I was 5ft 7ins & under 5st... if the doctors hadn’t force fed me I’d be dead by now
Chloe forced to go to UK for life-saving care 18-year-old recovering and is now enjoying life
IRISH TEENAGER ON SURVIVING HER HARROWING FIGHT WITH ANOREXIA
AN 18-year-old anorexia survivor has revealed she would have died had her family not insisted she travel to the UK for appropriate treatment.
Despite two years spent in and out of various Dublin hospitals, the services and facilities available were unable to help Chloe at the height of her condition.
Though the teenager insists the nurses, doctors and therapists in the capital did their utmost, she believes they didn’t have the training required to provide her with the “harsh interventions” she needed.
In 2016 Chloe was at her lowest point. She was 16 years old, 5ft 7in and weighed just under five stone. She told the Irish Sunday Mirror: “I was consumed with food, that’s all I thought about. I was losing energy and I deteriorated very quickly. It was an addiction, no matter how much weight I lost – it wasn’t enough.
“The stigma with anorexia is that you want to be the skinniest or the most beautiful, it can be different for everyone but in my experience, when people told me I didn’t look attractive, in my head I was winning.
“I didn’t want attention – I just wanted to disappear.”
She was living with her mum in South Dublin at the time and her friends got her in touch with the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service. Chloe was then admitted to St Joseph’s Adolescent inpatient unit at St Vincent’s Hospital in the capital.
Chloe added: “The staff were so, so lovely. They did their absolute best for me and I loved my counsellor. She made me realise a lot of things about my past that I didn’t think bothered me.
“I was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder because I started to remember things from my childhood that I’d repressed – a specific incident that happened when I was seven. When all this came to the surface, I stopped eating completely in St Joseph’s, I started associating eating with remembering what happened to me as a child.”
The troubled teen could just about manage a high-calorie protein drink but couldn’t eat food as the sensation of fullness triggered memories of her childhood trauma.
When she was offered two weeks’ leave from the clinic, her condition deteriorated again.
Life became a vicious cycle of hospital admissions followed by stints at home where Chloe would only consume diet drinks.
She said: “I ended up weighing below five stone. I was a healthy eight-and-a-half stone and then it just went down to just above four stone.
Life can be beautiful but I had to hit rock bottom to see that
CHLOE AFTER OVERCOMING BATTLE WITH ANOREXIA
I moved in with my granny and grandad because my mum had to work. They’d just cry and beg me to eat but I just couldn’t do it for anyone. I couldn’t do it for them or me, the fear was just too much.
“My granny brought me to hospital because I started turning purple and blue from the poor circulation.
“The results of the tests they did scared them a bit. I was sent back to St Joseph’s but they were too scared to keep me in because they couldn’t attend to me medically.
“Apparently my blood pressure and my stats were very dangerous and they sent me back to the main hospital in St Vincent’s, two nurses brought me there and I thought I’d only be there for a few days. There I was given adult psychiatric treatment. I was being treated as an adult rather than a child. I probably would have got more intervention if I was placed in a children’s hospital.”
Chloe was fitted with a tube which allowed staff to feed her. But as she was in an adult facility, she realised she could refuse food.
She added: “The nurses would come in and say, ‘Chloe do you want a feed now’ and I’d be like, ‘No’ and they’d say, ‘OK’ and just wrote ‘refused’ on the sheet. There was no intervention.”
Chloe was told she’d die if the situation remained the same and it was then her relatives in the UK suggested she should go to a dedicated eating disorder clinic in England. Professionals in Ireland agreed this was the best option. She was eventually taken to Springfield University Hospital in London.
The teenager said: “I don’t think they were expecting what they saw.”
After 52 weeks and two days in the hospital Chloe had come on leaps and bounds in her recovery, although it was a difficult road.
She said: “I fully believe that without the team in the UK, I’d be dead by now. Trusting others and letting people help me is a big thing that aided me getting to where I am.”
Last month the HSE announced a move that will see a new model of care for those with eating disorders. According to the health care provider, the aim is to improve quality and safety, access to services and provide value for money in how these services are delivered. Chloe now lives with relatives in Kent and although she misses home she has to stay in the UK for the superior level of care she’s getting.
She added: “I’m so lucky I have reached a stage I can do normal tasks and can experience normal teenage things.
“Life truly can be beautiful. For me things truly did have to hit rock bottom for me to see that.”
If you’ve been personally affected by Chloe’s story please contact Bodywhys – The Eating Disorders Association of Ireland on 1890 200 444.