The patient’s acceptance of parental demand for increased food intake, steady weight gain, as
well as a change in the mood of the family (i.e., relief at having taken charge of the eating
disorder), all signal the start of Phase II of treatment.
This phase of treatment focuses on encouraging the parents to help their child to take more
control over eating once again. The therapist advises the parents to accept that the main task
here is the return of their child to physical health, and that this now happens mostly in a way
that is in keeping with their child’s age and their parenting style. Although symptoms remain
central in the discussions between the therapist and the family, weight gain with minimum
tension is encouraged. In addition, all other general family relationship issues or difficulties
in terms of day-to-day adolescent or parenting concerns that the family has had to postpone
can now be brought forward for review. This, however, occurs only in relationship to the
effect these issues have on the parents in their task of assuring steady weight gain. For
example, the patient may want to go out with her friends to have dinner and a movie.
However, while the parents are still unsure whether their child would eat entirely on her own
accord, she might be required to have dinner with her parents and then be allowed to join
friends for a movie.