“Mom, I need to go to the doctor,” Sophia matter-of-factly stated. “Something isn’t right.” I didn’t spot the signs. Amidst the pandemic taking away her first real day of high school, her 14th birthday having just passed, and navigating new friends and classes remotely, I can say it would have seemed impossible to know. But I have been beating myself up for the not knowing, not seeing, and not being present to her. I am her mom. I am supposed to see and know before she does.
She revealed she had lost 15 pounds off of her already small frame. She was crying daily and struggling to understand why. Her migraines had been intensifying in frequency. I knew, but I didn’t know. Shame washed over me as I tried to justify – big baggy sweatshirts were the trend, she wasn’t talking to me and when she did it was full of sass and snark, so I thought best to leave it for now. She was a new teenager after all.
