This Crazy Life

So, my amazing plan I had been contemplating and thinking on went awry.  I had a date I wanted to admit her.  Well, a week really.  A week that would give me summer at home with my other two kids and get them started back to school before I had to move for PHP, again.  Of course, this was all dependent on several things, like the length of time in treatment, but I had a good idea how long she would be there.  This all fell apart when we went to clinic almost 2 weeks ago and they said she needed to admit now.  They had even talked to the facility, and they were ready to take her.  So, we went home and packed and left the next morning for an 8.5-hour drive to Dallas, TX to admit her to ERC Dallas Thursday morning.  I felt rushed.  She of course didn’t want to go.  It was a very emotional time.  If she’s there 8 weeks, she’ll be in PHP before summer is over.  Before my older daughter turns 15.  But she’ll be in PHP when she turns 13 and I can be with her.  But her twin sister will also turn 13, and I can’t be with both of them.  While it was nice to rip the band aid off, it still sucks.  Actually, sucks doesn’t even begin to describe it.  So far, she’s eating and completing by food 100%, no supplementing.  Which is huge for her.  However, she’s eating to come home, not to recover.  There is most definitely a difference.  When I spoke to her yesterday, I asked her if eating was getting any easier.  Maybe I shouldn’t have asked.  But I’m always going to be hopeful.  No.  It’s not.  Eating is a huge struggle.  She still doesn’t understand why she has to eat.  So basically, we’ll just wait.  Let her eat more.  Nourish her brain and hope for the best.  I don’t know.  I try to stay hopeful and positive but, in all honesty, I don’t know that they can change her yet.  I attended a virtual class with Dr. Wooten.  It was about learning to talk back to the eating disorder.  What to say, how to respond.  It was informative, however, one of the biggest things I took from it was eating disorders have their own timelines.  Unfortunately, no one can predict their timeline.  And younger patients typically take the longest.  Younger patients typically take the longest.  I’ve read this several times.  They often must gain the maturity to separate themselves from the eating disorder.  But hearing it from someone well known in the eating disorder world still stung.  It also makes the comments of I still don’t understand why I have to eat sit all that much harder.  But she’s safe.  She’s being fed.  I’m not having to fight her.  She’s home sick.  I miss her.  But she’s safe.  And we’ll continue working and learning and doing everything possible to get her well.