How much further can we fall?

Every time we think we've hit the bottom, we fall further. The last few days have certainly proved this. 

Ollie was admitted to the specialist unit on Friday. He spent the afternoon there, as well as the whole of the following day. Whilst those days were awful (for him - and a guilty break for us), today, a day spent at home, has been spectacularly horrifying. 

To say that Ollie hates the unit is a understatement. He detests everything about it; the people, the routine, the food, the location, the commute, all of it. He has been reluctantly compliant whilst there, refusing to eat but generally doing everything else he has been asked to. The way that he has told us about these feeling has been through actions rather than words. 

Firstly, the escape attempts. He tried to run away from us as we were walking from the unit to the railway station on the first evening. We flanked him and returned home safely. Then came the first early morning trip to the unit: more attempts to run away when walking, but he was manageable in the car. He tried to run from the unit when being collected, and has ramped up the escape attempts from there.

So far, Ollie has tried to run in London, and at home, at stations, and in car parks. He has tried to run from our front gate; even from our car. He sits in the back, where child locks are installed, but today tried to climb into the front of the car and also tried to leave via the car window. We have all our doors & windows locked at home, with keys hidden. 

Ollie's thwarted attempts have just served to anger him more. In the last 24 hours he has caused a fair amount of destruction in our home. Our TV is now smashed, and the sound bar beneath it now has no remote control. Both were broken in a fit of pique. Another door handle has been ripped from a door, and he tried to cut himself using the screws he pulled from it. Things have been thrown, repeatedly. We have lost count of the number of attempts to get to knives. The most dramatic moment was him throwing a stool at a patio door in order to smash the glass - luckily it held. All of this is in addition to the more "standard" self-harm of hitting his head with his knuckles, picking at the numerous scabs on his arms, and head butting things.

He has kicked, punched and bitten us. He has tried to trip us up. He has watched us like a hawk, taking the opportunity to hurt himself if we broke concentration even for a second. Anorexia has controlled him completely. 

Ollie's disgust at being NGT-fed was shown in his incredibly thorough sealing of the end of the tube, using almost a whole reel of sellotape. This took quite some time to unpick at the hospital. He looked beaten by the futility of it all whilst the nurse proceeded to push his Ensure into his tube. 

All day, Ollie has told us that the only thing he wants is to die. He says everyone would be better off if he were dead. That he won't get better, and that the unit has just made him worse. 

All day, we have deflected the abuse and stayed with him. Our reflexes have luckily been sharp enough to keep him physically safe. Mentally we're hanging by a thread.