Mother and Daughter Share Their Journey Through an Eating Disorder

WALKING HAND IN HAND –

May 14, 2022 – By this point — at the recommendation of her counsellor — she had given the voice a name and started to speak to it. She called the voice “the bitch.” saying it tried to control all aspects of her life. Kyla says the voice told her she was “worthless, stupid, unworthy of love, unworthy of living a full or happy life, unworthy of food, ugly, unwanted and so much more.”

She kept a journal and shared some of her entries:

“[The bitch] convinced me that I did not deserve to be healthy and that being sick and dying was better than eating. She convinced me that if I did not starve myself and work out excessively that no one would love me and no one would want me around. although, even when I did do all of those things the bitch was never satisfied.”

“It would scream at me to eat less and when I did It would say eat less than that. It yelled to workout two hours a day and when I did, it said that wasn’t enough and I was worthless unless I worked out for 4 hours a day. But because I had such little self-worth and no outlets for [COVID-19]. I listened to the voice, and I believed her. One of the worst parts is that I listened to this bitch who wanted the worst for me and ignored all the people who just wanted the best for me.” Perry and her daughter were able to get into a program, which evolved over three phases — the first of which included taking away all control from Kyla. It meant the teen wasn’t able to dance or see her friends.

She wasn’t allowed to prepare her own meals; every detail down to the forks and plates were chosen for her, the food was plated for her — and Perry was required to watch her daughter eat.

“I felt like I was doing something wrong,” said Perry of the strict regime. “It was hard. It was a lot of painful nights of tears.” By this point Kyla had only been eating 500 calories a day. Their goal was to get to 3,000 calories a day…