Hello fellow Pilgrims…
On my 21st birthday, I kissed a boy. A boy I barely knew and 14 months later I married him. Nearly 30 years later, he still calls me his lovely bride and our kiss remains the best decision I ever made. Jeffrey remains the smartest person in every room I enter, he is thoughtful-not shy, funny, humble, and compassionate. He is more than a lover and friend; Jeff is a partner in every sense. When we make decisions, they are joint. It is not one pulling the other along. We are a couple who play to our strengths and protect our spouse’s vulnerabilities. Jeff is the reason I started writing— he really did more than nudge, he told me to. And as a result, I feel it gives me permission to occasionally have him pen a guest post. After all it has been nearly six years since the last time. Each time he writes, I fall in love with his words, his world view, and the life he has built for our family. After reading this piece, I think you will see why I love him. I also hope this becomes PilgriamgeGal’s most popular post- it’s only fitting. -K
My lovely bride, Kathryn/PilgrimageGal has been sharing our story of battling ED (Eating Disorder). As a result, she often spends time in Facebook groups providing encouragement to other families battling ED. According to Kathryn, and not to perpetuate any stereotypes, it appears that the majority of her audience is, well Mom’s.
She suggested that “We” write a post to offer the Dad’s perspective. And by “We”, she meant “Me”.
I pushed back, I mean why should the Dad perspective really be any different, and what could I possibly offer?
However, being the persuasive spouse she is, she convinced me to give it a go. (And despite what she said in the intro, we do occasionally pull each other along. But its always gently, with love and for the greater good.)
As a starting point, I wrote a blog post almost 6 years ago about being a spouse of someone with a chronic disease, titled Clive's Guest Post (No my name is not Clive, but that’s a story for another day.) The too long didn’t read (TL/DR) pull out quote is:
When the most important job you will ever have is, taking care of your family, really the choice is already made. You pull on your big boy pants and you do what you have to do.
When you have a child with an eating disorder, you don’t have the option of sitting on the sideline, you get in the game and do what you have to do to get them well. So, if you are a DAD not buying into the eating disorder treatment of your child, all I can tell you is, GET OVER IT and GET WITH THE PROGRAM!
What does getting with the program mean? I can only speak for what worked for us, but here goes…
(First to be fair, I’ll keep it gender neutral, since in reality it could be a Mom who needs to hear these words as much as a Dad.)
Every couple typically has a division of labor. One person mows the lawn, while the other does the laundry, one does the grocery shopping, while the other pays the bills, etc. It's natural for someone to take the lead on battling ED. But let’s be clear, battling ED is an all-hands-on deck experience. Every adult in the house needs to be on the same page and sending the same message and working hard to lead the child through recovery.
Our path to wellness is through Family Based Treatment (FBT). Emphasis on the “Family”. This isn’t Mom’s Based Treatment or Dad’s Based Treatment, its FAMILY Based Treatment.
I hope you have a therapist or doctor helping to walk you through the FBT rules and process. Ideally, both parents will be in those early sessions to help build and understand the plan. If that is not possible, then the lead parent needs to set the rules that will be followed by everyone in the house. If you aren’t there to help develop the plan, you don’t get to criticize it after the fact.
The fastest way to derail a treatment plan and slow down the path to wellness is for someone in the house to say in front of the child battling ED,
That looks like too much food on the plate,
or
I think it will be OK if she doesn’t finish dinner this one-time.
or
Let’s just make up the calories later…
Any questions or disagreements on the feeding plan, must be made outside the hearing of the child. When I made a mistake, Kathryn would quietly say,
Time for a washing machine talk,
and we would head out to the garage to discuss the eating rules and clarify what we should be doing.
If one’s parent or an in-law is around at meal times sending the wrong message it can derail weeks or months of progress. You may have to have a stern talk with your parents. Don’t make the other spouse talk to their in-laws. Each spouse needs to control their own parents. If the grandparents can’t follow the rules, then they aren’t allowed in the house.
If you’re not the spouse taking the lead on handling the ED treatment of your child, then you need to follow the rules. Do the assigned reading. Don’t derail the treatment because your gut says you're being too hard on the child. Trust me, ED doesn’t care about being too hard on your child.
I was lucky, I had an understanding boss and could work flexible hours and my office was 5 minutes from my child’s school. I was able to attend a lot of the therapy appointments. On many days, I was able to eat my lunch with my daughter at school, to make sure she was eating and help her through the stress of lunchtime.
If you aren’t able to do those things, don’t beat yourself up, but realize you may need to be extra supportive of the spouse who is doing those things.
Let’s face it, in many situations, one spouse needs to work full time (or more) to make sure the bills get paid, while the other may become the full-time caregiver and ED manager.
However, never forget that battling ED is a 24 hour per day, 7 day a week job. It never takes the weekend off; it never takes a holiday. I don’t care how stressful your job is, I will have a hard time believing it is more stressful than battling ED and being responsible for making sure your child doesn’t die from an eating disorder. So, when you come home after a 9–10-hour day, remember your spouse may have spent the day at the kitchen table. 2 hours getting your child to eat breakfast, then another hour for the mid-morning snack, then 2 more hours getting them to eat lunch, with food throwing, yelling, cursing and crying. Maybe they had a doctor or therapist appointment on top of all that. Don’t be surprised if dinner isn't waiting on the table and you don’t get to sit down and watch the game or evening news quietly with your evening cocktail. And when the weekend rolls around, be ready to step in and give the parent who has been leading the ED battles at meal time all week a break.
If there are other kids in the house, things get even more complicated. Be careful, that one parent doesn’t get to become the fun parent who gets to distract the other kids by taking them to the movies, soccer games, etc., while the spouse who has ED lead continues the battle at home.
Ideally with 2 parents sharing the load, you can tag each other out. Kathryn and I could read each other pretty well. When she saw I was getting frustrated, she could take over. When I saw her wearing thin, I would tell her to go get some rest and I finished the meal. We would take turns taking our other child to see a movie on the weekend or other distractions. We would take turns being good cop/bad cop. Kathryn definitely had the lead, she understood the FBT ins and outs better than me, but we worked together.
We make a good team. She was good in the heat of the moment when an individual meal went south, while I was good at the big picture and used my nerdiness to track calories and weights in spreadsheets. Each spouse playing to their strengths.
Battling ED is a slog. There’s no way to sugar coat it. There is no secret quick fix. Severe cases can take a year or more to get to a point where you can be comfortable letting your child go off to a sleepaway camp for just a few days.
Battling ED can also be demoralizing, scary and frustrating. When your little pig tailed darling is suddenly screaming that she hates you because she doesn’t want to eat, it breaks your heart. You’ll also make mistakes. My low point was one afternoon, when I gave my daughter a milkshake for her snack. A drink she had completed several days in a row without question. This day, suddenly she balked and wouldn’t drink it. I talked calmly telling her she didn’t have a choice. As she continued to argue, I felt my frustration slowly climb, until I suddenly blurted out, way too loudly,
Just drink the F-ing milk shake!
(Full embarrassing disclosure, I used the full F word expletive.) Her eyes suddenly got very big, as did mine as I realized what I had done. I stepped away for just a second to take a few deep breaths, then returned to the table to apologize. That was one of the low points and certainly took me out of the running for Father of the Year.
The hardest lesson to learn was that being the authoritarian doesn’t work. Bribing them doesn’t result in long term recovery. All the parenting tricks you thought you had to get them to pick up their toys or do their homework, no longer apply. They eat or there are consequences. End of story.
ED steals your child from you. But your child is still there, trapped inside and they will reveal themselves in the quiet moments. At night, as I tucked her into bed, she often had anxiety and would ask me to stay for a few minutes to help her wind down. As a distraction to keep her mind from spinning, we would play the alphabet game. Where you pick a subject “Harry Potter”, then take turns saying, A for Albus, B for Bellatrix, C for Charms, etc.
I said, D for dog.
Dog? What dog?
Harry Potter’s dog!
Dad, Harry Potter didn’t have a dog!, you’re terrible at this game, and I hear her quietly giggle.
In the darkness, I smile.
Regardless of the food battles earlier in the day, in those moments she was back to being my pig tailed baby as we both forget about ED for a few minutes as she drifts off to sleep.
My wife calls these, exquisite moments. The moments are still there. You need to appreciate them and hold them close and remember them when ED flairs and the battles over food commence. As recovery continues, the exquisite moments will become more frequent until they out number the battles. And they will be with you forever as the memories of ED fade into the past.
So, if you’re still the spouse that isn’t fully on board yet. All I can say is, “GET OVER IT and GET WITH THE PROGRAM!”
Your child deserves every ounce of strength you have, to help them get better.
As Kathryn and I approach the 4-year anniversary of our daughter being admitted to Rady Children’s Hospital with a severe case of anorexia, we rejoice in the knowledge that she is well on the road to permanent recovery. Most days we can happily forget that she has an eating disorder. Meals and snack times are stress free. However, we remain vigilant and will continue to carefully monitor her through high school and beyond.
My daughter’s current state of wellness is due to us following FBT.
And due to the fact that my wife in protective mama bear mode wouldn’t accept anything but full and total recovery. She is also willing to hold me equally accountable for my daughter’s wellness.
We’re not special. Just two parents equally committed to ensuring our children are healthy and bringing all our skills to the table to make it a reality.
You can do it too.
- Jeff (a.k.a. Mr. PilgrimageGal)
Links embedded in this blog post, include:
https://www.pilgrimagegal.com/archive/2014/03/clives-guest-post.html
https://www.pilgrimagegal.com/archive//2015/09/exquisite-everyday-moments-with-beauties.html
https://www.pilgrimagegal.com/archive//2012/11/the-name-we-dont-speak-of.html
(photo credit: PilgrimageGal)