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Original poster

Support thread 11 for parents of young people with an eating disorder

999 replies

GrannyRoberts · 12/01/2024 21:08

Hi all, here is our new thread. I will attempt to post a link on thread 10.

OP posts:
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11
Original poster
GrannyRoberts · 04/02/2024 19:41

Sorry just saw your update! Good that she's managing to eat and drink, and yes, back to A&E if not. Massive hand hold, I know how hellish this is.

OP posts:
summertimesadness24 · 05/02/2024 05:54

I agree I think this isn't working caring for her at home
Unless I didn't have a toddler and a job of course ! But on a serious note I very much struggled last week to cope
Today the plan is I'll wake her earlier ( she usually gets up at 7 am, leaves for 8 am) however it's not usual days at the moment and she doesn't eat in like she used to do so I'm thinking I'll wake her 630 and she can have an hour to eat then 30 mins to get ready which is ample
If that doesn't work this morning she's not going in
With the stress of trying to get out the house by 8am with a toddler in tow it's hard enough but it's trying to adjust to this new way of life atm

Love and hugs to everyone going through this

I'm out with a friend for dinner tonight and this weekend as tiring at it was we didn't change our plans and I'm adamant this won't take over our lives
I know I probably should cancel all plans and sleep lol but for our own sanity and mental health I'm trying for an equal balance this week as last week was hell

X

ReineDeSaba · 05/02/2024 06:30

@summertimesadness24 you are very stretched. It is now effectively like having two toddlers. School should be off the table if she is not eating. I hope breakfast isn't too much of a battle.

Girliefriendlikespuppies · 05/02/2024 08:11

Summer I don't think your dd should be going to school either, you need to focus on getting 3 meals and 3 snacks firmly established. Can you get signed off work? I think most parents on here had to get signed off for 1-2 months (or longer) to start with.

Eyelashesoffire · 05/02/2024 13:24

EDx · 31/01/2024 19:33

I hope you don’t mind me posting? I am (hopefully) not a parent of a child with an ED. Rather I am an adult who has an undiagnosed ED as a teen and went on to have disordered eating for decades. I’ve been lurking for a while but the discussion about being a vegetarian brought me to the surface. I hope this helps but please do understand it’s just my perspective.

I wanted to be a vegetarian prior to my ED. This was in the 70/80s and I had close friends who were vegetarian so this wasn’t odd to me. My parents wouldn’t hear of it though. The dangerous part of my anorexia was when I was 14-15 but when I went to university at 18 and could make my own food choices I immediately became vegetarian. This was partly for humane reasons, but even back then I knew it was really about control and how I could play other people. If you’re a vegetarian it’s so much easier to say you don’t fancy the vegy option, or you’ve had too much cheese, or that the foods been too close to meat.

Being vegetarian was a wonderful way to control my eating without seeming odd. I personally know a few children who I thought had disordered eating and then they’ve gone vegy and that’s been the confirmation for me. Eventually they have been diagnosed with eating disorders. But I knew.

For me the ED comes first and the vegetarianism is one way to enable it.

5 decades on I’m still vegy, so it is important to me, but I’m making the choice For certain reasons , rather than having the ED making the choice for other reasons. Does that help?

Thanks @EDx that's really interesting. I hope you're well now. I can totally see the logic in that. My DD turned pescetarian around 4yrs before the ED started to present. She did eat really well, not picky and always ate good portions.

I did think that 4 yrs of being pescetarian was way too long to be part of the ED. But reading on other forums, people have said the ED was bubbling away long before it showed any overt signs. So although it's a bit mind boggling as she always ate so well, maybe she was starting to struggle?

summertimesadness24 · 05/02/2024 17:16

Girliefriendlikespuppies · 05/02/2024 08:11

Summer I don't think your dd should be going to school either, you need to focus on getting 3 meals and 3 snacks firmly established. Can you get signed off work? I think most parents on here had to get signed off for 1-2 months (or longer) to start with.

I've never thought of this
I could potentially do that - so she did eat 'half her lunch ' and one of her teachers is making sure she does

summertimesadness24 · 05/02/2024 17:17

ReineDeSaba · 05/02/2024 06:30

@summertimesadness24 you are very stretched. It is now effectively like having two toddlers. School should be off the table if she is not eating. I hope breakfast isn't too much of a battle.

So she eat all her breakfast after a 45 mins battle but she did it

Proseccoismyfriend · 05/02/2024 17:25

@summertimesadness24 so glad school are on board with you, we've found their food support second to none and it's played a vital role in recovery, he eats better for the teacher! Stand firm on finishing meals or no school, if a satisfactory amount hasn't been eaten at lunch she goes straight home, we thankfully only had to do this once and it made the message loud & clear food = life and activities without that it's home/hospital and bed rest. You're doing fantastic, keep going

Girliefriendlikespuppies · 05/02/2024 17:59

Summer half lunch isn't great, what about the snacks? Honestly I think you need to take some time off work and keep her home in order to turn this around. I said to the GP I needed to be signed off with stress as my dd has anorexia and he did it straight away.

summertimesadness24 · 05/02/2024 18:46

Girliefriendlikespuppies · 05/02/2024 17:59

Summer half lunch isn't great, what about the snacks? Honestly I think you need to take some time off work and keep her home in order to turn this around. I said to the GP I needed to be signed off with stress as my dd has anorexia and he did it straight away.

I think I'm going to do this.....so...update Dinner has been refused so now what ? Back to a&e?! No drinks either ?!

summertimesadness24 · 05/02/2024 18:47

So it's a constant battle ! I've sent her upstairs after refusing to eat' I feel
Soooo stressed

Eyelashesoffire · 05/02/2024 18:50

@summertimesadness24 I was signed off sick for a few weeks, it just got too much for me. I would consider it if at all possible, from what my CAMHS ed team say it's very common. I felt like I should be able to do it all, they said "absolutely not!"

Eyelashesoffire · 05/02/2024 18:51

@summertimesadness24 oh sorry I missed your last post. How much has she eaten today?

Original poster
GrannyRoberts · 05/02/2024 18:55

@summertimesadness24 my thought is back to A&E if she's refused dinner. Sending her upstairs , although it does feel like a punishment in normal times is probably exactly what the ED wants. Totally get why you would do it, but it does unfortunately give ED the power. Do you have any other leverage (phone/school/friends) that you can use? If not then yes, hospital again I would say. Sorry you're going through this, it's absolutely awful.

OP posts:
Original poster
GrannyRoberts · 05/02/2024 19:00

Also to add I was signed off for 6 weeks when DD was first discharged. I regret forcing myself back to work after 6 weeks if I'm honest. Work were not pressuring me at all, just my stupid work ethic. While 3 + 3 is being established it is a full time job. If you can be signed off then there is no question that you should do that.

OP posts:
NCTDN · 05/02/2024 19:51

My feeling is also back to a&e. Your dd and the Ed need to know that you are in charge.

Girliefriendlikespuppies · 05/02/2024 20:22

Summer you can use whatever leverage you like, I took dds phone, stooped her seeing friends, no Tv basically no life unless she ate.

If it's complete refusal then yes pack her up and go back to a&e, tbh they should have admitted her at the wend anyway.

greydoor · 05/02/2024 21:04

I had a few standoffs with my dd in the early days, and me and my dh would tag team because it was so intense. I would say to dd that while I completely got how terrified she was feeling, that there is NO WAY to recover without eating. Food is medicine. There is literally no alternative way.

She really hated me saying that if she had cancer and hated the treatment, I would be doing the same thing and making sure she got it.

And no matter how unpleasant she would be to me, I would NEVER give up.

I'd try and get her to remember 'before', to try and get her to get some kind of sense of recovery being possible (that didn't work but I hope a tiny seed landed). I would tell her that she was ill, and she had an eating disorder, which meant she wasn't able to make decisions about whether to eat or not. And so we wouldn't be giving her an option.

Now, these are only things I said - I'm not naive enough to think there was something special about what we did. And it sounds like you're doing this, so if you can't make her eat then I'd put into place a boundary of a&e.

When is your first appointment with the team?

Original poster
GrannyRoberts · 06/02/2024 09:11

@summertimesadness24 how are things today?

OP posts:
Cantfindthewordsddstruggling · 06/02/2024 10:42

Does anyone else feel that their own mental health has taken an irreparable nose dive. Really not sure how much longer I can cope with all of this not knowing if there is an end in sight in dd’s battle with the monster that is AN
I’m safe just wondering how others have navigated the feelings if they’ve felt like this. Thanks

summertimesadness24 · 06/02/2024 10:54

GrannyRoberts · 06/02/2024 09:11

@summertimesadness24 how are things today?

Hi things aren't good

We ended up in a&e again after DD refusing dinner, refusing to drink
The last time she eat was lunch at school

We got to a&e spent 4 hours with a nurse who said they couldn't do anything and said ' what do you expect us to do we are a&e'

Although we were there 24 hours ago when bloods ecg were done I guess because of her obs were ok that's why the nurse said that

I have kept
Her off school and although refused breakfast she has eaten her snacks
From her meal plan and drank a pint so at least if I can get minimum calories in her today it keeps us out of a&e?

I'm exhausted

I'm taking her to McDonald's for lunch and she has agreed to eat a cheeseburger happy meal so although it's probably all
Wrong I just feel so consumed and I can show my food diary to the clinic on Thursday

Xx

Proseccoismyfriend · 06/02/2024 10:55

See the gp @Cantfindthewordsddstruggling ad's may help support you through this, my mental health is very up and down and really depends on how the ed and ds's behaviour is. Some days I really felt like there was no point anymore and that all of this was too hard and I couldn't face another meal or snack. I promise I feel much better now, we're still a long way off recovered or well, last nights dinner was a complete shit show and it through me as for a few weeks he'd been eating well. We were back to food refusal, tears, sobbing he got through it and this morning's breakfast was the best we've ever had. I found looking back at photos from younger years and happy smiles that made me want to fight to get that back. I also found some comfort in the fact that when things were so heightened it meant I was challenging the ed enough to take back control of my child. Sending love, it's the hardest thing I've ever been through and I'm only 6 months in

summertimesadness24 · 06/02/2024 10:57

Girliefriendlikespuppies · 05/02/2024 17:59

Summer half lunch isn't great, what about the snacks? Honestly I think you need to take some time off work and keep her home in order to turn this around. I said to the GP I needed to be signed off with stress as my dd has anorexia and he did it straight away.

Half isn't acceptable no and she only did half her morning snack

summertimesadness24 · 06/02/2024 10:57

greydoor · 05/02/2024 21:04

I had a few standoffs with my dd in the early days, and me and my dh would tag team because it was so intense. I would say to dd that while I completely got how terrified she was feeling, that there is NO WAY to recover without eating. Food is medicine. There is literally no alternative way.

She really hated me saying that if she had cancer and hated the treatment, I would be doing the same thing and making sure she got it.

And no matter how unpleasant she would be to me, I would NEVER give up.

I'd try and get her to remember 'before', to try and get her to get some kind of sense of recovery being possible (that didn't work but I hope a tiny seed landed). I would tell her that she was ill, and she had an eating disorder, which meant she wasn't able to make decisions about whether to eat or not. And so we wouldn't be giving her an option.

Now, these are only things I said - I'm not naive enough to think there was something special about what we did. And it sounds like you're doing this, so if you can't make her eat then I'd put into place a boundary of a&e.

When is your first appointment with the team?

This is good I'm going to enforce this

summertimesadness24 · 06/02/2024 10:59

Girliefriendlikespuppies · 05/02/2024 20:22

Summer you can use whatever leverage you like, I took dds phone, stooped her seeing friends, no Tv basically no life unless she ate.

If it's complete refusal then yes pack her up and go back to a&e, tbh they should have admitted her at the wend anyway.

She's sitting here watching her fave tv programme! No phone no iPad but then she's disconnected from her friends - I guess I could take away the TV?