Note: This post was submitted under our previous forum system which was anonymous. Please do not be alarmed that your username is not visible alongside your post. For consistency we need to preserve anonymity in the old forum system. These topics are still active and open for comment.

Please read the Iceberg House Rules before posting or commenting in these forums. You must be logged in to post or comment.

More for family member of ED suffers

How can families help the most?

Creating healthier environment for healing

Re-exam family values

Be an example – Be a role model

Learn to listen and motivate your loved one

Develop empathy not sorry

Always have a Hope

Reed and share on Iceberg

All of us occasionally respond to a friend or family member with feelings or actions we know are not useful – no guilt

Comments

Do you believe full recovery from ED is possible?

Submitted on June 9th, 2010

Above all the sufferer’s family can hold the belief in and expectation of recovery for the sufferer. This is most important because in the negative state of mind induced by the condition the sufferer cannot even imagine what recovery is at times let alone believe it is possible. The family as they are witnessing the process from outside can hold out the prize of health and peace of mind to the sufferer.

They can believe in recovery for the sufferer until the person can believe in it themselves.

There is always a solution…:):):)

Benefits in Standing Back

Submitted on June 6th, 2010

Years ago, if someone had told my parents to take a stand back, I would have been delighted, for all the wrong reasons. My interpretation of such an idea would have been my ticket to avoiding recovery and allowing myself to continue with my conditioned behaviour. However as my mentality has now thankfully moved from very distorted thoughts to stubbornly only pro-recovery thoughts I now see the genuine and overwhelming benefits of such advise.

Eating Distress is a reaction to environment, and as that environment became more and more involved and ultimately based around my condition I became more and more stressed, ashamed, guilty, stuck and enthralled in it. One thing you can be sure of is that your child sleeps, lives and breathes eating distress and self berating. Nothing else occupies their mind. The best thing that you can do is offer up the alternative. You can show them how to live, by carrying on with your own life.

Eating distress had become my identity…..and was scarily close to becoming my families too. It is hardly surprising that the notion of a normal life seemed so unrealistic and scary, because nothing about my life was! Nothing! Like everyone that suffers with eating distress, I was hugely sensitive, and picking up on every negative emotion in the house.

Somehow, by trusting the advice of my therapists my parents found the courage to stand back from my recovery, and step back into Life. It might sound like a contradiction, but by them standing back….I had never felt so supported. Belief and Hope in full freedom was what I lacked most. I was introduced to it in sessions with therapist but having it continue into my home life meant it slowly became part of both my and their reality. My sensitivity learned to tune into the positive emotions, even more so than the negative ones. It would seem that’s all I needed; It was the best gift they ever gave me.

The most practical advice/sharing that I can give you based on my experience is don’t adopt the role of being the parent of an Eating Distress- get on with your own life, while offering support and consideration to your child’s pain. Just because I was the ED sufferer, every individual in my family was suffering in their own way , find someone that you can vent and talk through your emotions with, never your child though- they’re having enough challenges and realisations (to fill about 20 heads) to try and process without absorbing yours too. When they display emotions, don’t ask them “What’s wrong” because very often, they’ll have no specific answer. Just give them a hug, or an understanding eye. Never blame yourself for their condition. Similarly never blame them! Nobodies a saint, we’re all gonna flip sometimes…. that’s human! Forgive yourself for frustrated outburst, and seek out ways to avoid them in the future. Remember that while the condition can provoke dishonesty, slyness and angry outbursts, this is not your child’s real nature.

Remember—EATING DISTRESS is only a temporary lodger in your home!! Temporary!

It may sound like a cop out that once everyone stops focussing primarily on the food and behaviours, that’s when they will sort themselves out, but coming from someone who spent nearly every waking moment trying just about every possible route to self destruction –it’s true!

Full freedom requires the past to be learnt on, and then left where it belongs…The past. By stepping back from the process the transition from painful past to a contented present and an optimistic future will be so much easier!

As they make their journey through recovery appreciate your child as they are….whatever stage they are at, and never relate them to their past behaviours. This will help them discover faster who they are without the ED and realise they no longer need it as part of their identity.

Recovered

There is always a solution…:):):)

I like this

Submitted on June 6th, 2010

I like this quotation:

The family is our refuge and springboard. Nourished on it, we can advance to new horizons. In every conceivable manner, the family is the link to our past, bridge to our future.

(Alex Haley)

There is always a solution…:):):)