A tricky week in Derbyshire...

The week got progressively worse as Ben's mood deteriorated. It was a combination of school lurking on the horizon and resisting the need to exercise compulsively. Some days were OK, but ED was still there - like on Thursday at Chatsworth House cafe where he suggested 'sharing' our lunch and 'donated' some of his '"full fat" cheese to me.


While I tucked into a Magnum icecream and Millionaire's shorbread, he tucked into a Milky Way and a banana. OK, up until recently even a Milky Way would have been too scary for him which does go to show that we've come so far in so many ways. Yet ED is still in control over many areas of his life which hammers home the fact that we are still in this for the long haul. It's not over yet - and it won't be for quite a while.

Most other days he just skulked around, miserable as sin.

By Friday morning his mood had deteriorated into 'melt-down' with 'effing and blinding' shouting, tears and deep depression. So I decided to call it a day. We packed our things and came home a day early. Here at home I feel pretty darn tired - as if I've been through a very strenuous and demanding week rather than a relaxing vacation...

On the plus side, I believe he did resist the urge to exercisely compulsively. But the week wasn't entirely exercise-free. After all, we went on a walk most days and the Peak District isn't exactly the washboard-flat Norfolk Fens...

Some may accuse me of colluding with the eating disorder but before we went away we agreed to modify the Contract to make it easier for Ben to manage the holiday and resist the urge to exercise. By reducing his daily calorie intake by 100 the idea was that it would reduce the additional stress while 'experimenting' to see if his claim that - every time he kept to his daily calorie total he felt compelled to exercise thereby 'using up' the extra calories - was true or false. The scales would tell (we've still to weigh...)

In the event it didn't reduce the stress but it did mean he was able to resist the compulsions. But I feel as if I've negotiated with the ED which isn't ideal...

And now he's saying I also agreed to reduce his daily intake by a FURTHER 100 calories when he returns to school because, at school, he really will be "sitting around all day doing nothing" and this way he'd reduce the stress to manageable levels and find it easier to sleep.

I denied agreeing to that and insisted that any decision will be made based on what the scales say this weekend...

So he said that any weight gain would "destroy him" and that he had "put on tonnes of weight" recently. I pointed out that his weight is the same as it was 14 months ago. Between then and now it has been significantly lower. And so on...

But I wasn't in the mood for either discussing things calmly and in a 'dolphinesque' way - or having an argument.

So we just packed the car and came home, via Meadowhall shopping mall where I drowned my sorrows in a shoes purchase and a couple of bottles of M&S wine for later, leaving him to try and find a snack he would eat "for pudding" because "YOU say I must eat".

Hmn...

Time out while I bring in fresh anti-ED troops...