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13 year old - low mood and losing weight rapidly

Keelz

My daughter (13) is diagnosed with ADHD and Autism, she has always been a quiet, solitary child but was generally comfortable at home as long as we gave her space and let her come to us. Recently she has become severely withdrawn, deleting WhatsApp so she doesn't have to communicate with friends from school (there hasn't been a fall out or bullying ive checked, her friends are as confused by this as we are) she just lays in her bed all day and only really talks in as short sentences as possible and honestly usually quite rudely. She has also lost a significant amount of weight in the last 3-4 months. She was never a big girl, a women's size 10, but she has started exercising every day, and gets quite upset if we have plans that prevent her exercising. She won't go to bed until she's done her workout video no matter how late it is. I have had to buy her new clothes this week because all of hers are hanging off her, she's gone down at least one dress size as well as a cup size in her bra's. She eats breakfast and a small dinner with us but ive been checking her school account and she seems to only be buying drinks and fruit pots. She claims that she's sharing meals with friends but I don't believe her if I'm honest. If my calculations are right she's eating about 800-1000 calories a day which is way below what she should be eating, however she's not hiding food, or being secretive in other ways so I don't know if were looking at a potential eating disorder or normal teenage girl body issues. 

Im very concerned about her at the moment between the eating and the low mood, her anxiety is high and she has begun wetting the bed again. The school is aware but is, in all honesty, a bit useless. Just doing surface level interventions that in reality help nobody.

Im waiting for a CAMHS appointment but I just wondered if anyone had any advise on getting her help or how best to support her, I'm terrified of saying the wrong thing and making everything worse. 

Parents

  • Could she be in burnout? For myself, when the outside demands (which includes communicating) all become too much I start restricting my food as it's one thing I can control and the demands of having to eat is just too much. I am autistic with PDA profile. If she ends up under CAMHS and eating disorder services it vitally important they know how autism impacts her with food and eating. It's all too common that they ignore that and try to treat an eating disorder in the only they know how which can cause more harm to an autistic person. It might be worth a GP appointment and getting bloods etc done as it's the speed of weightloss that can cause health problems.

    I hope I haven't spoken out of term, I'm going off my own experiences and from other online groups I'm in. There's a supportive Facebook group Autism and Eating Disorders for both adults and parents.

Reply

  • Could she be in burnout? For myself, when the outside demands (which includes communicating) all become too much I start restricting my food as it's one thing I can control and the demands of having to eat is just too much. I am autistic with PDA profile. If she ends up under CAMHS and eating disorder services it vitally important they know how autism impacts her with food and eating. It's all too common that they ignore that and try to treat an eating disorder in the only they know how which can cause more harm to an autistic person. It might be worth a GP appointment and getting bloods etc done as it's the speed of weightloss that can cause health problems.

    I hope I haven't spoken out of term, I'm going off my own experiences and from other online groups I'm in. There's a supportive Facebook group Autism and Eating Disorders for both adults and parents.

Children
  • in reply to BlueHawk

    No, no you haven’t spoke out of turn at all. I actually think your scenario is more likely than an Eating disorder tbh. She is diagnosed with ODD and the low mood was there before the eating issues. This is why I’m worried to mention the eating to CAMHS because I don’t want it to overshadow the very obvious anxiety issues that I’m seeing.