Why does Scarlett Pomers walk with a limp? Did she have an accident or injury?

Actress Scarlett Pomers suffered from anorexia in 2005. Her body weight dropped to a shocking 73 pounds. She was barely eating, and exercising.

Among the many symptoms of being anorexic are distorted body image and swelling of arms or legs. This could be the main reason why many people have noticed that there's something wrong when the actress walks.

On October 10, 2005, Pomers finally admitted she was far from fine. She moved into a residential rehab center and, after two months, started seeing an outpatient therapist for five hours daily, as reported by People Magazine.

An excerpt from a November 2005 People.com article reads:

The moment Scarlett Pomers stepped onto the Reba set Aug. 10, castmates knew something was wrong. Usually a thin 99 lbs., the 5’2″ actress had withered to a skeletal 73 lbs. And the once outgoing 16-year-old was “quiet and depressed,” says her rep Rhonda Boudreaux. “Everyone on the show has been very concerned about her.”

With good cause. Pomers was barely eating, and exercising as much as six hours a day, often in secret. In early September, after filming just two episodes of the WB sitcom, she took a medical leave of absence and about a month ago entered a facility to be treated for anorexia. “It took several weeks just for her to be able to overcome the urge to work off every calorie she ate,” says a close family member. “But she realized that in order to get her life back, she must fight this.”

The illness started last winter as she tried to shed weight put on over the holidays. The pounds continued to drop after summer plans to shoot a movie and finish her first album fell through. “She felt that everything in her life was out of control,” says Boudreaux. Alarmed, her mother sent her to a doctor, a therapist and a nutritionist. By summer’s end Pomers had put some weight back on, but when production on Reba was delayed and the show almost canceled, Boudreaux says, “the stress began to wear down the progress she had made.”

Pomers’s family hopes going public will raise awareness of the disease and the “incredibly destructive Web sites” that encourage eating disorders and taught Pomers how to hide her illness. Now on the mend, “Scarlett wants girls to know there is no shame in being ill and seeking help,” says a family member. “Hiding it only makes the disease dig its way deeper into their lives.”

And with the continued guidance of a therapist, the actress has come to accept that it's okay to satisfy her body's cravings and has learned to work out in a healthy way as a devoted student of Kundalini yoga.

With her 2013 appearance as an endorsee of Minarik Guitars, it seemed that she's really coped well with the treatment.

Eating disorders -- such as anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating disorder – include extreme emotions, attitudes, and behaviors surrounding weight and food issues. Eating disorders are serious emotional and physical problems that can have life-threatening consequences for females and males.

Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder characterized by weight loss (or lack of appropriate weight gain in growing children); difficulties maintaining an appropriate body weight for height, age, and stature; and, in many individuals, distorted body image. People with anorexia generally restrict the number of calories and the types of food they eat. Some people with the disorder also exercise compulsively, purge via vomiting and laxatives, and/or binge eat.

Anorexia can affect people of all ages, genders, sexual orientations, races, and ethnicities. Historians and psychologists have found evidence of people displaying symptoms of anorexia for hundreds or thousands of years. People in non-Westernized areas, such as rural China and Africa, have also been diagnosed with anorexia nervosa.

Although the disorder most frequently begins during adolescence, an increasing number of children and older adults are also being diagnosed with anorexia. Nor does a person need to be emaciated or underweight to have anorexia. Studies have found that larger-bodied individuals can also have anorexia, although they may be less likely to be diagnosed due to cultural prejudice against fat and obesity.

To be diagnosed with anorexia nervosa according to the DSM-5, the following criteria must be met:

1. Restriction of energy intake relative to requirements leading to a significantly low body weight in the context of age, sex, developmental trajectory, and physical health.

2. Intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat, even though underweight.

3. Disturbance in the way in which one's body weight or shape is experienced, undue influence of body weight or shape on self-evaluation, or denial of the seriousness of the current low body weight.

Check out some tips on how to prevent eating disorders from CasaPalmera.com.

Want to lose weight the smart way? Check out how everything from eating right to sleeping more can help with healthy weight loss from the experts at WebMD.