at all on the days I planned to go out. This started happening maybe once a week, but eventually got to where it happened every few days. My friends thought I was anorexic or bulimic, but the only cause of my problem was alcohol.

I wanted to get as drunk as possible, as quickly as possible. I would save the calories for the alcohol and when it came time to drink, I had no worries. I would just pour drink after drink and not think of the consequences.

At the end of the night I would regret my decision. I would get so intoxicated that I had to be carried back to my dorm, needed help getting in bed and even woke up still feeling intoxicated the next morning.

It didn’t take long to realize that I was not only harming my body and poisoning myself, but also putting my life at risk every single time I took part in this.

I don’t see a way to fully prevent people from taking part in this practice, but there is definitely a need to increase awareness about the dangers. I feel that most people are not aware of the damage they are doing to their bodies when they do this.

Many people think not eating just makes it easier for their body to reach a high point of intoxication more quickly. But they are putting themselves at risk for serious health problems and possibly not waking up.

While you can’t force someone to eat before setting out to drink at night, there is always a chance that you could save a life by taking the time to try to explain why they should.

Bailey Parker is a freshman biology and psychology double major from Texarkana.