Life's little curve balls

anorexia
ˌanəˈrɛksɪə
noun
lack or loss of appetite for food (as a medical condition).
an emotional disorder characterized by an obsessive desire to lose weight by refusing to eat.
noun: anorexia nervosa

Recently I was confronted with the alarming fact that my fifteen-year-old son might be suffering from an eating disorder or worse a mental health issue.

While I've never been concerned with his eating habits of the past, I have been aware of his increased seclusion from the outside world mainly due to playing on-line computer games which I likened to being "normal" teenage activity.

His changes in appearance I've put down to growing-up and puberty. He's got tall for fifteen, he has body hair that perhaps far exceeds many others of his friends the same age, he likes his own space; his privacy. His appetite has decreased, not a little, but a lot. His moods swing from being talkative to the verge of becoming a recluse. He doesn't share his thoughts, feelings, ambitions, in fact he doesn't have any ambitions now or for the future, another sign I thought would change over time as he matures. His self-esteem is low, he tells me he hates his body, but he's always been self-conscious. He says his quads are too big, but they are skin and bone and I can't understand where on earth he would get the idea they are otherwise.

It wasn't until I sat beside him at the dinner table and noticed him struggling to consume 1 meat pie with chips and eggs, that I asked him what was wrong.

He pats his stomach suggesting he's full while an entire meat pie sits untouched in front of him. I make a joke you'll become anorexic, he replies,
"Probably."

It's a shock, an instant hit of reality and I would be lying if I said the condition anorexia had never crossed my mind before now.

Have I been naive to think these changes he's been displaying are normal; acceptable?

I'm worried sick; I google 'Anorexia,' and I'm still not convinced this is what he might be heading for even though some signs point to early diagnosis. I'm not in denial, or am I?
I don't want to believe this could be reality, that this is affecting my son who always had such a healthy appetite as he was growing up.
I open pages of Strictly Parenting written by Michael Carr-Gregg, Australia's leading parenting expert. I read the section on anorexia which predominately points to adolescent girls.

I visit websites and take particular note of physical signs, and now it starting to become more clear and make sense of ailments he's displaying, but I had never associated with an eating disorder.

Yes, he feels tired, but isn't that because he plays on his X-box so much?
Yes, he never has any energy and is often lethargic, his facial features have changed, his skin pale and pasty, his eyes sunken with dark circles, he has vomited on occasions following dinner, putting it down to eating too much. He has no muscle, he is skin and bone with no definition.

So now there is a real chance my son maybe suffering from not just an eating disorder but much more. Resources will now become my valuable friend, my source to determine if or when I might need to get my son professional help.

I've listed below some resources I've found in a short time and still reading through.

National Eating Disorders Collaboration
http://www.nedc.com.au/anorexia-nervosa

Anorexia Nervosa | Eating Disorders Victoria
www.eatingdisorders.org.au

Anorexia nervosa | Better Health Channel
www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au

We're all artists

I'm watching the Voice, there's cheering, there's coaching, there's artists fighting for their places, to show their talent, to be heard, to tell their stories, to prove their right; and their not dissimilar to us writers are they.

Singers, dancers, musicians, writers, they all need to learn their craft and we are all apprentices at some point in our careers. As writers we want to entertain our readers, we want to leave them at some point cheering, crying or laughing from the experience they just had, much like other artists.

And as a writer our craft is complex, it's not just a matter of putting words down (or is it)? We need to take into consideration a lot of things, things as simple as sentence length and structure, capitals, comma's and spelling.

Then there's things a little more complex like knowing nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interjections, and knowing how and when to use them correctly.

As we progress through our apprenticeship we might try our hand at understanding how dangling, squinting and misplaced modifiers can change how a sentence is interpreted. We might then need to take into consideration fragments and run-on sentences, we need to use these skills and use them to write short stories, articles, essays, interviews, memoirs, poems, novella's novels, biographies and columns.

It might take some of us longer than others to learn this craft, to become proficient; to become published, much like our counterparts making it on the big stage. And as writer's, yes, we too want to make the big stage, we strive for that big break regardless what our genre is or expertise. We want our stories to touch hearts, to leave impressions -some everlasting - much like a musician. We want our readers to feel, to be moved regardless how we make that happen.

We writer's must keep plodding along as artists, improving, growing. We must believe in ourselves, in our stories, in our audiences, and while one story might not make the grade, the next will. Our stage is huge where we get to showcase our art in journals, newspapers, blogging, on-line, periodicals, magazines, anthologies, competitions and through self-publishing.

Our art is hard, but it's also rewarding and yes rewards are out there to chase, some are small and some big, perhaps the biggest for most is publication while others chase smaller dreams, it doesn't matter what your dream is just chase it and the rewards will follow.