Teen Eating Issues/Disorders Support Thread 2

[myrtleWilson]

Our first thread is almost full. Here is our second - a place to seek and share advice, to lament and scream with rage and sadness, to celebrate each other's successes as we navigate the choppy waters of supporting our children with eating disorders.

All are very welcome, whether you're at the start of this journey or a more seasoned traveller.

I'll link this thread to the first one and then I thought it may be helpful if on joining this one we did a quick precis of our current situation.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eating_disorders/4016379-teen-eating-issues-support-thread?msgid=104736115

Some background: my daughter is 15, diagnosed by Camhs with anorexia on Christmas Eve after an episode of self harm. She is now at 47.8kg and back at school part time but experiencing going issues with friendships/bullying and is refusing therapy. Feeling weary with it.

Has she said why she is refusing therapy? It is very draining, so you're in good company here!

My dds 15 as well spring, the friendship issues at this age are not fun 😕 has she always struggled with friends or is this a new thing?
How are you getting on food wise at home?

We've had an okay evening, took the dog out and we played a bit of football which was fun (my legs are going to bloody kill in the morning, I'm so ridiculously unfit 😶) Dd seemed okay but then sloped off to bed early and didn't say goodnight which is unlike her 😕

@Lougle not sure she’s fully acknowledging her illness and she has said she doesn’t want to talk about her issues with others. Shame?

Oh and my dd is only just starting to engage with therapy now she's put on a bit of weight (94% wfh) she could not engage with it at all when she was a lower weight spring. It might just be that your dd needs to recover weight wise a bit more first.

@girliefriendlikespuppies The friendship thing has developed over the past couple of years but she’s always been a bit possessive. Food wise she’s eating pretty much everything on the meal plan except for the required amount of juice. It’s becomes difficult when she feels anxious.

Hey all and hope the birthday girls had good days.
Welcome (if that’s the right word) @Spring3 my DD is 13 and diagnosed just before Xmas too.
Put on another 500g this week which KW happy with. Now hit 93% wfh but still having daily issues with the changes to her exercise. We have stopped all home exercise and moved back to her clubs which started back this week.
Today she tried to cut back on breakfast and then I made a school.girl error and allowed her to eat afternoon snack (coffee cake) outside whilst I was making a cuppa for my mum and when I went outside not only had she stood up to eat it ( a new no no in this house) a large portion was crumbled on the patio. She claimed it was an accident. I managed a whole piece without dropping any....
I have also had to stop her from kicking a ball around outside and we had the usual melt down about how life is unfair and we are stopping her being herself etc etc....in the end I think the root of today’s issues was her nervousness about going back to her football club tonight.
Once I worked that out and we chatted about it it did help.
In the event she sort of enjoyed football but doesn’t believe she did that well. It all looked fine to me. She is such a perfectionist and asks too much of herself and of a training session with a bunch of teenage lads in a field when it was going dark....
We also got boood results today and she still has raised urea levels and also high triglycerides and some thing raised in the liver alaminesomethignorother...
KW has emailed paediatrician with results so I hope we don’t get another panicked ‘go to hospital’ call tomorrow....can’t deal with that again.
So a mixed day here. Working has been almost impossible. I have agreed with DH that I will cancel my leave next week when he is off work and I will work whilst he fields DD and I will take the following week off as mine are still on hol that week too. That way at least I can get some actual work done in peace....

Btw @Spring3 my Dd will not engage at all with the Ed team. I meet KW every week on Teams but DD has stopped attending with mutual consent. I try to do the therpasing with help from the KW. She hopes DD will come round once we are weight restored but it may not happen.

I only ask spring as my dd has struggled on and off with friendship issues for a while and is now almost at the point of having an ASD diagnosis. A third of girls with ED have ASD so wondered if it was ever something you had considered for your dd?

The crumbling food thing my dd does the min my back is turned lots, hope the paediatrician can shed some light on the bloods for you.

@Spring3 welcome but sorry you're gping through this too. This really is a great thread though for knowledge sharing and support.... friendship stuff does seem to feature highly with our DDs. Pretty sure a trigger for my DD ( 13) was a long standing (but v possessive) friend fall out which resulted in this girl moving to another school. DD could never discuss it much at all or communicate feelings ( thats a big prob) so I think unfortunately the AN becomes a retreat from all of this.
In time you'll hopefully find your DD can engage with you more around her thoughts /feelings but it does take time - and weight gain. Ours has still not directly told a single friend herself ( they have more tgan an inkling however...) so I'm sure shame & fear of rumours/ isolation is huge..

@Lougle thnks for YC info. You're like my personal knowledge bank

@Lottsbiffandsmudge hope those bloods check out okay today... the crumbling and standing has also been a theme here recently. DD just started askung to eat snsck upstairs while doing smthg with sister in bedroom. I want to encourage less rigidity & more normal patterns - ie not always sitting at same place around d room table, fixing on how many minutes she'll complete it in etc - but then hello covert crumbling, the dog "accidentally" eating stuff and our archenemy, standing. So such a hard balance to achieve..

DD trying P.L for 2nd time today. Hoping to break back of it before Easter hols. She continually talks about how she can't remember things - if I ask who she sat with, what she did in a class etc etc. It prob sounds like she just can't be bothered to talk about it but it runs deeper tgan that. Could it be effect of meds?? Olanz & sert?? Anyone else found this?
Starting to think sure there is an actual issue here that we need to look into as part of her psych assessments did pick up on poor long t mem....

Dd seems to be struggling again, I think since Ystds weight check 😕 even though she's blind weighed I think her imagination goes into overdrive.

Don't think she's looking forward to the Easter holidays either.

Hardly said a word to me Ystd evening and this morning, she's just had her CBT session so hoping that might have helped her a bit.

She said she was getting a voice telling her to count to 10 repeatedly last night as well which she said she hopes isn't another OCD thing ☹️ this illness is so f*cking relentless, poor kid.

Dd was admitted last night. Has agreed to try Olanzapine as says she doesn’t want to ever be admitted again and it’s too hard when the food is in front of her. Asked me to buy some chocolate hot cross buns for when she gets out. Trying to sort school stuff as in middle of GCSEs, hoping they’ll let her have her laptop.

I'm so sorry everyone is struggling.

@Scr1bblyGum has she been admitted to general paeds or an ED unit? I'm so glad she's agreed to olanzapine. Be aware it is really sedating at first, but it does wear off. DD1 absolutely needs it to be able to eat.

Ahh Scribbly maybe this is the wake up call your dd needs to get her choosing recovery, agreeing to the olanzipine is a brilliant sign. Hope you're okay (well as okay as you can be 💐)

Sorry everyone is struggling.

I was wrong about his height, I just measured him and he’s 165cm not 163cm! NHS BMI thing now puts him on 1st percentile. What’s his wfh now? (Mid December birthday)

Sorry to hear that @Scr1bblyGum but hope this means you can progress with the meds and really really hope they help for her.
@Girliefriendlikespuppies my Dd is awful on blind weigh days. Yest was a struggle.
Today I have given up. I don’t work weds so we have had quite a nice morning watching a dvd and doing some paint shopping. She went in the garden with her brothers whilst I made lunch which I let ride (as it’s normal social activity and usual for them) ate lunch but moaned and bitched about the milk being bad when I had just opened it! And then I was trying to meal plan for next week with everyone there to input as it’s bank holiday etc and keeping all mine happy is a bloody minefield of unappreciated shit and she kicked off about sausages again. Then DH (who is off next week and I am not) started going on about taking her and brothers mountain biking on Monday (OK I guess as she has no training as it’s BH) and then for a day at the seaside another day. FFS I am trying to limit her activity and god alone knows what he thinks she will eat- we live at least 2.5 hours drive from any seaside. He is in cloud cuckoo land tbh. And they will no doubt spend the day walking around, digging and being in the fresh air which will eat calories.
So after melting down about the sausages (she has compromised on meatballs which are more calorific go figure) she is booting a ball around outside and we are meeting friends later for gentle activity in the park. I can’t face dragging her in.
I have given up. If she loses weight DH can deal with telling her she can’t play sport next week.
I really don’t want to do this anymore. I know compared to hospital and some of the horrendous stuff you are dealing with it seems small but the constant pushing to move around and to think of things to stop it is so bloody wearing, esp when my other half doesn’t seem to get it despite me losing it with him about that yoga the other week. Plus the food planning arghhhhh

77.89% WFH now @NelleBee.

Hello all and welcome @NelleBee and @Spring3. DD is 14 and we diagnosed in January with anorexia - her stats and bloods are all quite good but she doesn't weigh enough (hovering around 80% WFH) and has developed lots of rigid rules around healthy eating.

It's not great with us as she had some sort of a stomach bug at the weekend (genuinely, she was ashen, diarrhoea and then vomited) and lo, she had lost a kilo on Monday. And every gram is so hard earned...

We slacked off a bit with the return to school but I am now taking over completely. She's been getting far too involved in food prep so she's banned from the kitchen and choices are to be reduced. She does eat the three meals and the three snacks but with the healthy eating obsession we just can't get enough calories into her to gain weight.

This may be a daft question but why is it bad to eat stood up?

Thanks @Lougle I’m more worried now. He did eat a cheese sandwich and Doritos at lunch time

Sorry your DD got a stomach bug @Valleyofthedollymix that must be hard

Scr1bblyGum sorry to hear your DD was admitted, hopefully it helps her in the process of acceptance and gets her looking toward recovery.

We had a camhs physical today and the nurse was very concerned about DD weight and also heart rate between standing and sitting. She said shes going to speak with her team about what to do. DD was totally honest when the nurse asked her how it felt to be told her weight and heart are really concerns and DD said plenty of people have said that to me its not surprising..... and continued on to say she has no problem and doesn't see what all the fuss is about.

On the way home I was asking if she will eat the meal plan now as she's been told they have real concerns and DD said if I could I would but I just can't.

I have no idea what to do.

Oh @Valleyofthedollymix that's gutting.

@NelleBee I don't think it is bad for you to eat standing up, except that people tend to eat when they're standing up because they're so busy, which means they tend to gulp down their food and that can lead to indigestion. But there's no particular reason why it's bad for you.

@SoTiredNeedHoliday I'm so glad someone is backing you up. Hopefully they'll do something.

@Scr1bblyGum I hope your DD is ok.

DD1 spent the day at my parents today. The first time I haven't directly controlled meals. I sent her with snacks, lunch and clear instructions. When I picked her up she'd had everything given plus a glass of milk and a mint aero. 2460 calories so far, so it takes the pressure off dinner.

However, she hasn't drunk much and she was having vision disturbance when coming downstairs. I took her blood pressure and it was 91/53 with a heart rate of 133, which explains it.

@Lottsbiffandsmudge your DH sounds like he's trying to 'get her out of it' by making life fun, but he's not seeing the seriousness of the condition. I'd be really frustrated too.

@NelleBee it is not bad to eat standing up per se but lots of ANs do it as they know standing burns more calories. Constantly standing is one of my DDs issues. I am forever asking her to sit down.
@SoTiredNeedHoliday that sounds so tough and very typical. My DD could never see what all the fuss was about. No words of wisdom it’s hell. Just keep trying I guess.
@Valleyofthedollymix I get the whole having to take control back again bit. I often think I have turned a corner, relax about something (like DD making her own ready brek) and then find I shouldn’t have.... The healthy eating thing is a nightmare.

@lougle I know he is trying but it isn’t him that will have to think up a packed lunch of the right number of calories but that has no crisps, butter or chocolate. Whilst also making sure she has both snacks packed and either a thermos of milk or something else to eat of equivalent calories. They just don’t think.