Ep 93: How to Spot & Treat Eating Disorders

<p><a href="https://talkingtoteens.com/podcast/eating-disorders-1/">Click for full show notes, exercises, and parenting scripts from this episode</a></p><p><br></p><p>For the average person, there is absolutely nothing frightening about pizza. It’s delicious, cheap to order, and easy to eat! So why might pizza be such a struggle for a teenager with an eating disorder?</p><p><br> Pizza is high in calories and fat, and can be very triggering for someone who constantly obsesses over what they eat. Pizza is also the go-to food for birthday parties, school events, or college activities. It’s one of the most frequently eaten foods in American culture. For a teenager with an eating disorder, adjusting to regular life means eating pizza--and for them, this is isn’t easy.</p><p><br> That’s why we need to take teen eating disorder treatment seriously, and help those suffering from anorexia, bulimia, or binge eating as soon as possible. By waiting too long to address these problems, or letting teenagers struggle with them alone, their physical and mental health can only get worse. It can become so serious that even something as simple as pizza at a school event can become a battleground.</p><p><br> My guest today is Lauren Muhlheim, clinical psychologist and expert on teen eating disorder treatment. She recently authored <a href="https://amzn.to/3e5H4K5"><em>When Your Teen Has an Eating Disorder: Practical Strategies to Help Your Teen Recover from Anorexia, Bulimia, and Binge Eating</em></a>. The book dives into a lot of information about eating disorder recovery, focusing mainly on the idea of family-based treatment.</p><p><br>You may be familiar with the term family therapy, in which a family undergoes treatment together to work out issues they may be having with one another. Although they may sound similar, family therapy and family-based treatment are actually very different. When it comes to teen eating disorder treatment, family therapy focuses on the cause of the disorder, viewing family issues as the underl