Tips for Moms Dealing with a Bulimic Daughter

When your daughter is properly diagnosed with an eating disorder you will feel a variety of emotions. These powerful emotions might make it hard to functions in day to day life. However this is one time of your life when you need to be a pillar of strength for the person depending on you for emotional guidance. You might feel guilty and regretful about some of the choices that you have made in rearing your daughter. You will probably be scared of the future of their daughter and feel frustrated about the whole process.

Guilt is a common result of finding out that your daughter has anorexia. The guilt can be intense because you examine the future life of your daughter. The problem with guilt is that it is so dissociative. It takes you away from what you need to be focused on right now and puts you somewhere in the past thinking of what you could have done or should have done differently.

The fact is that there are problems that you have to deal with right here and now. If you don't get around to dealing with them then you will have just have more to regret in the future. This is a vicious cycle that piles more and more on to you until you will not be able to take it anymore. Provide the emotional stability that your daughter needs right now in order to make it through bulimia. Put your feelings aside for now, don't worry you can always come back to them later if need be, right now you need to be a pillar for your daughter to depend on. Recovery is a family process and it requires the adults to be stable enough to deal with the issues of the daughter.

You might also feel a great sense of fear. Every time your daughter sits down at the table you can't help but let your mind get lost in the horrors happening in your daughter's head. This, however, can be interrupted as judgment from your daughter. Even though you are scared for her life, she has to know how you will respond to her disorder.

The other issue with fear is that it leaves you vulnerable. When you are scarred you are more likely to give into bargaining and manipulation. She will begin to hold the cards as to what it is she eats and what she doesn't. Stand firm about your position as an authoritative figure because that is what she needs.

Sources

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/bulimia/DS00607, mayoclinic