FOR MORE than three years Carolyn has watched her teenage daughter Jackie struggle with the “secret world” of an eating disorder.
Youngsters with this illness work so hard to conceal it, she explains, they have a secret life. It makes them disengage emotionally from friends and family.
“Anorexic tendencies on top of bulimia,” is how Carolyn describes her daughter’s condition. “She will not put weight on above a certain level. She wants to be Kate Moss.”
After several periods of treatment, Jackie has become more clandestine about her bingeing. But her mother knows she is buying in food from the supermarket, consuming it and then vomiting.
What particularly worries Carolyn is the way her daughter seems to be adapting to this way of life. “Last year I had a child who was terrified of her condition. Now she’s acquiesced to it.”
While she does not think Jackie’s physical health is in jeopardy at the moment, she sees the psychological impact: the evident unhappiness, poor concentration and sleep disturbance. Although her daughter sailed through her Junior Cert, Carolyn doubts if she can cope with the demands of the Leaving Cert in this state.
Meanwhile, they have undergone what Carolyn describes as the “Russian roulette” of seeking community-based therapy in the Dublin area. “You hope it’s going to work, but you don’t know.”
The search for professional help started with their “very helpful” GP, who referred them to a local, free service. Although it was good on paper, it just didn’t work for the family, Carolyn explains.
For a start, Jackie disliked the therapist and was soon refusing to attend sessions. Carolyn herself was unhappy at being told it was up to her to follow her daughter around and impose the treatment.
“Rightly or wrongly, we pulled out.”
Some time later, as her condition worsened, Jackie had an assessment interview for a bed at St Patrick’s Hospital. “There were two friends ahead of her in there,” remarks her mother.
The hospital, according to Carolyn, said Jackie was not suitable for residential treatment but that she needed good psychological help. Unfortunately, “anybody they would recommend had a waiting list of eight months. So it was up to us to find a therapist.”
They did find a psychotherapist through word of mouth and Jackies one-to-one sessions seemed to go well. Although Carolyn wondered what sort of façade her daughter who, she says, has “become a consummate liar” due to her condition, was presenting to the therapist.
After some months, the psychotherapist said Jackie no longer needed to continue attending. She told Carolyn that her anxiety was part of the problem and that if she gave her daughter some space, Jackie would be able to cope.
“She was trying to empower my daughter,” acknowledges Carolyn. “I wanted to believe that but I knew that there was something superficial about the whole process.”
Slowly but surely, Jackie’s eating disorder has crept back. “I see her withdrawing from the family. Her anxiety levels are high.
“Three weeks ago I told her I was concerned: ‘Whatever is happening, you need help; you can’t do it on your own’, I said.”
Jackie is starting with another psychotherapist and they will see how that goes. However, Carolyn feels they are no further ahead than they were three years ago.
“I still have faith in the long term that as a mature adult she will get it sorted; that she will realise at 24 or 25 that it is no way to live your life.”
Meanwhile, as a mother, she feels powerless as Jackie’s illness blights her promising young life.
*Names have been changed