Sunday 16 December 2012

Achievement

Finally felt like I had made a tiny bit of progress in the dining room yesterday. After some careful thought I asked my named nurse if I could try moving from the supervised table to an unsupervised table for my 3.15pm snack as I felt that because I really struggle with my meals it might make me feel like I had at least made a small step forward. My nurse thought it was a good idea but to just try one snack to start with. It was quite scary as I had to accept that I could be trusted to eat my snack and not cheat by trying to get rid of some of it and this completely went against what my eating disorder wants, never the less I did it and felt quite proud of my achievement.

My sense of achievement however was short lived when after dinner last night a particular patient announced she was going to be unsupervised for all meals and snacks, my reaction " what the fuck!!"
Perhaps I should explain my reason for such a reaction by highlighting some of her behaviour displayed at breakfast a mere two days ago, when challenged about not having used all her milk a staff member poured the remaining milk from her jug on to the cereal so the patient spooned three spoons of milk on to the table! The cereal was then replaced at which point she bellowed there was more cereal than last time and staff were just picking on her, the outcome three handfuls of cereal were removed from the bowl, crunched up and thrown at a member of staff!! Finally at dinner yesterday she was challenged about the way she ate a sandwich several times so she got up and moved to another table. Answer by staff to this behaviour.... put her on the unsupervised table, genius!!!!

Now I can see why they have done it I think they are working on the assumption that challenging her doesn't work and almost makes her more defiant to do the complete opposite to what they ask her and so if she is on unsupervised she will just get on with it. Great in principle but if this is not the case it is really unfair on patients who have worked hard to be trusted enough to actually progress to that point and not just been given it because staff have given up!! I know it's petty to think like this but it really did feel like my achievement had been pissed on (pardon my French!)

After talking it through with parents and Ben I have decided to give her the benefit of the doubt, maybe it will work and she will just get on with it and not feel the need to cheat herself and constantly kick off as most of the time she will be on her own and therefor have no one to play up for. However if I find that at snacks she is still crunching her crunchie and then dropping half of it on the floor I'm afraid sod it I will say something as I'm not going to be made to feel like a complete mug for sitting there complying when she blatantly isn't. While I readily accept that I am there for me and at the end of the day she is only really cheating herself it does have an effect on those around her and I don't see why I should put up with it just because people don't want to say things to her because they know the reaction in her it will provoke. Guess we shall see what happens today..

2 comments:

  1. YAY I'll have a friend on the unsupervised table. :) I agree that you should mention this to staff if it continues to be a problem - although generally they keep a watchful eye on the table anyway. I found that being unsupervised when other unsupervised people were 'cheating', although hard, ultimately made me more defiant against the eating disorder. I guess I realised I couldn't "beat" the other person and get away with it, so I developed more of a 'fuck it' attitude. Plus it is SO nice to feel like people aren't watching over you like a hawk! I don't know about you, but I was so self-conscious about being watched that I think it made me worry more about the food (even though it was obviously necessary to begin with). I'm not suggesting this is how you feel at the moment, cos does take a lot of strength to take more responsibility for yourself, but you're doing the right thing in trying to move forward and I hope you can feel good about this despite what the ED might be telling you. :) Anyway, see you later - I'll be back for tea! x

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  2. Thanks Bec wise words looking forward to seeing you, hope all has been ok xx

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