End the Food Fight: Replacing Control with Connection to Help Your Child Heal from an Eating Disorder

It’s no surprise that eating disorders send parents into a panic. You may feel angry at the eating disorder, at treatment providers, at your child, or even at yourself. You want to "fix it," but you're terrified of doing the wrong thing. In this powerfully compassionate book, psychologist Tom Wooldridge guides you to take a different path. Dr. Wooldridge explains how eating disorder symptoms are fueled by out-of-control emotions that kids and teens can't put into words, and teaches specific parenting strategies that can help. Guided practices and reflection prompts help you slow down your own emotional reactivity and remain present and attuned, no matter what stage of treatment your child is in or how impossible it feels. Vivid stories illustrate what it feels like to replace control with connection--and how it opens the door to recovery.

Tom Wooldridge, PsyD, is a board-certified psychologist, eating disorder therapist, and psychoanalyst in private practice in Berkeley, California. He is also Chair of the Department of Psychology at Golden Gate University in San Francisco. Dr. Wooldridge has years of experience treating children, adolescents, and adults with eating disorders, including working with parents negotiating the complexities of a child in treatment. He has published several books on eating disorder treatment for mental health professionals.