11 year old child with AN: advice please

[PonderThus]

We are just at the start of this very hard journey. Our DC has been diagnosed with acute AN and is on a weight regain plan. They went back to school this week with no physical exercise allowed but mentally they are still not well.
We’ve been told no therapy can start until they have regained weight to a point that is acceptable, needs to be at 90% and currently around 80%.
I think there are underlying nuerological issues too, just very OCD behaviours etc.
It is so hard to not get entrenched in long conversations about food and weight. Asking the same thing again and again and becoming aggressive when I don’t respond with the right answer but try to say it is about good choices and sticking to the plan. Their behaviour is getting harder and maintaining the food on the plan is getting harder and harder.
I’m signed off work just now but need to go back. I feel immense stress at how I will manage it all.
What are rights at work in a situation like this? How do others cope? My life and our family feels like it is falling apart. I cry a lot and lack energy and not sleeping. My DH is not able to cope and our eldest feels down. Any tips or advice, is here ever light at the end of the tunnel?

Could you speak with your employer and ask to reduce your hours temporarily to see how things go? Is that feasible? Really sorry you are all going through this.

Thank you x

This sounds so tough

Agree, speak to your employer about reducing hours as this is not going to be a quick journey

I think also pursue your suspicions re neurological issues, as there can be a link

I'm so sorry you're going through this. My DD17 has been in recovery from anorexia for around two years now and getting her weight back up after her diagnosis was the hardest thing I've ever had to do.

If you haven't already come across her, I would recommend Eva Musby - she has a book and videos on YouTube which I found helpful.

It's so counter intuitive but don't get drawn into discussions or arguments about food - they just go round in circles and achieve nothing. Use anything you can as leverage and try and get her weight up as quickly as possible. Life stops until she eats.

I'd speak to your employer and see what flexibility or time off you can get - I ended up having almost three months off and we saw the most progress when I was off and not trying to juggle work. I know I was very lucky to have that.

I raged against the idea that there was no place for any therapy until she was weight restored but it was right - there was no taking to her about anything when she was at her lowest weight.

Please hold on to hope no matter what - recovery is possible. Wishing you all the very best and sending you strength and love. And please feel free to dm me if I can point you to any other resources.

Anorexia is often control related (in a sense that they feel very out of control in many ways, and a way of coping with that can become restricting food and weight as that is one thing that's more securely within their control)
I would try to minimise and avoid all other demands if you haven't already. If school is causing stress then maybe a reduced timetable of part days would support recovery better too.

Keep food as a choice rather than a demand as much as possible, store some snacks in DCs room so they can be eaten without other people seeing as sometimes there might be feelings of shame around being seen eating. Offer for meals to be eaten in their room (obviously with discrete thorough checking that it's not being dumped somewhere)

Just wanted to give some solidarity - my DD is 12 but we’ve been in this for nearly two years. For nearly all of the last school year we picked her up at lunchtime or fed her in the car then sent back in to school. Is your work local enough for you to do an extended lunch break to facilitate that?

DD is around 80% and in school full time now, but no PE. Look up Eva Musby, she has coping strategies and helps to remind you that you’re not the only one going through all the feelings, there’s also a support thread for parents on here.

So sorry to hear that. Please consider it could be OCD and ARFID related to PANS PANDAS and I would suggest posting in the PP Facebook support group as many families with experience who could help. NHS not well informed usually at all sadly.

Thank you for all of the helpful responses. It does feel an uphill struggle and hard not to catastrophes xx

Hey OP, hope you're doing ok, it all sounds really difficult. I was just wondering if you have thought about therapy for you in the meantime. It might help if you have space to vent as it is a lot to carry and like you say, it is easy to catastrophise.