Wow, I've never heard of anyone being able to afford an IP ED treatment for that long. Insurance programs usually will not allow it to go on for that long & usually force an end date no matter where the patient's at in their recovery, or like for me, I was IP on funds the treatment center had for people who didn't have insurance that covered it & didn't have the money to pay & whether I was ready to leave or not....They forced me out after 6 weeks & when my husband couldn't drive that far to pick me up, one of the heads of the treatment center actually drove me home. My weight was no where close to being safe....I was in & out of the medical hospital with Central line IV nutrition for almost a year after that. Sounds like your family must be really rich to be able to afford that kind of treatment for you for that long.

I am sorry that you are struggling with it. For me, I wasn't the typical anorexic person either & didn't have the body image issues that they kept trying to cram into my brain as being the problem. You are right about them not being able to treat anything but what they claim is the text book anorexia issues...& they refuse to deal with the REAL issues causing anorexia. My anorexia started at the age of 42 with my depression & the weight loss that the Prozac started & I really liked the loss of weight & seeing the weight drop & also, there had to be some "passive suicidal" issues involved also. Stress all my life caused me to loose weight even when I was in college getting my degree but those periods of stress were there & over....the extended period of stress that turned into depression, the weight loss never went away which ended up in a very excessive case of anorexia.

The second time about 10 years later came after going through a trauma & had nothing to do with body image.....even though there's always something about loosing weight that once it gets started is almost impossible to have any desire to stop & not being able to eat because of the nausea caused by the stress becomes a vicious circle.

My pdoc & my GP told me to find an ED treatment center after I said what a loser the last time was.....when I talked to the ED treatment centers & told them about the trauma & how it had made me so sick I couldn't eat & caused me to loose so much weight I had to be treated in the medical hospital for about a month....they said they only know how to treat anorexia caused by body image issues.

I believe that 99% of what end up body image issues are really other issues that aren't being treated by them....I have heard more people who end up with anorexia who have been sexually or emotionally abused as a child or in their growing up years, I've hears of many who have gone through a rape, & many who ended up in a bad relationship & ended up pregnant & had an abortion that they struggled living with....the consequences......anorexia.....maybe because of body image issues that were caused by those things or maybe just the internal stress they were experiencing but it came out as anorexia & restricted eating rather than overeating.

Sometimes I think there as many reasons for anorexia as there are people who suffer with it & the treatment needs to be completely personalized.....I think their textbook cases aren't worth the paper they are written on personally & from my own experience & the experience of other's I have heard about & talked with.

The issues aren't easy to deal with....but if they aren't even addressed as the initial cause of the ED, whether anorexia, bulimia, or overeating, ...how can anyone expect recovery?

I am sorry you are struggling there & you are right...it's easy to adapt other's behaviors & thought processes into our own after being around them for so long & sometimes after hearing what they try to force us to believe about our ED that really isn't the case....really isn't appropriate TREATMENT.. I knew it made me angry with them trying to tell me the cause of why I was dealing with anorexia. I didn't really know what all was involved with my anorexia at the time because my depression was so bad....but I sure fire knew it wasn't what I felt they were trying to brainwash me into believing was the cause.

I'm sure that was why they ended up discharging me when they did.....but no other people were in the program for much longer than 6-8 weeks either.

Sorry for the & the rant.....but your situation sounds very similar to my experience in some ways.

Maybe you need to find another treatment facility who can REALLY HELP rather than this one that is stuck in what they believe to be the only textbook treatment of your ED.