Dr Sarah Ravin speaks sense....

Thank you to my dear friend, Mamame from the ATDT Forum and FEAST, for this link to Dr Sarah Ravin's latest article. (She is a really clued-up US expert on eating disorders.) The content is particularly relevant to us at the moment as it becomes increasingly clear that at least one half of our treatment team is, unfortunately, living in the past, adhering to outdated theories rather than modern evidence-based eating disorders treatment.

The more I think about it, the more I'm angry about Fri's CAMHS session...

Seeing Ben and H go off cycling today spoke volumes about where Ben is in the weight recovery stakes. He may be within the first 6% centile of boys of his age, height, etc, but in my very strong opinion he is NOT Weight Restored...

1.2kg weight gain since our last scales session... BMI now 19.7

Mixed messages at our CAMHS session yesterday with the psych's assistant. Some of it was absolutely OK, but my gut instinct wasn't too sure about other bits - unless it was the assistant's clever way of making Ben react in a positive way to yet more weight gain... It might be... so the jury, as they say, is out on that... But the Very Good News is that, 10 weeks into the Contract, and over the past 8 weeks, Ben has averaged out at a weekly weight gain of 0.4kg which is almost what the NICE Guidelines recommend. Considering that for MONTHS, he'd lost and then maintained (after an initial fast gain right at the start of our CAMHS treatment last spring), I think that's well worth celebrating!

A bit of bribary (hopefully) goes a long way...

The prices of Ben's favourite Warhammer models go up tomorrow, so yesterday he wanted to do a 'bulk buy' online. He didn't have enough cash so he asked for an 'advance' on the Contract points money. So I thought about it and said "OK, yes, in principle, but it would have to be a 'conditional' loan"...

Delegating and talking...

Thanks for the lovely feedback re. my "cry for help" the other day! Ben offered to clean the house yesterday afternoon in exchange for some new shoes he wanted, so that's sorted for a while. My sis has been visiting my Dad and is going again tonight, so I won't need to go until tomorrow. As you'll see from my other entry, my wonderful friend S has been brilliant; her cups of tea are positively soothing. And I had a word with Ben about his behaviour the other night...

Watch Laura from ATDT and FEAST on the telly!

Laura Collins, the founder of FEAST and its ATDT forum has just recorded a TV interview talking about FEAST and also explaining how parents / carers are central to helping their teenagers recover from this dangerous but treatable illness. See her here>> And read her own comments on her blog here>> It is excellent and well worth watching if you're a parent or carer of a teenager with anorexia or another eating disorder.

Some people are AMAZING... positively SAINTLY!

I have a friend who I will call Sarah who I briefly mentioned in the last entry. Sarah has Secondary Breast Cancer which has spread to her lungs, spine and liver. She is currently having horrible intravenous Chemo which makes her feel pretty naff most of the time and all her lovely hair has fallen out. Yet Sarah has a cunning way of getting you to come clean with what's bugging you - and also of phoning you when you could really use a good chat with a friend. She is a saint.

A bit of "me time" urgently required, I think...

You know when you pour something into a jar and you can't get the lid on because there's just too much in it? Well, that's my brain at the moment and I appear to have reached yet another "burn-out". However, as we parents know, it's not like a stressful job where you can just walk out and never come back; we're in this for the long-haul, whether we like it or not and whether we can handle it or not. Basically we have no choice. There are 6 things going on at the moment which are causing a serious power surge in my brain -

Early warning signs in boys - what to look out for...

Today I was thinking back nostalgically to our family holidays before the anorexia muscled its way into our lives. Anorexia wasn't even on our radar; that's something that happened to girls, not boys. Not in a million years of my wildest nightmares could I have dreamed that my wonderful teenage son was developing anorexia nervosa. Maybe if he'd have been a girl, I'd have been alerted sooner. But I thought it might help other worried parents of boys if I listed the warning signs that should have set the alarm bells ringing that all was not right with our son...

Blog from summer 2009... frantically cooking...

Back in 2009 I used to write a regular blog for a local newspaper and I've just had a quick look back on my entries for summer 2009 to see if they shed any light on the early signs of Ben's eating disorder. Here's one I found about his new-found passion for cooking - and there are SO MANY CLUES dotted throughout it that it makes me want to scream to myself "Why didn't the alarm bells start ringing?!!!!!!" Instead, I was simply inspired to write an 'amusing' blog...

Kentucky Fried Chicken ad makes me think back...

Watching a Kentucky Fried Chicken ad on the telly yesterday reminded me of one of the very early indicators that all was not right with our son, back in the summer of 2009. It was early August and H, Ben, Ben's friend and me had gone down to London for my sister-in-law's birthday party - a lively drinks and buffet party at her home. I was vaguely aware that Ben wasn't eating much - just picking at the buffet now and again, and being very selective with what he ate.

No, it's NOT OK for Ben to reach a weight he "feels happy with" and stick there...

Thank you, Giant Fossilized Armadillo, for your comment on my last entry. (GFA has been part of our network of mums and recovered eating disorder patients that have been tremendous help over the past year or so.) And the first thing that came to mind when I read her comment on the cognitive healing which comes with being Weight Restored at a proper, healthy weight was this...

Bit of furniture throwing at CAMHS...

A few months ago it was the table; yesterday it was the heavy arm chair which Ben picked up and threw across the room at our CAMHS session before punching the wall and walking out. Thankfully he eventually returned and we were able to resume our session. Then, to rub salt into the wound, we returned to my car to find it had been "keyed" all the way along the side resulting in what will be around £150-worth of work to put right. So not a good afternoon, all in all...

Why is the fear of weight gain still such an issue?

I get so frustrated that, at this advanced stage in recovery, Ben still stresses about putting on weight. Today I asked him if we could work on doing full days at school once the AS Level exams are over and he starts A2 course work towards the end of this term. "Not if I find I've put on loads of weight next Friday", he said.

My latest ATDT Forum thread on our Recovery Contract

Because one of the other mums on the wonderful ATDT Forum was responsible for inspiring our (so far) successful Recovery Contract, I posted an update on the Forum yesterday to tell everyone how we are doing. Read it here>>

On this day 12 months ago...

Inspired by a thread on the positively saintly ATDT forum, I took a quick look back at where we were exactly one year ago today. Here's my (edited) thread for Monday 16th May 2010 plus my responses to the various bits of excellent advice (read the original thread here>>):

Exam week - and what a change from last year!!!!!!

This time last year Ben sat his GCSEs. He'd been away from school since March, unable to face it at all. The school arranged for him to sit his exams in a separate room away from the main examination hall. And before each exam he registered in the school Medical Centre rather than the form room. In other words, everything was carefully managed so Ben didn't have to meet any of his peers at what was an extremely stressful time for all of them. Being with his peers would have stressed out Ben and could easily have resulted in him walking out and going AWOL - or just freaking out during the exam which, in turn, would have upset everyone else. I'd drive Ben to school because the eating disorder fueled social anxieties prevented him from getting the school bus and we'd deliberately arrive at school after the other pupils had gone to their class rooms. That's how bad things were...

Up 1.8kg on Friday!

Funny how for me it was a cause of celebration whereas for him it was a cause of shock... Thankfully he began to accept it as OK after a while as I reminded him that we're looking at gradual weight gain over the LONG TERM and when we pan out and look at the past month the weight gain is actually very manageable. Mind you, I know it's going to be difficult if he puts on a similar amount next time he's weighed. I don't believe he would be able to handle that at this stage unfortunately... UNLESS we pan out to the long term again and the rational side of his mind accepts that as being OK. As any parent of an eating disorder teenager will know, rational thinking goes totally AWOL for quite a few months as the condition gets worse. But the Good News is that it gradually comes back. This is why I am keeping a chart to show the GRADUAL increase over the long term to avoid potential knee-jerk reactions.

What a week!

Blogger is finally back in action after being offline every time I clicked on it... Meanwhile what a week's it been what with the weekend (already alluded to) and my dad deteriorating daily until he was hospitalised yesterday (and still continues to deteriorate...) Meanwhile Ben has cooked 3 evening meals VERY SUCCESSFULLY because I've been too busy sorting out my parents. We've had sausage, butter bean and veg casserole; chorizo and chicken jambalaya with pitta breads; and creamy home-baked ham with leak and mushroom spaghetti - all without "slimming them down" in any way. And today Ben has put on 1.5kg in weight at his fortnightly weighing session...

OK, so where shall I begin...?

Probably at the end and work backwards... Starting with my 84 year old mum who's just called to say my elderly Dad is "playing up" again and she wants to come round to let off steam (he had a seizure in November resulting in delirium; to all intents and purposes he seemed to have made a reasonable recovery but now he's snapped back into old behaviours and making things impossible for her...) Preceded by my back agony which has been hellish all weekend... Preceded by the fact my M-in-Law wouldn't even look at me, let alone talk to me by the funeral yesterday. Why? Because I'd deliberately kept a low profile all weekend, much of the time keeping Ben (and as a result H) away from the chaotic emotional hot-house that was my sis-in-law's house where everyone else was staying because the whole situation was having an horrendous "trigger" effect on Ben's eating disorder behaviours and risked messing up the entire weekend for everyone - yet I think my in-laws probably took this as me being rude and keeping Ben and H at arm's length on what was a very important family weekend. A textbook case of not being able to please all of the people all of the time and ending up pleasing none of the people all of the time...

Crazy in-laws family here we come...

So tomorrow we're off to London to my H's crazy family for the funeral - and a weekend of haphazard eating and goodness-only-knows-what-else awaits. One thing is certain, it's not going to be a smooth ride as there's always some kind of Extreme Trauma going on with someone in the family which results in the whole family talking about nothing else all weekend. This is a family of High Drama - from the wayward uncle who ran away with the gypsies when he was a boy to various mental health problems (the genes associated with which, I often wonder, may be the cause of our own problems over the last 20 months or so...) - not to mention a host of other dramas which I'd really rather not go into here... Plus all the heightened emotions that a family funeral brings... And meanwhile I have Ben and his eating disorder to worry about... No-one could accuse us of leading a boring, uneventful life... but I sometimes wish we did...

CAMHS can of worms?

Sometimes I wonder if our CAMHS visits are just opening up a can of worms that is better left on the shelf... What I mean is... Ben and I are pretty close. These days he's happy to talk to me about pretty much anything to do with his eating disorder and anything else, basically because he knows I "get it". We're also very similar people. I know the current issues as regards his recovery and everything is going reasonably well, despite the odd blip which is only normal in what is bound to be a bumpy ride to a certain extent. Basically, I believe I know pretty much what is going on inside his head these days...

These things always seem to affect the really nice teenagers...

I was having a chat with Ben today about how, in our experience, eating disorders and other mental illnesses seem to affect the nicest and most sensitive of teenagers rather than 'the idiots' (as we call them) who just go out and get drunk. A massive over-generalisation no doubt, but it's our opinion anyway...

Okay, so 'Plan B' (and now 'C') for the weekend is...

I've been mulling over the problem of H's family's haphazard attitude to mealtimes coupled with the problem of not being at home with our usual Eating Plan this weekend and this is the Plan I propose to put forward to Ben:

Bit of a gap since last entry

Bit of a busy week what with all the Easter bank holidays, then the Royal Wedding and bank holidays. During this time I've managed to injure my hip somehow and am in AGONY when sitting down and standing up (OK walking or climbing stairs, though...) so that's put a damper on things. Been busy with work, too, which isn't easy when you have a short week due to bank hols and are in agony. Then, over the Easter weekend, husband's grandad passed away so we're all off to London next weekend for the funeral and meanwhile the family fights over what they should have at the funeral, etc. Me, I keep well out of it. Thankfully, everything is still going fine with Ben's recovery and he's back at school after the Easter break. AND I insisted on a permanent increase in daily calories at CAMHS on Wednesday when it was found that Ben had LOST WEIGHT by almost the amount he put on last month. Thus far he has kept to this increase. But there may be a spanner in the works when we go to London at the weekend...