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Dear Santa......part IIIMar 22 '01 Write an essay on this topic.
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I know it is not your time of year now. I know that it is the Easter Bunny who is on everyone's mind, but please let me write you since you have been with me thru this saga. I have written you earlier to bring my daughter back to me since I was losing her to bulimia. Then I wrote you and thanked you for bringing her back to me on Christmas Eve in the wreck. Now I write to you to ask your help again. I have lost my daughter again and this time it is so much worse. She seemed so much better after the wreck emotionally as far as the bulimia. .Granted she couldn't binge/purge because of the injuries she sustained to her mouth. Granted she was just glad to be alive and realized how many guardian angels she had that night. It seemed like it was "over" as far as the bulimia went. Well it wasn't!! About 2-3 weeks after the wreck she started binging and purging again and it seemed to spiral out of control. In fact it spiraled downward so rapidly that on Jan 31st she attempted to take her own life. Santa, how many times do I have to watch death puts its grip on my precious baby girl? Ash was hospitalized for over a week after the suicide attempt and has remained in intensive outpatient therapy 3 nights a week for 3 hours each time. BUT Santa, it is not enough!! She even goes to a support group for eating disorders. But again it is not enough!!! She sees a psychiatrist every few weeks. But Santa, NONE of this is enough!! Now Santa, the insurance company says she has had enough time and wants to end her outpatient therapy sessions. They say it IS enough! How can they tell unless they see her and talk with her? Santa, when I see the glaze look come over her and watch the first bite go in her mouth, then I know it is too late to stop the cycle. She will consume anywhere from 5000 calories upward before she finally feels full enough to be satisfied and then see the guilt come forward and into the bathroom she goes for the ritual she performs to make herself expell the just eaten food. She used a special toothbrush to make herself gag and puke. It became her "best friend". However one night her therapist asked her to give me the toothbrush so it would be a symbol of giving up the ritual. Well you would have thought it was worse than her "best friend" dying. She fussed and fumed and cried over it. My son finally broke the toothbrush into 4 pieces and threw it over the balcony into the woods. She cried for hours over that loss. Santa, we can't keep any food in the house or it will be consumed within a day. I have tried locking the pantry, but she broke the lock off. My son puts his food in his room, and locks his door when he is away. She breaks into his room over and over. She will eat Bisquick mix, mixed or unmixed. She is not picky. She will eat frozen uncooked biscuits if desperate enough. She loves to eat brown sugar from the box......it is sweet and delicious. Cake mixes are good too she says. So you can imagine how she enjoys her binges when there are any snacks or sweets in the house. If DHS came into our home right now, they would say I was not feeding my family at all due to lack of foodl. But it is the only way I know to not enable her to binge. We buy our food day by day that we need to cook and consume. Hard to keep doing, but necessary. Santa, I have never seen someone drink 3 2L bottles of diet Pepsi in one day and not feel the bloat of it and the caffeine effects. But she drinks that much at least and more if she can. She won't drink milk, or juice because they have calories........go figure! But ya know what is funny? She does have occasional days when she eats normal and forgets to binge. Those times are rare, but they do happen. When we go out to eat, she presents the front of a normal teen with good nutritional habits. She is a true closet eater. She is considered an addict Santa, and to recover must go thru the same 12 steps as any other addict, whether alcohol or drugs. And she is already stuck. Step One is to admit you have a problem. She can easily admit to me and the therapy sessions of her bulimia, but she cant admit it to others. Especially her friends she is scared to admit it to. This keeps her from binging and purging at school, work or anywhere else in public. But it is also keeping her from truly admitting she has a problem. It doesn't help when her father calls her and tells her NOT to tell anyone about her bulimia because it will ruin her life! IT IS RUINING HER LIFE NOW IN DENYING IT!! So she is hearing from him what she already thinks.....hide the problem. Santa, can you help me with this problem? Santa, she feels like she is worthless? She says she doesn't know how to "fix" it. She can tell you all the right words and shows much insight into her disease. But knowing it and feeling it are very different. She asks me constantly "how do I stop? She looks to me for magical answers and I feel powerless to help her. She uses me as her punching bag when angry and her lap pillow when she is sad. She says her worst fear is that I will abandon her! She says she doesnt understand why I have stood beside her thru all of this and esp after the wreck and the suicide attempt. She doesn't seem to take any comfort in knowing I love her unconditionally and leaving her is not an option to me. And if it was an option......why would I leave her? I love this child with every inch of my fiber. I am proud of the young lady she is becoming and have such faith in her. I see her strength and know somehow and someday she will find it again. But for now all I can do is be her punching bag and lap pillow and keep letting her know I love her now and always. I am constantly told by the therapist that the thought process of someone with an eating disorder is screwed up and they dont see things like "normal" people do. Ash sees herself as fat and ugly and worthless.............and that is 180 degrees from the truth. But nothing I can say to her at this point will change her mind. But Santa, there are physical changes in her since this has all began. On top of the weight loss, her face and hands are now bloated. A bloated size 0. So in her book of course she is fat! She doesnt understand that this is due to electrolyte imbalance. Also her hair is so dry. it looks like straw. Her thyroid function is almost nonexistent and she is anemic. Her teeth have enamel burned off from the acid in the vomitus. It is sad there because she still has her lower mouth and teeth wired to the bone from the wreck. With these physical changes is her lack of desire to fix herself up each day. She stays clean, but her hair goes back into a ponytail "wad" and she wears what she calls comfy clothes......baggy sweats and wind pants. Granted there is nothing wrong with comfy clothes, but for her it is abnormal. She was a perfectionist in her appearance. In fact that is alot of where the bulimia stems from .......her perfectionism. She always had to have her life so perfectly outlined and controlled, that she felt out of control. Somewhere in her healing process Santa, I hope she can find a middle ground. Santa, with all the days Ash has missed of school from the wreck and from the suicide attempt and resulting doctor visits, I am amazed she hasn't failed a class or seen her grades slip. But instead she has maintained her 4.0 GPA. It is something she refuses to let slip even an iota. She is hell bent on college, or was I should say. Right now we can't discuss the future that far away. We must only focus on today and get thru it. If she succeeds with no binging or purging then it is a step in the right direction. However if she does succumb to the urge then I refuse to say it is a step backward........just a step off the path. Truly it is "one day at a time". There is a hymn with that title....and it truly stays in my mind right now! Santa, can you put another word in for me to our Heavenly Father? You did at Christmas time and the angels were with us to keep Ash safe. I know God is keeping a few angels in reserve for her because one would be worn out trying to protect her 24/7. But can you whisper in God's ear on her behalf also. All the words sent above for her can only help with the recovery. Thank you Santa and God Bless. Ten_angel  |
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