Teen Eating Disorders - Thread 5

[myrtleWilson]

Welcome everyone,
Our last thread can be found here
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eating_disorders/4279530-Teen-Eating-Disorders-Thread-4?watched=1&msgid=111172926#111172926

That we're on thread 5 in about a year is a reflection of the incredible increase in mental health issues, including eating disorders amongst young people over the last couple of years.

With that in mind, we thought we'd try to include some resources that have helped us along the way to date. No one resource will be a panacea but hopefully this list will be a useful starting off point for any newcomers and a reflection for others. It is our first go at sharing a list of resources on a thread so it won't be perfect!

www.beateatingdisorders.org.uk

anorexiafamily.com/?v=79cba1185463

www.youtube.com/evamusby

www.youtube.com/channel/UCa7G1P5WQopVMc9qTSP_lgA

www.orri-uk.com

www.nhs.uk/mental-health/feelings-symptoms-behaviours/behaviours/eating-disorders/overview/

www.stgeorges.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Junior-MARSIPAN-Risk-Assessment-Framework.pdf

People to look up on social media
Hope Virgo
Ro-Recovering
James Downs
Cara Lisette
Adam Fare
BarefootRebel
Ilona Burton

Girlie hope Covid is not too bad for your DD

Betty - great news on a gain!

dark how are you doing?

Happy birthday to the birthday girls 🥳

Dds last bday was an odd affair as we were in lockdown, dd was really not well and I'd been signed off work 😩 I'm seriously hoping her next bday (her 16th 😬) will be better in February.

So big news here, dd told me that her form tutor handed out doughnuts and lollipops today (it was a careers day so they'd spent the whole day in form) she couldn't bring herself to have the doughnuts but did have a lolly! What I was happy about was that dd seemed quite proud of herself and given her reluctance to ever have anything 'extra' this feels like a step (finally) in the right direction.

We also had quite an open conversation about the fall out from eating the lolly, she said the voice kept screaming at her to walk around more but she managed to ignore him (she always refers to the voice as a he!)

I don't want to get my hopes up but it does feel a bit like something is shifting.....

Is anyone on here watching strictly? I felt the need to have a conversation with dd about Rose as she's looking frighteningly thin.

I thought exactly the same nc I have to remind myself that some people are naturally v skinny but I thought she looked too thin 😕

Her arms look like DDs looked at the height of her illness.

Hi all, and happy birthday to the DDs who have them. Girlfriend, her having that lolly is a really big deal, big up to her!

My DDs weight loss has slowed - last two weeks it was 200g and now 300g whereas before it was 700g - 1.2kg a week. I am perturbed about this. I don't know why it's happening.

And her mood is really, really low. I have asked repeatedly for her sertraline to be increased (honestly it's been a bloody miracle for me and I want her to come out of that dark place too!) but they just don't respond.

Last weigh in she was 90.3 WFT and with another 300g on I'm hoping it's gone to 91. We are very very slowly reintroducing activity which I thought would have a positive effect on her mood but it doesn't seem to be.

Anyone else experienced this?

Another week another loss. She’s still pushing back and not eating everything and being back at school her body can’t cope with that. We have an appointment with the psychiatrist tomorrow and I’m really hoping they agree to give her ad’s because nothing motivates her to eat, she doesn’t care about anything at all at the moment.

My dd has just had the biggest meltdown to date. She’s messed up her room again, ripped her drawers out. Screamed and raged at me and her dad. Kicked her bedroom door so hard it’s cracked. I have no idea how to deal with these rages other than to not engage and wait for it to pass.

Oh boy @Bettybarkalot123 that really sounds hard. I'm so sorry and sadly not a clue as to how to help. There seems to be lots of people on the EDSUK Facebook page who experience this. Maybe they could advise?

@Moomarre you may have to fight hard for this. They'll probably say SSIS don't work at low weights. We were given olanzapine three times a day 2.5mg and it has made a difference. Initially she was very sleepy on it but an inpatient at the time so it didn't really matter. Apparently at higher doses it increases appetite too.

Thanks @DarkBlueEyes. We have a clinic session tomorrow so I’ll try and get some advice then.

It all started from us telling her that if she didn’t stop trying to take over in the kitchen at meal and snack times we would put a lock on the door so she couldn’t come in. She said she just wouldn’t eat anything at all if we did that. It’s a bloody nightmare isn’t it!

The Facebook group is very good and really helpful.

I'm so sorry you're dealing with this @Bettybarkalot123. Could you ask for meal support? She might find it easier to comply with someone outside the family.

@Lougle it’s strange but it’s not necessarily the meals that trigger these rages. It’s often what the Ed perceives as a threat, so tonight it was the threat of no longer being allowed in the kitchen at meal prep times. She pushed the table away aggressively when presented with pop chips and a glass of milk this afternoon. She stormed off, so I left her for half an hour then called her down to finish the milk which she did, then stormed off again raging.
Then she came downstairs at 4:50 and demanded her tea. It was already cooked ok the slow cooker. I asked her to wait as it was a bit early but she insisted she wanted it then. She ate a big portion with couscous (I know.. a bit of a weird combo), then had fruit and yogurt and stormed back upstairs. She’s probably very hormonal too, but I’ve never seen her as bad as this before. She spent the rest of the evening in her sisters room, looking pale and exhausted and barely speaking.

I think the anger is part of the recovery process Betty I seem to remember going through this with dd (I honestly think I have blurred some of the memories out 🥴) but she did have some huge tantrums when I didn't back down. What I did find was that generally the following day/meal would be a bit easier. It's almost like she'd given it everything she'd got and when it didn't work could say to herself 'well I tried'

I think the ED phases are similar to the grief phases now I think about it, denial, fear, anger, depression and lastly acceptance. My dd has literally gone through each phase in that order!

Have you managed to keep her out of the kitchen since then Betty?

So dd has a weight and height check today she is 59.6kgs and grown another 1.5cms!! So almost 172cm height wise which means she's over taken me 😳 I don't suppose you could do a wfh for me Lougle please? I'm guessing still around 100%.

Mentally she seems pretty good at the moment, I've noticed the ocd has been much less as well.

I think it makes perfect sense @Bettybarkalot123. ED are never really about the food. I saw DD1's consultant yesterday and he was surprised when I said she'd had Burger King a few months ago. I told him that she'd never restricted what she ate. It was more a case of 'You upset me, I don't eat. I don't get my own way, I don't eat. I feel sad, I don't eat...' It's always about comfort/control, once the food elements are stripped away.

@Girliefriendlikespuppies that's great news! DD1 had put on 0.8cm when she was measured yesterday, too. Your DD's WFH is 98.99% now.

Thanks guys, I’d be lost without you all. I don’t get much feedback from the Ed nurse, she’s pretty useless if I’m honest - so the reassurance and advice I get here is so valuable to me.

Yes it was about control yesterday. Thinking back it started almost immediately when she got home, she went straight into the kitchen for lunch. I had already made a jacket potato and she was having beans and cheese. Straight off she snapped… I’m not eating that I’m having scrambled eggs on toast. I didn’t back down and she ate lunch but she was very angry as soon as she got home.

She’s incredibly angry right now. Mainly at me but also at her dad and the Ed nurse. At the session last week she asked dd if she could remember what made her feel so sad and unhappy, dd shouted “when you stopped me from going to school!” Her worst fear is that happening again but her second worse fear is getting “fat” as she perceives it. She’s totally torn.

She’s also angry at how long she’s been like this. She says we promised she’d better if she started eating and she is so why isn’t she better!

@Girliefriendlikespuppies - she was in the kitchen for evening snack but sat at the table and didn’t try and get involved. We also find the next day is better. I think she holds a lot in, especially now she’s at school and sometimes it all gets too much. Great news about your daughter - it’s great to hear the positives too as it gives us all hope.

DD also has these absolutely shocking meltdowns (she's hit me during them) and they sort of burn themselves out by the next day. Every time I've got a little bit less terrified by them - I don't know if I'm becoming inured (a bad thing) or whether I've just learnt that they don't last.

They always leave me feeling equally exhausted though. I think I've become better at not catastrophising from them - we're not spiralling back to the beginning having made no gains. I just keep telling myself that a step backwards isn't so bad so long as the step forward is just that tiny bit bigger.

@Girliefriendlikespuppies really happy to hear that there's an improvement in mindset.

@Moomarre - Sertraline has helped DD, I think. Olanzapine just turned her into a zombie, but others have had great results.

@DarkBlueEyes - 200-300g weight gain is still great. Frankly that's a win in our house. From what I gather 500g is ideal because it's so more sustainable than bigger gains (though apparently in hospital they aim for 1kg+ but presumably they're keen to get them out asap).

We've got a big review tomorrow. I'm still unsure of what we're really aiming at and where we are on this line of recovery.

@Valleyofthedollymix she did actually say to me to go away from her as she was scared of what she might do. Hope the review goes well. I often think when people ask how she is that I don’t actually know, I don’t know where we’re up to on this journey to recovery.

I've just had a session with the psychiatrist and am left feeling a bit lost. She said dd is just over 100% wfh and they wouldn't be looking for her to gain much more 😕 personally I'd like dd to get to 105% so we have a bit of a buffer. The Dr said it wouldn't help her body image to get any bigger her body image is shit anyway!

They want to discharge her in January, she also mentioned telling dd her weight to normalise it 😐 they want to stop the weight checks as well.

It all feels a bit much and my anxiety is through the roof as I can see that this is a really crucial stage to get through without having dd relapse.

The cbt is also looking like it'll stop so in dd will be left with nothing.

Dd still needs so much support with getting her to eat enough so it's not like she is fully recovered at all.

Ugh.

Oh god that's so frustrating @Girliefriendlikespuppies - can you make yourself annoying to them in order to keep her under their system?

We had a conversation with the psychiatrist yesterday where he kept on saying 100% WFH shows the best clinical results in recovery etc and I kept saying 'but surely that's an arbitrary average weight that is right for some and not right for others?' to which he'd obfuscate. I am obviously not a professional but it seems obvious to me that it's more nuanced - your dd's weight never dropped very low and needs to be slightly higher than 100, my dd has never in her life been near 90% so I can't see how making her a good 10-15% above that is going to help her.

The medical profession can be so black and white in their thinking sometimes.

My dd had a good gain today. 700g she’s now saying she has calculated that she only needs to have 2000cal a day now to maintain that. She says she’s healthy and she won’t gain an ounce more. I told her if she wants full time school after Christmas, a Saturday job, sixth form… she will have to.

Does she need to know her weight Betty? I'm a big believer in blind weighing, at least until they're a bit better mentally. Fab weight gain though, well done and keep going.

Dd had her college interview today, she did really well and told her college tutor about the ED and actually said she has anorexia. I was really proud of her, she did really well and the college lady said they would get someone from well-being to contact her which sounds promising.

Valley exactly re wfh, my dd has always been a athletic build and we're all a similar shape in my family. I have friends of the same height who have always sat at a lower weight and been completely healthy but for dd anything less than she is now has had a significant negative impact on her state of mind. I do agree that pushing them past where they would normally sit is needed though if just to give them a bit of a buffer.

Hi @Girliefriendlikespuppies we talked about this with the Ed team today and they say that their normal approach is not to blind weigh as they feel that knowing their weight normalises it. I’m hoping that as has happened before, she will have bad couple of days and then move on, until next week anyway.

Thanks @DarkBlueEyes I went in prepared to fight but it seemed to be more of a formality as both dds nurses were pushing for it and the psychiatrist just needed to ok it. He had a good chat with dd and both nurses (I was there for some of it then got asked to leave) and will be involved with seeing dd every few weeks. Seemed like a really lovely man . She’s been prescribed sertraline but I need to phone CAHMS tomorrow to find out where the prescription is because it’s not where I thought it was going to be 🤦🏻‍♀️

@Valleyofthedollymix sertraline was amazing for my partner a few years ago. It worked as a total brain reset and he didn’t need to be on it long at all. Dds issues are a bit more complex so I’m not expecting it to be the same miracle but I’ll take any help we can get right now.

Girlie well done to your dd for owning the ED at her college interview that’s a huge step I think. Quite worrying that they want to discharge her though, surely just getting to 100% wfh doesn’t mean hey you’re cured! Also a huge amount of pressure on you to support her alone

Well after posting last week about how well DD is doing we’ve had a bit of a setback. Caught DD filling her water bottle down in the kitchen at 6am on Saturday morning and thought it was odd. I was suspicious that she thought I was going to weigh her that morning. I didn’t say anything as it was my birthday (and didn’t weigh her) but thought to myself that I would weigh a few days later when she not expecting it. Also thought she looked a little bit thinner again last week but because weigh-ins have been on track thought was just my imagination. Well, weighed her first thing on Monday and lo and behold she’s 2 kilos down. She has admitted to not eating some of her snacks at school on occasion and she’s been water loading the morning of her weigh-ins. I don’t think she’s telling me the full story but anyway we have gone back to the beginning. 3 + 3 plus pint of milk and me adding double cream to her smoothies. She is FaceTiming me from school so I can watch her eat her snack and lunch.

She says that it’s the stress of her mocks (they literally started this week so really bad timing!), the imminent ski trip which is less than 2 weeks away (which won’t be happening which is just as well as there’s no way I could trust her there now) and some recent drama and fallings out within her friendship group. She says she’s been struggling but she didn’t want to worry me. But this is exactly what concerns me, that she knows she’s in trouble but still can’t find it within herself to ask for help!

I feel like such a fraud that literally last week I was extolling on how well she was doing and yet here we are again! 🤦‍♀️ I know we are not back at the beginning and she is still far better mentally then she was back then but it’s just made me realise how quickly it can start again. And concerned that if I hadn’t caught it now how soon would it have been before she was back fully in its grip? Is this the life she is going to have from now on?