Supporting your Child or Other Loved One with an Eating Disorder Through the Holidays

Supporting Child with Eating Disorder Over Holiday in Los Angeles, California [Image description: photo of a Black family preparing a meal together and all the family members are dressed up] represents a potential family supporting a loved one with an eating disorder during the holidays

By Carly Poynter, AMFT, staff therapist The holidays are a challenging time to navigate for most people. The holidays are even more challenging for those who struggle with their relationship with food. As we prepare for the holiday feasts and festivities, there are a few things to consider, especially when you have a child or …

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When to Add an Individual Therapist in FBT-Phase 1

Individual therapy in FBT

When I am working as the Family-Based Treatment (FBT) therapist for a teen in eating disorder recovery, their parents will often ask whether the teen should also see a therapist individually. Unlike other therapy situations, in FBT there is no expectation that there is both an individual therapist and a family therapist. It’s there in …

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Externalizing an Eating Disorder: When, Why, and How Do You Do That and Who is “Ed” Anyway?

Externalizing your eating disorder

Externalizing an eating disorder is a therapeutic strategy that became more widely known through Jenni Schaefer’s book Life Without Ed, cowritten with her therapist Thom Rutledge. The book summarizes Jenni’s recovery from an eating disorder. Jenni describes how in her treatment she learned to personify the eating disorder as “Ed,” an abusive boyfriend. As explained in …

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How do I Parent My Teen During Family-Based Treatment? When to Set Limits

Parents doing Family-Based Treatment (FBT) often struggle with “normal parenting concerns” and setting limits while doing FBT. They’re refeeding their teens at home, doing the hard work often done by professional staff at treatment centers, but they still have to parent. It’s exhausting. Their teens who have eating disorders are often experiencing the psychological and …

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FBT Treatment Team Members

Family-Based Treatment Teams

Family-based treatment (FBT) is the leading evidence-based treatment for teens with anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. While in an ideal world, every person with an eating disorder would have access to a full treatment team including a therapist, a dietitian, a medical doctor, and a psychiatrist, FBT calls only for a therapist to guide the …

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This Halloween, Serve Candy to Your Teen in Recovery

Halloween Candy

A Family-Based Treatment (FBT)-approach For teens with eating disorders, Halloween can be scary for the wrong reason: the candy! Most teens with eating disorders are only willing to eat a restricted range of foods. Expanding this range is an important goal of treatment, with the reintroduction of fear foods being a key step. Candy tends …

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Family-Based Treatment Can Help Depression and Self-Esteem Too!

FBT Depression and Self-Esteem

Family-based treatment (FBT) is the leading evidence-based treatment for teen eating disorders. It represents a paradigm shift from older treatments that focused on helping teens become independent from their parents in order to recover from their eating disorders. In FBT, parents are central members of the treatment team and they are charged with guiding and …

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Are We Setting Recovery Weights Too Low?

Recovery Weight

  At the 2018 International Conference on Eating Disorders (ICED) in Chicago, I attended a plenary, Recovery from an Eating Disorder: How Do We Define It? What Does It Look Like? And Should It Always be the Focus? During this plenary, Anna Bardone-Cone, PhD spoke about the essential components of recovery from an eating disorder. …

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On Empowering Parents—Not Pathologizing Them

Empowering Parents

I often write about the importance of including parents in the treatment of adolescents and young adults. My work is informed by my training in Family-based Treatment (FBT), which as a central part of treatment seeks to empower parents to help their ailing children with eating disorders to return to health. When asked why families …

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A Viewing Guide for “To The Bone” Movie

Eating Disorder Film Guide

Ten Things I Want Viewers of To the Bone to Know “To The Bone,” Marti Noxon’s semi-autobiographical film about her experience as a young adult living with anorexia, was released today on Netflix and has already stirred up much controversy within the eating disorder community. Generally, I do not see things in black and white. …

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