time to take eating disorders more seriously

Recently, I watched the Nova episode about eating disorders. I'd seen it a few times before, but since I find comfort in shows and documentaries about EDs I didn't mind seeing it again. What I discovered this time around is that I have big problems with some of the straight up bull shit presented as fact.

First, let's talk about the doctors and treatment "experts" interviewed. So many people have made careers out of studying eating disorders. For example, Dr. Kaye has been making a living tossing around ideas about ways to treat EDs since the 1980s. He has yet to figure anything out that has true value to the people suffering from this mental illness.

It seems that eating disorders are classified as mental illnesses when it comes to billing the insurance companies or when docs apply for research monies; however, when it comes down to it we're told that we're responsible for creating this and that to recover we have to want to get better. We're told that we won't relapse if we really want recovery. Is this what other people with mental illnesses are told?

To the paranoid schizophrenic do the docs say, "Just tell those voices to be quiet. That's from a bad part of you and you have to tell it to go away." Do they have little rituals where they come up with drawings that symbolize their mental illness then burn them to make the illness go away? Do they tell paranoid schizophrenics to name their schizophrenia?

Modern day treatment of eating disorders tends to be belittling, ineffective and offers little more than trite or cliched solutions. Most of the time, treatment does more harm than good. It's archaic and wildly irresponsible.

I can't help but to think of Polly Williams, who was featured in the documentary, Thin. She committed suicide a couple years after her treatment in Florida at Renfrew. Why? Did she relapse? Did she not want recovery? According to the bull shit we learn in treatment facilities, she just didn't want it badly enough.

What a load of crap. Treatment facilities need to stop worrying about their finances and start fessing up to the truth. The truth is they don't know what they're doing. Sure, they can get your loved one to eat, maybe. They can help them stabilize their weight. They can even provide a safe place to talk about problems, but can they really offer cures? I don't think so.

Maybe Polly truly believed that she was responsible for creating her mental illness, that she had to eliminate part of herself in order to get well. Maybe she felt like the ultimate failure when she was unable to delete the thoughts which led her toward destructive behaviors. Maybe she realized she was no match for a psychiatric disorder. Did she believe her treatment team when they said, "You just have to want it."

I'd much rather have a treatment team tell me that they have no clue what they're doing and that they'll do their best to help me, than have a team that twists the truth in order to sell me a stay at their facility. Buyer beware of the philosophy which states that we made this illness what it is and therefore must fix it within ourselves. Is that what they're telling psychopaths these days, too?

Look, the number of deaths as a result of eating disorders is too high to take lightly; yet it seems like the mental health community treats EDs as though the afflicted has self indulgent, vanity problems. These are serious, life threatening mental illnesses that need to be perceived and treated as such.

I have so many more thoughts about treatment and "recovery." I'll expand on this in the near future.