Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Anorexia and My obsessive compulsive disorder

Obsessions

Hi, my daughter Asha was 11 or 12 when she started having obsessions about locking doors and windows, turning off every power point in the house, making sure all windows were secure and if that was not enough she would check everything 2 or 3 times.

This would happen if we were leaving the house to go somewhere or in the evening before going to bed. She did this for over a year and then she decided she would get healthy and lose some weight.

She had a gym program drawn up for her by the staff, and she would spend up to three hours at a time there. Then she changed how she would eat at home. It got to the stage where she was only eating apples and drinking water. Then the apples became less and so did the water. She stopped eating apples all together and was just surviving on the water.

One Tuesday morning we decided to take her kicking and punching to the emergency room at the hospital. They did many tests, asked a lot of questions and by the end of the day we were told that she was anorexic.

Her body temperature had fallen very low, she was freezing cold and her heart rate had dropped to 37. She was rushed to critical care for three days. Her heart rate has been very low another two times since then. She was admitted into the children's ward because she was under sixteen, she had no choice. They doctor's told us that she was anorexic.

She was so thin and so cold. They stacked heaps of hot blankets on her to keep her warm. She was freezing. She was so upset because she was being admitted. Some more tests were done.

The staff at the hospital was great but my daughter simply could not eat. She had staff members helping to convince her to eat. Dieticians did meal plans and discussed it with Asha, even if she agreed to do it she still wouldn't eat. The medical staff was watching her all the time, which made her very uncomfortable.

Asha has lost 25 kilos in five weeks. Her peripheral circulation is just not working properly now.

Asha had to miss year 11 as she was hospitalized for ten weeks the first time and then for another four weeks later that year. We try to get Asha to eat and drink but is very hard and stressful. And she just won't eat.

The next year she was put back to year eleven and she had full blown OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder) when it came to homework. It was so full on. She got to the first school holidays. She spent the full two weeks in the hospital being fed. Mostly by a nasal gastric tube which feeds her at night.

Nothing is helping her to get better. Anyway, she did very well in year 11, and now she is in year 12. Much harder she says, and now the OCD has come back but in a different way. She has set hours for doing her homework.

She washes her hands at least 50 to 60 times a day and then can't touch anything or she will have to wash then again.

She thinks there are germs on the clean cutlery and she stares at them and turns them around and around before she can use them, and then she thinks that there is still something on the spoon. This happens with everything that she uses, so frustrating.

She has to do the dishes as she does not trust us to do them. Even when she has done the dishes on her own she still tells me that she can see things on the spoon, and then it is the ritual of just staring at that spoon for as long as it takes.

Nobody can walk anywhere near Asha when she is eating she is so scared that things will get on her or her food. Then she starts asking questions, do you think there was something on the spoon? I am sure I can see something. No Asha, just put the spoon into your food.

So now we are not allowed to wash any of the dishes after any meal. She washes the drinking glasses first. Changes the water and does the crockery only after she has rinsed it, then more water to do bowls or pots. Then she will not touch the pans or plates that have had cooking oil on them. We do get to wash them.

The skin on her hands is so dry they simply have no natural oils left in them. Asha asks for reassurance all the time, about all of the OCD problems that she has. I think she is looking for the right answer so that maybe she can stop worrying about her severe OCD all the time.

So, we have gone from teenage OCD, to anorexia nervosa and then to adolescent OCD. I really want my child to be better, but we know her chances are not real good. While I can draw breath, I will never give up on her, never, she
is my baby and she is too important. Thank you for your time.

Asha's mum Karyn and sister Stephanie.