It was my sister who first noticed my 11-year-old son's dramatic weight loss. He had been wearing very baggy jumpers and I had not seen him topless since summer but during a long weekend visit to see her, she happened to see his torso as he was changing. She pulled me aside and told me how shocked she was to see him so skinny.
How could I have not noticed?
I have sent myself crazy over the years, wondering why he developed an eating disorder. Was our parenting to blame? Did I contribute to his anxiety? Was I unintentionally passing on subliminal messages about weight loss?
My main responsibility was to keep my children fed and healthy and I was failing miserably.
He did not have a mobile phone, only accessed the internet for school projects and wasn't exposed to social media. In fact, being raised on a farm in a tiny rural community, his exposure to the wider world was quite limited.
He had always been a placid child, good at school, tidy. A people pleaser. Years later when I asked him why he thought he had an eating disorder, he responded simply by saying "I didn't want to get fat."
Was it that simple? Or was it a multitude of triggers, including his personality that created a 'perfect storm' for his disorder to thrive?
He's always loved physical activity especially hiking and running, so when he would spend ages on my exercise bike, or running after school, I thought nothing of it. He justified it by saying he was training for the upcoming school cross country. I was just grateful that he wasn't spending his spare time on his Nintendo.
Adrianne was thrilled to see her son outside exercising rather than playing games indoors. Source: YouTube
But I began to notice he was using a smaller bowl with not much food in it and my research with Dr Google confirmed he displayed about 8 of the 10 common signs of an eating disorder. When I contacted the school principal to discuss my suspicions, she reported he was throwing his lunch in the bin.
Eventually a psychologist diagnosed he was controlling his anxiety through food. He had difficulty keeping his body warm and started to grow downy hair all over his body as a physiological response. His personality became zombie like, he was pale and had trouble being happy. My heart bled. My main responsibility was to keep my children fed and healthy and I was failing miserably.
Frantic, I demanded the psychologist refer him to the ED unit at Princess Margaret Hospital in Perth but she refused – he was so naive to his own disorder that she didn't want him picking up strategies from the other patients. We tried everything to thwart his devious methods to get rid of food but none of it worked.
Mealtimes became a battleground and something we both dreaded, with screaming matches, arguments, crying and a battle of wills because I was convinced he was going to die before my eyes. I sat there for hours trying to make him feed just like I did when he was a baby and then slinking around like a spy to see what he did with the food. My placid son started to resent me.
Adrianne discovered her son was throwing out his school lunch. (AAP Image/Mick Tsikas) Source: AAP
Eventually we began Family Based Therapy and after a few more months, the new psychologist was working wonders. We spoke one on one and with the whole family together.
He learned it was okay to tell people how he feels even though the other person might not like to hear it and soon began to show signs of rebellion like 'normal' kids his age.
It took a year but he found his way back to the average weight range and five years on he is still recovered. I am immensely proud at how he has grown in self confidence, rises to any challenge and is now a normal, happy and healthy 16-year-old with great friends, a few football trophies on his shelf and studying for possible admission into university.
...any dramatic loss in weight is not normal and the alarm bells should start ringing.
Parents of boys need to be just as vigilant as they would be for daughters about changes in food intake and exercising. The scaling back of food will be subversive and the exercise "justified", but any dramatic loss in weight is not normal and the alarm bells should start ringing.
Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for boys to go untreated longer and to receive less professional care than girls because there are few services are designed to meet their specific needs. The stigma associated with having a 'female disease' also contributes to a delay in seeking help.
In our society, kids get mixed messages from the media. On one hand, they are bombarded daily with ads for junk food, yet the same magazines and television shows that display these ads also celebrate pencil-thin female or six-pack male models.
This has created a state of confusion and anxiety for many prepubescent as well as adolescents children. Personally, I no longer speak in terms of being "fat" or "skinny" but now use the terminology of healthy or unhealthy.
Although it was the worst year of my life, I thank my son for bringing our family closer than we have ever been. I'm a firm believer the early intervention and the family therapy with a competent psychologist were key factors in his road to recovery.
Catch up on Insight's look at when trying to be healthy becomes unhealthy, here:
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