Luna's fight with Anorexia Nervosa (true story)

11

July 2010, 13 years old
POV Robert

Luna is admitted in a clinic for 24-hour treatment. The situation became unsustainable. She didn't get better from day treatment and we couldn't do it anymore either. Admitting that really feels like failing, but this illness creates so much struggle.

We are fighting the disease, but Luna is taking it like a battle against her. In her eyes, we think that she does everything wrong, that she is a problem, that she is burden for everyone. We just want her to get better, to be happy again, and to be able to enjoy life, to laugh again.

It's summer break. Maria will soon leave to Italy with Emily and Naomi. Not the whole family has to suffer from luna's illness. Someone needs to be with her, but the girls need a vacation too. Maria is having a hard time going, to let Luna go for a while, leave it to me.

I like staying at home. To rest for a while, to be alone for a while, we live close to the clinic so I can visit Luna a lot. But the empty house is also nice. Too much has happened these past few months. A break is more than welcome.

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POV Maria

The idea of going to Italy while Luna withers away in the clinic is making me nervous. When it was decided that it was better to treat her clinically, we didn't really know what we were saying yes to.

I was startled when I saw the common living room and her own room. Of course they tried to make it cozy, but it's not a home. When we heard that we can only visit twice a week and during the weekend on an arrangement, I almost took her home again. But then what?

We couldn't do it anymore at home. It always went well for a few days, with a lot of effort and guidance, Luna ate everything that was on her eating list and then gained a little weight. The weight gain frightens her so badly that she immediately stopped eating. We were at our wits end.

But now she's there. With even less to do than at day treatment. When I imagine how she has to go to bed by herself at night, no hug, no one tucking her in, my heart breaks. We call before so goes to bed, but recently she doesn't to talk to us anymore.

When we visit her we go straight outside. She's not allowed to walk, it's weird because my child never sat still for a second, was running across the hockey field half a year ago, now sits in a wheelchair. She wants to move, but every movement burns calories. Calories she barely gets with the small bits she eats. The city where the clinic is is not exactly a nice area to walk around, but we do our best to discover nice parks.

We doubt the effectiveness of this admission. Yes of course, she eats supervised, she gains a little weight again, and she's out of the danger zone. But the reason why she doesn't want to eat is hardly addressed. Her self image, her interpretation of how people look at her. It's not being worked on.

There isn't even a treatment plan yet. Everyone is doing their best, we can see that. For each conversation they take all time needed, but in the waiting room the next hopeless parent waits.  The staff spend hours supervising the meal times. For playing games, an extra conversations, for more therapy there is simply not time.

So much more money should go to mental health care to provide better 24 hour care in clinics. The powerlessness we feel, the therapist also feel it. We see their efforts, their tiredness and also their despair because Luna is so untreatable.

Every time we visit her she gets more depressed. She barely talks anymore. It's better if I'm gone, she wrote in a short note this week. I panicked and called the psychiatrist. She's on holiday. Luckily we got to talk with the substitute psychiatrist.

She understood us right away. 'Luna needs to be on medication and needs to go home as soon as possible at least in the weekends.' She was clear. Luna is on anti depressants now. It reassures me just a little.