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Something’s not right

Faith-and-Hope
Community Guide

Re: Eating Disorder

.... continued from Night Shift this morning ..... potentially triggerin ....

@Mazarita @Former-Member  @Spookytookims @Kurra 

_________________________________________

I had watched the rest of a movie I had started with D3 the night before, the kids had decided they would have pizza because I was exhausted, and couldn't get up to make the dinner I had prepared, but S2 didn't want to be the one to order it. Presumably D3 was going to ....

I dozed off (again .... had done so late afternoon already) and woke up at 9pm WA time to find that D3 had gone into the shower, and had thought it wise to trim her hair ... except she wasn't happy with the result, and kept trimming .... 3/4 an hour later she had shoulder length hair instead of elbow length hair and came in to see me joking around about it, but clearly put out ....

I told her it was too late to order the pizza, and organised between D2 and D3 for S2 to have left-overs reheated (he would have just skipped the meal and eaten junk across the early hours of the morning, as in 3 - 4am). D2 and I had sweet potato chips and dip. D3 cooked something else for herself.

Then the cyclone hit ....

D3 came into my room and threw herself onto the bed, angry and upset about her hair, which had dried and was sitting puffy around her face, exaggerating how heavy she is at the moment. She started a self-deprecating tirade which included spouting that nothing was going to work in terms of her weight loss, so she was obviously going to have to take drastic dietary measures ....

I had tried to say several times that I wasn't up for this conversation, that she was over-wrought with the Uni tension along severity of the haircut, but that we should see how it was in the morning, and take it from there. She eventually left, leaving the door wide open, but I could feel the start of a panic attack, which is where I dived into convo with @Spookytookims on another thread, and decided to turn on piano music to help settle me down (S2 had been playing earlier).

I could tell that the way I had been feeling this week was underlying ... the sense of endless trudging towards an undetermined goal that can take over in a situation like ours if you don't keep applying distractions and mini-goals.

Five minutes later D3 returned and started again, spouting fury and starting to make it personal to our circumstances, without including WH directly, to which I responded that all this was pressing my buttons re WH and I really couldn't cope with any more ... and she was a full-on tempest by this point. That just added fuel to the fire, and after trying to stop her shouting at me by shouting back about the effect it was having on me,I had to just batten down the hatches and refuse to engage with her till she left my room again, furious, about ten minutes later.  

In that state she was just full-on reactive.  No sense or engagement of compassion was gonna get through. This is where the emotional abuse from WH has rolled forward in a pattern that can mean he is here amongst us even when he is not here, because someone has taken up his behaviour pattern and role by proxy .....

I fell asleep looking up in-patient eating disorder programmes here in our state.  I try to avoid doing that because it's like a hungry person watching other diners through a restaurant window .... and I have woken up still feeling bruised and shaken.  Am gonna get myself out for a walk and a good cry behind my sunglasses around the river, land myself in the coffee shop for something hot, and then think about getting myself to the Palm Sunday service at church.  

I will throw some sort of offer to come in D3's direction, but some of her tirade last night was about having put on so much weight that nothing in her wardrobe fits anymore, which is just making her haircut all the more toxic in her circumstances .....

😔😪😤😒😠 ..... dolphins, come to Mumma .... 

14 REPLIES 14

Re: Eating Disorder

OMG @Faith-and-Hope       For real, 

         BearHuggy.png

So sorry.   Yes hoping for dolphins and a much improved palm sunday for you.  Hope your daughter is feeling better after sleep.  Oh you poor thing, yes that would just be too much.  Thinking and hoping for you she has settled down this morning and hopefully was just the hair thing that pushed her to lash out. *fingers crossed*  anyhow.  You take care!

Spooky

Re: Eating Disorder

Thanks @Spookytookims .... still feeling steam-rolled at the moment .... and WH due back in three days .... 

Hoping to heaven that the dr deals appropriately with S2 tomorrow, that S2 opens up and shares his state of mind properly, and we have some better defences in place by the time WH steps off that plane, cos he's sure not going to cope when he realises S2 has been missing classes and sinking, and I haven't either told him, or "taken charge of S2 and sorted him out" ie been too weak as a parent according to WH's uber-controlling mindset and agitation from his mother, also in an uber-controlling by proxy mindset ....

Sigh ...

Gotta get focussed on the day I am in and get moving ....

🐬💕

Re: Eating Disorder

@Faith-and-Hope
It is so difficult when cyclones of that nature hit our homes. Re the 'hair trim' a visit to a hairdresser that understands curly hair (I'm assuming she has curls too) can result in a very stylish and becoming cut. Often a pixie type layered cut can result in a longer neck that actually minimises body size rather than accentuate it as a bob tends to. I know because I too have thrown myself in to a world of desperate hacking at my hair and ended up with an absolute disaster.

I can appreciate your concerns about her expressed interest in a more drastic diet regime. Time for a shopping trip for a few tide over garments for the moment methinks.

I am truly concerned about the catch 22 situation you are in F&H. The interminable willI won't I scenario. This is not the time to discuss this however your priority right now is to reestablish your equilibrium and move forward with dignity and grace. I believe the service for Palm Sunday will help you to ground yourself and your kids prior to WH's return this week.

Right beside you F&H 👭😙💕💜💕😙👭

May your God walk with you all, over the coming days.

Re: Eating Disorder

I have always done the haircuts for our family when money has been tight @Kurra, and done a fair gist of it, untrained, but arty enough to carry it .... have taught D3 how it's done with long hair to achieve layers perfect enough to look like a salon cut to the untrained eye, but yeah .... she won the lottery and bonus for curls in the family, and the layers don't work for her unless her hair is blow-dried straight, or straightened, so it was a bad idea from the outset.

The longer hair was adding balance to her frame, as it does for me too .....

I have mentioned elsewhere that S2 is a ball of misery, and D3 is a ball of fury, at their core .... maybe these are stages in some sort of model for families or individuals dealing with pure sort of situation, but in our state we can't access appropriate support facilities without a diagnosis over WH first, and from there looking at what has happened to the rest of us in the course of his illness progressing.

If we were to try to access private support, the bills would be crossing WH's desk, which is possible to achieve if all the kids end up at their own psychologists, sent there by the GP, but at this stage the kids are unwilling to do that. I know the fact that I visit a psychologist is a point of derision behind my back from my MIL, because I know her ideas about psychologists, and her nature, and how my attendance there will have been presented to the family. It's very likely that comments have been made within the hearing of the kids behind my back. All very toxic.

The kids are going to have to make their own choices though, and I am hoping S2 is offered and takes up the appropriate support.

The more of them that are placed under external support systems, the less I have to carry.

Thanks for listening @Kurra @Spookytookims

Re: Eating Disorder

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh - gotcha @Faith-and-Hope

 

My son was like that - in my face - always everyone else's fault and blasting the paint off the wall with his fury

 

And there was only one of him

 

Now I am stuck and there is not one useful thing I can think of to say - whoops - sorry

 

I read your last post again - still stuck - sorry again

 

Perhaps it's best to just let you vent and let you know I get it - and like I said - I only had one of these baby dragons

 

Love you Faith - keep-on-keeping-on

 

Dec

Re: Eating Disorder

Dear @Faith-and-Hope, just another post to let you know I too am listening and hearing. Like @Kurra, I feel concerned about the ongoing nature of the troubles in your family, the ongoing complications arising for all of you out of it. I also respect your decision to remain in that situation for reasons you have explained before. Hoping the hurt fades quickly for you from D3's bad treatment of you this morning. Heart

Former-Member
Not applicable

Re: Eating Disorder

@Faith-and-Hope  Thinking of you. 💜🤗 I'll respond more fully later but feeling your pain at the moment. 

Love and hugs 💜🤗

Re: Eating Disorder

@Faith-and-Hope Im just dropping in to you too.  Wanting to let you know I'm thinking of you and hoping your faith and hope, and palm sunday is helping you find a little 'you' again, today. I've told you before how much I worry about you and now I know why I have had those feelings so intensely.  You know..  it's that empath thing we both seem to feel for others innately without really knowing why or where it comes from.

i know you understand that, because you've posted about it elsewhere too.  When I tell you "take care" it feels like it comes from my soul with you.  I know you are super capable, but ...  be extra vigilant, just humour me on this and do it please.  😛

Re: Eating Disorder

Thanks @Spookytookims .... I appreciate what you are saying, and send you hugs for it .....

I am taking the best care of myself and the kids that I know how, but we have been through much worse than this already .... When I joined the forums a year ago we had come through a couple of years with WH swinging into the sort of state D3 was in last night, and landing across all of us .... sometimes in the middle of the night, and often several times a day.

D1 married and moved out last year, but she was part of what was happening here, so she knows ..... and has ended up having to help me parent the younger kids through it all.

Major melt-downs from him are now much fewer and far between .... tempered I think by the fact that I still visit a psychologist for moral support every few months. At our worst point a couple of years ago, I was attending twice-weekly sessions with the psych for four months, filling him in on what was happening thick and fast, as well as trying to convey the background family issues and schemas.

Basically we have achieved a doable balance for now while we wait for some unspecified outcome. I have been presented with a spectrum of possible outcomes, so it's unspecified within that spectrum.

We are doing a good job on the whole but S2 is barely holding it together at the moment, and blaming himself for that. I can see that it is the result of living with WH's illness. Yes, there are many other factors in play, but with a "together" Dad and "together" parents, and a "together" family life, rising over the other variables and rising to those challenges would just be par for the course.

Leaving is still the worst-looking option at the moment.
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