ABSTRACT
Christy Henrich, a former gymnast of near-Olympic caliber who had eating disorders, died on Tuesday in Research Medical Center in Kansas City, Mo., near her hometown, Independence, Mo. She was 22. The cause of death was multiple organ system failure [. . .]. Ms. Henrich had long suffered from two eating disorders, anorexia nervosa and bulimia. After narrowly failing to make the 1988 United States Olympic gymnastics team, Ms. Henrich, a harddriving competitor who was only 4 feet 10 inches tall, placed fourth in the unequal parallel bars event in the 1989 world championships. Forced to retire at that time, she weighed 93 pounds, but then she grew frailer and thinner. Weakness forced her to retire from her sport in 1991, and in mid-1993 she was down to 60 pounds. Ms. Henrich’s death came after a week in the medical center following 10 days in critical condition in a hospital in Independence, Mo. [. . .]. [H]er mother declared: “I would say 99 percent of what has happened to Christy is because of the sport”.1
