Sophie has been home and gone back to uni. Wow 6 weeks at home just flew. It was wonderful having her for so long. She had the usual depression/anxiety drop down during the peak assignment time, but this time didn’t ring me as much. With her new psychologist she handled it herself. Doesn’t mean it was any easier or less deep, but she made her own decisions and didn’t need to vent to me. I see this as a step forward and wait to see how this semester goes.
This post though is about getting sick. It’s winter here, Melbourne has it’s own strong flu variety this year and lots of other nasty bugs. When 
you get sick, it’s normal to cut back on eating. You really don’t feel like food, nor sometimes can you keep it down. If you get the viruses with the killer sore throats or Tonsillitis then you have an extra level added to the pain of eating. You might not eat anything decent apart from some light liquids for anything up to 14 days. It’s the nature of being sick that we all follow.
For those recovered or in recovery getting sick needs extra care. If you are at home or still not fully independent, you then have a team or family support to encourage you to eat. The bottom line for those with anorexia, is you DON’T lose weight. But it’s hard to remember that when you really sick, living independently away from home and figure that you can easily gain any weight loss back or it won’t matter, or being so sick it doesn’t even cross your mind you might be losing weight. Or that it might be an issue if you do lose weight.
After all – if you are fully recovered – you won’t have had any Ana behavior to stop you eating. You won’t have had any Ana thoughts or heard Ana’s voice either. Your well past that. You may even still see a psychologist, take good care of yourself, see a doctor regularly, have medication for anxiety or other mental health issues. So when you get really sick, you tend to do what we all do – eat when or how much as you are able to.
Sophie learnt her next step in self care and staying recovered. She got the flu and Tonsillitis together – one very sick girl. And she did try to eat and drink. However being unable to eat her normal amount for over 2 weeks, her weight dropped. What it brought home to her, was how quickly during sickness the body can drop in weight. And in the case of a recovered anorexic, weight loss to a certain point can start to bring thinking changes.
As she said, she felt physically ok, and wasn’t anywhere in the realm of Ana thoughts, but her mind ‘darkened’, it was easy to slip back into the habit of not eating a meal or eating enough when getting over the sickness. She found herself a bit defensive about food. Thankfully she was home by this stage, so mother got involved (despite the fact she is now 20 and really beyond me dictating food routines). Yep, I can still be the Food Police. But because she doesn’t want to go back down the Ana path, she drank the sustagen, ate pies, bread, raisin toast, pasta, pizza etc etc. She snacked in-between meals and she brought her weight back up. Not quite as high as I’d like to go back to Melbourne, but still in her good weight range.
It’s a confronting lesson when just being sick can result in weight loss you didn’t plan or want, and the extra strength needed to continue to eat. Whilst recovery teams will tell you that this might happen, until it actually does you don’t plan or really know how you will actually react or be when very sick. Sometimes you learn as situations become a reality for you – rather than a textbook experience. Now she knows.
Third week back in Melbourne she has come down with a similar bug and another round of damned Tonsillitis (sensitive little things once they get sick). This time Soph is more knowledgeable and is eating more and drinking sustagen etc. She also is seeing her psychologist and doctor as well. We are also heading down (we couldn’t do it last semester) for a parent check in of how she is going.
The learning curve can be tricky, sneaky and sometimes ‘left of field’ in recovery, but as long as you take note of the lesson and build toward being strong if sickness happens again, then you have learned another step in the reality of self-care. Getting flu vaccine might also be part of the lesson!
