Times 2 - UK (2020-09-07)

6 1GT Monday September 7 2020 | the times

life

recognise the personal strengths that

she can utilise to address her

significant vulnerabilities.

Many parents worry that if they

cease to be vigilant around the eating

disorder and have a more relaxed

relationship with their child they will

be somehow “giving permission” for

the eating disorder to exist. That is not

the case. You have made your

concerns clear, but you are not the

right person to enable your daughter

to acknowledge the changes she needs

to make. I advise that you reframe

your relationship in a way that reduces

the unhappiness for you both.

You hate your daughter’s eating

disorder, but you don’t hate her. If you

can separate these, then perhaps you

can enable her to do that for herself

and use her resilient, more adult self

to manage the anxious eating-disorder

self. When she abuses you, see this as

the eating disorder abusing you as it

abuses her. A very helpful book is Life

Without Ed: How One Woman Declared

Independence from Her Eating Disorder

by Jenni Schaefer. See also

tinyurl.com/y3lucho5.

The love you show can, however,

have elements of tough love. I agree

that your daughter needs to move out

and so you can set that boundary —

not as a punishment but as an

acknowledgment that you are not

helping her with her eating disorder

and also you need to step away from

the stress and take care of yourself.

This will also push your daughter into

a more self-sufficient space. If you

continue to fund her therapy make

sure it is with an accredited therapist

who specialises in eating disorders.

For further advice and support

contact the excellent charity

Beat at beateatingdisorders.org.uk

(helpline: 0808 8010677) and ABC at

tinyurl.com/y4dnu7kf (support line:

03000 11 12 13). I wish you and your

daughter well.

If you would like Professor

Tanya Byron’s help, email

[email protected]

argued that the continuing emotional

enmeshment between you and her

does, to some degree, maintain her

eating disorder.

Despite many adult achievements in

her life, eg partner, friends and job, her

relationship with food is immature and

regressed. Your frustration comes from

perceiving her as an angry, recalcitrant

child and you step in (with good

intentions) as a more prescriptive

mother, which infantilises her, hence

her pushback and further regression

(eg stealing food and lying, swearing at

and dismissing you). So point one is

that if you want her to behave like an

adult and take responsibility for

herself you must treat her like one.

This will be hard because it requires

you to take a full step back and let

your daughter get on with things

herself. If things deteriorate, then she

will need more intensive professional

help. Sometimes things have to get

worse before they improve because the

individual who needs to make

significant changes has to decide that

change is necessary for themselves. It

could be argued that while you prompt

and push her, she gets no closer to

deciding that she needs to take

responsibility and instead battles

you for telling her to.

Point number two is to shift

your perception of your daughter

from a deficit focus (her eating

disorder) to a strength focus

(her ability to complete her

degree, get employment, and

have and maintain good

relationships). Your

relationship with her has

become defined by her eating

disorder and consequently is

fraught and negative. A person

struggling to the degree that she

has will never feel motivation to

change if they feel judged. While

logically it seems absurd that she

would self-sabotage in the way that

she does, she is really struggling with

self-loathing and body hatred. She

needs compassionate understanding to

My daughter’s eating disorder has destroyed our relationship

Q

NN

QQQ

My relationship with

my daughter has

broken down. She has

had an eating disorder

for eight years,

starting when she was

in her mid-teens. NHS treatment

worked on weight restoration so

once her weight was up she was

discharged. She found this time

extremely upsetting and unhelpful.

She restricts her food, then binges

and purges. She is very thin and is

often asked if she is a model, which I

think reinforces her eating disorder.

Her problem got worse when she

went to university where she had a

short period of counselling. She was

unable to complete her final year

because her housemates couldn’t

deal with her eating disorder any

more and told her to leave. This

devastated her because she

considered them friends.

She moved back home and

eventually managed to complete her

degree. She has twice spoken to her

GP, but was told her BMI wasn’t low

enough and directed to websites.

This has made her afraid to go back

and made the disorder worse. We

now pay for private therapy, which

she says helps, but she still has the

eating disorder.

For the past few years our

relationship has been tricky. I have

talked to her about her eating and

encouraged her to put strategies in

place, eg an eating plan, but she

refuses. When I encouraged her to

write a list and took her to the

supermarket she had a huge

screaming and crying episode and

I ended up taking her home.

We constantly argue about meals,

food or how she is feeling. If I ignore

things we get on a bit better, but

shouting, screaming and swearing

have been normalised in our

relationship. I do also get angry and

have shouted and sworn back at her

and now feel furious with her for the

slightest thing. A big problem is that

Ask Professor Tanya Byron

at night she will binge on foods that

we have bought for meals, then lie,

shout or swear at me. Recently we

had a row that I said was

unacceptable and I told her she

would have to move out because I

couldn’t deal with her any more.

She is now 22 and has a job, friends

and a boyfriend, so I think she is

functioning OK. I had my own

struggles with cancer a few years

ago, so I feel I need to take care of

myself too. How can I improve our

relationship and help her to make

the most of her life?

Diane

A

NN

A

Eating disorders can

be destructive not just

to the individual

struggling but also to

those close to them.

What you describe

sounds extremely entrenched and

evidently, despite your best intentions,

you are not facilitating a process of

change. Indeed, when considering

mental health and associated

behavioural difficulties, not only is it

important to assess the problem from

the perspective of the individual

struggling with it, it is also necessary

to assess the impact of family and

other close relationships on the

development and maintenance of the

problem behaviour.

It would be helpful to separate

your daughter’s relationship with

her eating disorder from your

relationship with it. While they are

undoubtedly bound up with each

other, the only thing you can

control is how her eating disorder

affects you and how you affect her

eating disorder. Understandably,

you are beside yourself with

anxiety as you helplessly watch

your daughter sabotage her health

and wellbeing. You are also,

justifiably, frustrated and angered

by this and her abusive behaviour

towards you. None of this helps

you or her and indeed it can be

You need

to let your

daughter

get on with

things

herself

help. So

worse b

individu

significa

change

could be

and pus

deciding

respons

you

P

you

fro

d

(h

de

h

r

d

fr

st

ha

chan

logica

would

she doe

self-loat

needs c

ions,

of

s it

rom

ary

the

e

r

h