Living with binge eating teen is wrecking my mental health…

[EmmatheStageRat]

So sorry for the pity party, and I hope I don’t offend anyone struggling with food/eating issues here, but I am desperate to engage with others who either live with or are binge eaters.

In the interests of transparency, DD(15) has multiple complexities as she is adopted, has a significant physical disability and has ADHD and autism. DD has always been very interested in food and eating and has never had an ‘off’ button; all my party memories are of her being the last kid sitting at the food table while the others would be running around. Since puberty, there is not enough sugar in the world to fill her up. DD always has to eat her share then take ours. I have had to hide her six-year-old sister’s Christmas chocolates in the shoe cleaning bag in the hope that DD will not find them and eat them. She has no boundaries.

DD has previously broken into a lockbox where I’d tried to keep treats safe. I cannot keep a single penny in our house as she regularly ransacks my bag, purse, pockets, money boxes for cash to fund her habit.

My elderly and frail mother is totally housebound with no mobility and I’ve discovered that DD has been stealing huge quantities of £20 notes (money under the mattress generation, sadly).

It was DD’s birthday two days after Christmas and I spoiled her, despite our low income. The very next day, I discovered that she had actually stolen my mum’s bank card in order to go to our local sweet shop. I warned her that I would phone the police the next time I discovered a theft.

Unbelievably, today, I went to hand my lovely postie a fiver from my purse (I’d removed the last of the cash from my mum’s house and hadn’t been quick enough to hide it in the Dobble tin) only, you’ve guessed it, to find the £5 - plus other notes - missing. There is no reasoning with DD, she shows no shame or contrition and she respects no boundaries. I am broken. And I have no help as our local CAMHS is only funded for anorexia cases and not binge eating.

So sorry for this massive cry for help.

I struggled with BED growing up. I had mental health issues alongside it and trauma. As you know, it's not often something that happens on it's own and is a result of a complex medical issue/mental health/SEN issues.

The stealing part sounds like it's become an extreme addiction and coping mechanism. It sounds very severe to those who don't understand and as though the person must have no morals, but I can assure you this screams addiction. I'm sure underneath these behaviours you DD is a girl who is in a lot of pain and crying for help.

she needs extensive therapy and support. Maybe GP visit to get the ball rolling.

It sounds like you've done your best and you can't do it alone. You also need some support in this as well, as this is very tough on you too.

Sorry I only just noticed all your responses. By the sounds of it, you are doing the absolute best you can and in touch with the right people.

These things do seem to take a lot of time to get going, as does recovery but there is light at the end of the tunnel and the appropriate care for her is out there x

Totally this poor girl.this isn't a " bad " person doing immoral things.this is a very sick child.

@SugarplumFairyyy , thanks for sharing your personal experience. Please may I ask how you managed to get in control of your BED? And, also, what those supporting you could have done to help?

Agreed.

I am naturally very conflicted about possibly disrupting my adoption and the thought of DD being accommodated by the local authority. I have done my absolute best by DD for the past 15 years but it has been at great cost to my own physical and mental health and to the unity of my extended family. Yes, I have had to have the honest conversation with DD about the possibility of me no longer being able to meet her extensive and complex needs.

I have this problem with DS who is ASD/ADHD. I have to hide food, even things like ketchup. I hide anything sweet because he'd eat the lot. He is the same with drinks as well, particularly anything fizzy so I've stopped buying them. He can down a can or bottle in seconds, is unable to sip or measure himself. It's a bloody nightmare. He also has a very limited diet with a list of about five foods he'll eat on rotation. I try and counteract things by keeping him very active and doing lots of exercise but I worry so much for his health.

I am aware this is a widespread problem with extremes of undereating and overeating in SN kids. I've done courses, I've seen the doctor, I buy multivitamins. It's very hard going. Fortunately he doesn't steal money and I hope he wouldn't as he understands that we are on a limited income and my food budget is strict each week. However, I was given a hamper of luxury food items for Xmas and he's eaten most of it. I didn't realise because he'd left the boxes intact. So, for example, a whole box of shortbread and a whole fruit cake to name two 😩. He knew it was my gift so I was really upset. He just says sorry or blames me for leaving it out.

I don't have any answers for you but know that you're not alone

A couple of things that jump to mind reading the thread - the adoption board on here may be a good source for recommendations for trauma informed therapists, if you’ve not already posted there.

The second is about the risk of adoption breakdown. I don’t normally advocate for this, but if you find yourself getting nowhere or falling between services I would write directly to the director for children’s services setting out your DD’s needs, the support she requires, the consequences for her and your whole family if she does not receive that help and what you would like to happen next. The Adoption Support Fund exists precisely to prevent placement breakdown, there should be money available to support you. I would be absolutely blunt with the DCS as well - your daughter’s needs are extremely complex, were she to come into care she will need at best a highly skilled and experienced therapeutic foster care placement, at worst a specialist residential placement. Both will cost far more than the therapeutic support you are seeking. See if that pricks any ears up, if not I’d make a formal complaint about the application of threshold criteria and lack of adoption support and take it all the way through the statutory process - given her age I wouldn’t delay this part too long as it can be drawn out.

You’re doing a phenomenal job in extremely trying circumstances and I get the sense from your posts it’s not in your nature to be a pain in the arse but now is probably the time to be.

This sounds like such a difficult situation. I agree with those who say you’re doing so well trying to manage it. I’m glad you’re also seeking help for yourself.

As a former binge eater, for me it was definitely a symptom of other issues, and I was only able to control the eating through therapy to address the root causes. I ate to suppress feelings - while I was eating, I wasn’t thinking. I also had a lot of difficulties with the relationship between myself and my mum. She was ‘funny’ about food herself, and obsessed with my (high) weight. The more she tried to shame me or control what I ate, the more I ate secretly to spite her and to maintain control. I tried to stop several times but it was therapy as an adult that ultimately fixed the problem - i no longer needed food to calm my mind.

I don’t know if seeking private help is an option, but can recommend this organisation if so, for working with all kinds of ED in neurodivergent people.

www.healingminds.co

Thank you, I will definitely check out this recommendation; do you have personal experience?

Thank you, I’m so grateful to all the ED-experienced adults who have posted here with their advice. Please, what type of therapy helped you?

@EmmatheStageRat yes, I’m a MH professional and know the director, have also done some of their training. I’m also autistic myself.

Just a sad update, really to illustrate the depth of the problem: my mum, who is housebound and frail and lives alone, fell out of bed and was on the floor for a few (no one knows how many) hours overnight. I have what I think may be Covid or an equally nasty virus and since I felt so poorly, once I got the emergency call, I sent DD1 up with a set of house keys to assist a neighbour in getting my mum off the floor, warmed up and back into bed. All good and I was basking in feeling proud of DD1.

My mum has not been responding to her mobile phone or her landline. So I have scrounged some surgical masks, dragged myself out of my own sick bed and raced up to my mum’s house, a mile away. Mum is fine, hot porridge has been made as well as multiple covered mugs of tea. Words have been had about keeping her mobile phone about her person overnight and actually pressing the emergency button on her lifeline bracelet which connects to a 24/7 box.

Anyway, I’ve just been in mum’s pantry to fetch a new box of porridge oats to discover the following wrappers: a whole pack of bakery caramel slices, a whole family pack of cornflake cakes, a family box of cornflakes and a family grab-pack of pigs in blankets crisps. It’s a sucker punch to my stomach to realise that even a family emergency is a good opportunity for DD.

Sorry to hear your update OP. Hope you and your mum are ok. Not to make excuses for your daughter necessarily, but how is she in emergency situations/stressful situations? Might it have been the stress of the situation that compelled her to eat? Just trying to frame it another way.

i didn’t have any particular kind of therapy, just talking, although I chose someone with a particular leaning towards family relationships because I knew that’s what a lot of my issues were concerning. I had tried an eating disorder therapist before which was somewhat helpful, but had to leave when I moved. When I talked through the root causes of my stress (mainly to do with my relationship with my mum, her relationship with my dad and their drinking) I found the binge eating compulsion went away and I didn’t need specific ED help, although I’m sure this isn’t true for everyone.

Sorry - I don't have any advice or wisdom - but I hope your mum's OK and that you feel better soon. You deserve a break.

I agree! But I’ve just discovered nit eggs in DD’s hair! I’ve never experienced nits in 15 years of parenting. Happy (bloody) New Year to me! 😅 What time is too early to crack open the gin?!

Hahah! Gin initially autocorrected to ‘gun’! Maybe Google is trying to tell me something! 😅

It’s a sucker punch to my stomach to realise that even a family emergency is a good opportunity for DD.

If she’s neurodivergent and has an ED (binge eating disorder is an eating disorder) then this is a compulsion. She is unwell and can no more stop herself from binge eating than an anorexic can just decide to eat normally and not restrict. It cannot be overcome by will power. I say this kindly and with knowledge of how very hard EDs are for loved ones, and how difficult it makes things in different ways. EDs have a lot in common with addictions in that way.

Thanks for posting and sharing. Yes, I’m also on a limited budget as I am a registered carer for DD1 and also my mum so I am unable to work. DD1 is a smart girl and I have shown her our incomings vs outgoings, but it makes no difference; she will still rummage through my pockets etc for any money to piss up at the sweet shop.

I know what you mean about boxes opened by stealth; DD1 thinks that if I haven’t consumed any of my treats by December 26th, then that means I do not want them and they are fair game for her to steal. I feel like a non-person. DD never apologises for taking stuff that doesn’t belong to her; her stock response is that she ‘didn’t do that today’. She fails to grasp that if I stabbed her to death and the crime was not discovered till a few days later, that there would still be culpability on my behalf. I find it really weird.

Long shot but could school talk to her about these issues as they arise?

@Thingiemajig , I don’t have the best relationship with DD’s school any more as they have resisted my attempts to secure an EHCP for three years. I have one now - without their support - and not only does DD have an EHCP but my LA volunteered high needs top-up funding once all the reports from the experts had been provided! While DD was on a Child in Need Plan with my LA and there was a statutory need for a meeting every six weeks (not sure if the timing is correct here), the school SENCO would make the point at every meeting that they did not witness DD binge eating ever. Quite how a young person would be able to binge eat in a school setting is beyond me (and DD, who also agrees the response is ridiculous) but it is very undermining as, in my experience, the word of a school is believed much more than that of a parent.

I think it’s important to try not to ascribe your own approach to your daughters. She clearly has significant compkex trauma and this is a deeply engrained physical compulsion to deal with it. It’s not a conscious choice.

by that I mean it is understandably devastating to you the things she is doing especially re yiur mother. But it is hopefully less hurtful if you see it as a physical addiction rather than your daughter even thinking at all about your mother - does that make sense?

I have complex trauma and as I continue to heal and be more self aware I continue to be astounded by how driven I am by physical compulsions I used to not even be aware of - including with food.

by biggest insight into addiction though happened when I was out on some strong psychiatric drugs a few years ago - I hadn’t smoked for years and years and even then only casually. Within two days of starting the pills I was a full on chain smoker. And I had absolutely no control over it. I was totally shocked and for me it was a frightening insight into addiction.

getting support for complex trauma is unbelievably difficult - even if you have the money. I would just keep advocating for her everywhere you can and make it very clear to everyone you can that she really really really needs help.

the body keeps the score is a good book on the physical impact of trauma.

she’s very lucky to have you caring for her.

Thst first para sounded arsey when I didn’t mean it to you - I was trying to find a way so thst you don’t feel so personally hurt if that makes sense - I do t think you’re being unreasonable in your response.

@Edinburghmusing , I’m genuinely grateful to everyone who has taken the time to post on my thread and share their personal insights. I am not offended at all; I am desperate to learn. It’s interesting what you say about addictions; DD was born addicted to heroin (and methadone) and spent the first week + of her life in SCBU in withdrawal. Her birth father died in prison of addictions.

Please, how did you access support for your complex trauma? My dad died and has left us a small bequest and I would happily spend it on the right therapeutic intervention for DD but there are so many charlatans out there.