Hello,
Our 9 yo daughter is what you could call high functioning and recently received an autism assessment. She has OCD behaviours and has also been progressively suffering with eating challenges. We are at the stage where she no longer eats in front of us and wants us to believe that she has not eaten in months. She, in fact, will secretly eat food that we’ve left in the kitchen but she makes sure nobody is anywhere near the kitchen or even downstairs before she goes in there to eat. On top of this all, she has started hiding her face from us and triggers if she thinks we are looking at her face.
We are extremely concerned at her level of intake but have actually discovered that if we, her parents, are not around then she will eat in front of other people. So we can drop her off at her cousins house and she will ravish what’s at the dinner table. If we confront her about this, she goes into an aggressive rage. It’s clear that she wants us to believe she has not eaten in months and suggesting otherwise brings her to boiling point.
We don’t know what to do and are bouncing around the system where she cannot communicate with therapists because they touch on the issues above which trigger her. All her behaviour issues go away entirely when she is at someone else’s house - even letting others see her face and interacting and socialising extremely well, eating well and no meltdowns. But when she comes home again, there is a backlash and she reverts to the “rules” she has made for herself inside the house.
She is refusing any medication and we are discussing options with a therapist about taking her to a clinic but we are extremely concerned at how they might handle her and how she might, in turn, retaliate towards us longer-term. Does anyone have any advice on this?
