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Sometimes it’s even free. In March 2020, Diane Summers, a nutrition therapist in Seattle, asked her colleagues if anyone had time to offer free meal support through Instagram Live. “I was sort of hoping that two or three people a day would go live,” she said. “But we were just inundated with the will to be a part of the project.” Therapists and dietitians signed up in each time zone, which allowed the account (@ covid19eatingsupport) to offer a 24-hour live meal service for several months of the pandemic.
When adolescents fixate on restrictive diets
Adolescents have been particularly vulnerable to the development of eating disorders during the pandemic, both because adolescence is already the most common time for such struggles to emerge and because of the additional pressures they face today. ‘hui. “It’s a combination of the loss of structure, the loss of relationships with peers and the loss of their usual activities,” said Dr. Muhlheim. “They have all that time and they decide to focus on an exercise program, or maybe they feel like running is the only thing they really can do. But we know exercise is a huge trigger.
That’s how it started for Lily, a 16-year-old high school student in Los Angeles who said body image anxieties weren’t a big part of her life until the pandemic. “I don’t think weight loss has ever been on my mind,” she says. “I love to run, I have plenty of time, so why not push myself and see how far I can run?” She started training every day to fill the time previously occupied by school and team sports. “Lily is super smart when it comes to books and school comes to her easily, so she’s had a lot of extra time,” her mom, Nikki, explained with the move to distance learning. (The family asked to use only their first names to protect Lily’s privacy.)
After a few weeks of intensive exercise, Nikki noticed that Lily was eating less at family meals as well. “I didn’t necessarily skip meals, but I tried to eat less meat and dessert and more vegetables,” Lily said. “I thought I was healthy.” But she also became more obsessed with her weight and put the brakes on her eating again.
In those who are vulnerable to eating disorders, even involuntarily plunging into a negative energy balance, which happens when you expend more energy than you consume in calories, can trigger the rigid state of mind. and restrictive that characterizes most eating disorders, said Dr. Kenisha Campbell, director of outpatient adolescent medicine clinical services at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
“Eating disorders are disorders of the brain because the brain cannot function without proper nutrition. So once the “eating disorder brain” is under control, they can’t make any decisions about eating, ”explained Dr. Campbell, who specializes in the treatment of eating disorders. “We have to feed the brain so that the brain can fight the eating disorder.”
In December, Lily often felt dizzy and had developed a resting heart rate of 40 beats per minute, which was dangerously low for her. She was confined to bed by her family doctor and was prescribed intensive family treatment by a psychologist in which her parents planned meals and watched everything she ate. In the rough days, it was as if the whole family were stuck in the house with their eating disorder, Nikki said.
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