Concerned about my daughters eating habits
My 16yo daughter is showing concerning eating habits and I am not sure what to do. During a stressful time at school 1-2 years ago, she lost quite an amount of weight even though she was already fairly thin. We talked about it often and tried to talk about her mental wellbeing as well. I made sure she was eating her meals for a while as well. Now she has gained her weight back and is back at a healthy weight.
I thought that she would be doing better now, but I am not sure if this is normal. She has been eating a way bigger amount than usual lately and on some days she eats for 3 people, she hides what she is eating and I find wrappers in her room. But sometimes she eats very little and very sensitive about food even though she is active. I obviously don’t make a comment about how much she eats and I don’t comment on her appearance, as I want her to eat without feeling bad.
But instead of getting better, she has been getting increasingly sensitive, depressed and has been withdrawing herself from us. Not only is she shutting us out, she is also isolating herself from her friends. I am not sure if this is due to her past ed. I notice that her body image issues are getting worse.
- When she tries on certain clothing, she is suddenly very quiet and covers herself up and doesn’t talk with us.
- She keeps touching her arms or legs when she is in a bad mood or insecure
- On the trip to the beach she suddenly refuses to wear something revealing ex: a bikini, even though that was something she always wore and she kept covering herself with a big towel
and lots of negative self talk.
She does have a therapist but I don’t think she talks a lot about her eating habits or her body image. I am not sure if it’s helpful to ask her about it, as she looks very uncomfortable in any conversation related to this topic. I dont know what to do. She has been gaining some weight and eating more, which I thought is a sign that she’s doing better but I feel like she is mentally doing way worse. I do want to speak to her about this but she deflects every conversation about this.