ABSTRACT
Parent-Based Prevention is a focused and time-limited program for parents with eating disorders who are interested in developing and maintaining a healthy lifestyle in their children. The therapeutic strategies used in this manualized treatment include a flexible treatment setting that consists of spousal counseling and individual meetings with the parent affected by the eating disorder. This flexibility within the treatment setting allows the parents to focus their efforts on engineering changes at their home that will lead to improved feeding practices, healthier eating habits in their children, and more realistic and positive body image. To achieve this, the therapist focuses on three goals during this stage of the intervention. The first goal is extending the parents’ understanding of the effects of the parental eating disorder and parental anxiety, mood disorders, and additional comorbidities on the child’s eating behaviors and cognitions. The second goal is focusing the therapeutic discussions on the concrete feeding patterns as well as the family conversations about body shape, eating, and weight. The third goal is planning behavioral experiments that the parents can try at home, and evaluating whether the parents are able to nurture a healthier lifestyle in their family.
