Eating with Your Anorexic

By Laura Collins

A source of hope and valuable information for parents of children with eating disorders

This poignant and informative narrative relates how one mother rescued her daughter from the "experts" and treated the girl's life-threatening anorexia using a controversial approach. Known as the Maudsley Approach, this home-based, family-centered therapy, developed in Great Britain in the 1980s, has been receiving a lot of press here over the past few years. While it has been widely used in Europe for many years and is rapidly gaining acceptance among parents and within the pediatric and child psychiatric communities in the United States, until now, there were no popular books on the subject. Must-reading for parents of children with eating disorders, Eating with Your Anorexic is:

• The first popular book on an increasingly popular approach to curing eating disorders
• A source of practical information and guidance for parents of children with eating disorders
• An eloquent narrative filled with pathos that inspires, empowers, and informs

• Language: English
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill Education
• Release date: Dec 22, 2004
• ISBN: 9780071471220

Laura Collins

Laura Collins is an award-winning journalist who has worked as a senior writer for the Mail on Sunday for six years. She has broken stories, conducted interviews and filed dispatches from all over the globe. She lives in west London with her husband.

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Reviews for Eating with Your Anorexic

[librarymary09 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A very interesting book that really turns what you think you know about anorexia on its head. Makes the very good point that by the time families seek treatment for this disease, of COURSE they look dysfunctional because by that point, they've been driven frantic and crazy with worry over their teen's lack of eating. Dysfunctional family, therefore, is not always the CAUSE of anorexia, often it is "co-morbid" with anorexia, brought on by the disease and the feelings of helplessness that it brings.

I also liked this book because the author makes the very good point that doctors and therapists don't always know best, yet unfortunately many of them are not that good at admitting they are not omnipotent. The author of this book had to battle the "accepted wisdom" of how anorexic teens should be treated. I have great respect for her and for what she and her family accomplished.