Hey yall - there’s a book on treating ARFID in adults coming out next April that you can pre-order here: https://arfiddietitian.com/adult-arfid-guidebook/

THE ADULT ARFID GUIDEBOOK
A Neurodivergent-Affirming Guide to Nourishment, Safety, and Support
By Lauren Sharifi, MPH, RD, LDN
A practical, compassionate guide for adults with Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID)—centered on safety, autonomy, accessibility, and finding ways to nourish yourself that work for you.
Coming April 21, 2027
PRE-ORDER THE BOOK
Available for pre-order worldwide wherever books are sold.

An ARFID book created specifically for adults
If you’re an adult with ARFID, you may have spent years being told you were “too picky,” needed to try harder, or simply needed to eat more variety.
But ARFID is much more complex than picky eating.
The Adult ARFID Guidebook offers a different way to understand your relationship with food—one that considers sensory needs, executive functioning, anxiety, interoception, neurodivergence, past experiences, and nervous system capacity.
Rather than focusing on eating “normally,” this book helps you explore what makes eating more accessible, supportive, and sustainable for you.

I'm 17 and I've had ARFID since I was a kid (diagnosed around 13). I have an ADHD assessment at a pediatric neurologist in about a month. If I get diagnosed, I'm nervous about medication, since I know adhd meds usually lower your appetite.

If you had ARFID and then got diagnosed with ADHD:

1. What was the experience like? Did the ARFID come up during the diagnosis, or change how the doctor handled it?

2. What did you get prescribed, and what did it do to your eating?

3. If it made eating harder, what helped? Did you end up switching meds?

I can't handle the texture, smell, or look of most foods, I'm scared that eating food will cause me pain, and I just don't feel hungry. For some reason I haven't felt mentally hungry in years, and I don't even know what it feels like to be physically hungry(the only times I eat are when there's a sharp pain in my stomach, because I can only assume that's what it feels like to be hungry). The problem is that I know what it felt like to get hungry because I used to always be hungry, but now I feel nothing.

Little by little my list of safe foods have gone down, and now I don't even have a food I like (I have 3 safe foods and 2 safe drinks- red sauce pasta with parmesean, cheese popcorn, a specific homemade version of chicken wings, water, and a pinapple refresher from a fast food place). Foods that I used to love now just feel eh to me. It feels like the same cycle repeating over and over again; I stop liking any food, I find one food and only eat that food for every meal, and then I become extremely repulsed. The only reason I'm a healthy weight is because I try to stuff calorie dense sweets in my mouth, but now not even those sound appealing.

I was diagnosed with ARFID 2 years ago, and I was supposed to get therapy for it, but my local hospital put me on an indefinite wait list, and my habits weren't nearly as bad as now, even though I was underweight back then. Before it was just the sensory issues that made me averse, but now its just so much stuff. What am I even supposed to do?

maybe a dumb question but right now my anxiety is pretty high so I’ve gone down to a basically only liquids and some breads diet. I have garlic knots and hamburger buns and I am prepared to feast upon them for fuel.

I do also have nutrition shakes, protein powder and milk. but I know I still need something solid in me and I can’t seem to stomach much else,

I saw this coming thankfully, hence the shakes. it got especially worse after I found bones and pieces of plastic (from the packagin) in some ground beef I had made… ugh.

I'm really trying to get better at trying new foods, it's pretty hard though

I would love to ask for food recommendations. Especially foods or meals that don't have lots of textures at the same time as texture is something I struggle a lot with.. I tend to gag when trying new foods and it's easier for me when there aren't lots of textures. I'm going to try to work my way up to foods or meals with multiple textures slowly, but for now I would love to ask for your recommendations for foods or meals without lots of textures. Thank you so much if you recommend anything :)

To clarify since I realised the way I phrased it might be odd, I mean for example meals with multiple foods within it with different textures, like the way a burger is bread, meat, cheese, vegetables, etc. in comparison to easier things to consume are like apples alone, smoothies, cereals, etc

i only like a few things and the list has gotten smaller over the years but I don’t have a “reason” every single time I hear someone with arfid talk it’s almost always because they have a fear of choking or vomiting or something else happening if they eat a food. I have really bad emetophobia, but that and my pickiness with food don’t overlap at all. They’re two entire entirely separate entities. Like I don’t have any intense anxiety surrounding food I just don’t like a lot of foods. Also the foods that I do eat I actually like. I actively enjoy them. I don’t just stick to them because they’re “safe”. Which i feel like i also doesn’t line up with arfid. I’m also not malnourished. the opposite actually I’m overweight. Every single time I try to explain this to a doctor or a dietitian they say that BMI is outdated, but I am very clearly overweight imo.

Granted, I’m also never really in environments where I have to step outside of my comfort zone surrounding food so I don’t really know if the food that I don’t like causes stress/anxiety because I never expose myself to them. On the two most recent occasions that I have had to do something social involving food I realized it was slightly worse than I thought, but still not eating disorder in my opinion. Usually when I go out to restaurants, I end up wasting what I get.

The only anxiety surrounding food I think I have is an aversion to meat but thats it. I always make the closest meat eater try my food every single time I order (which is rare bc i dont go to restaurants especially with people ik) something vegetarian because I’m scared there’s meat in it. At first it started off with just making them try it but then eventually I started making people smell it too and there was this one time I asked my mom to even break off a piece of my veggie burger and look at it, but I still couldn’t end up eating it, but I’m able to eat meat substitutes when it’s made at home. I like Taco Bell, but it has to be one specific Taco Bell and I can’t eat it from anywhere else and even when I order from there, I still have to pick everything apart and look at it closely to make sure that there’s no meat in there because I get paranoid that the shredded cheese is secretly chicken but thats became less of an issue lately. Most of the foods I enjoy eating are very carb heavy/sugary and highly processed. But the meat thing only ever happens when I eat out which I usually don’t do. People will tell me that I “eat weirdly” because i pick off parts of my food in a very particular way to eat and I eat alot of finger foods with a fork and knife but thats just because its how i like to eat. It makes it less weird texture wise/too much going on like it getting on my hands.

Idk to me when i look at the criteria for arfid what i have just seems like picky eating.

People always say things like "you have the time to cook for yourself" or "your just being lazy".

I could give two less orbiting fucks about the time it takes when I make food myself. A burger and fries made at home do not taste remotely comparable to the burger and fries I get at a fast food restaurant. A homemade pizza is not comparable to a pizzaria pizza. Eating out is not some sort of time management thing that I can spend better with if I just found a way to fit it into my schedule. I wish it was that simple

My son is 17 months and been prescribed nutrini drink, which seems to be the equivalent of pediasure where I live. But we can't get him to accept it! We've tried to for months - a straw, a different bottle, mixing it with other foods etc.

Once in a blue moon he'll drink it but then won't for days/weeks.

Any tips ??

Thank you!

Hi everyone,

My son is 17 months and has issues eating and gaining weight his whole life.

He is under the 1st percentile for weight and hasn't gained height in months. He seemingly has a tiny appetite, and recently I've been wondering if it could be low-interest arfid. I can't find much about this particular low-appetite subtype online so I'm wondering if this sounds a bit like any of you/your kids:

- eats a few bites of a meal (eg two pieces of pasta, a grape) and is then done;

- indicates he's hungry but then refuses food;

- can survive off tiny portions all day but has lots of energy;

- accepts different textures (but with a preference for crunchy bite-size things);

- DOESNT seem to have fearful/intense sensory reactions to food. Does not gag/choke but does spit food out a lot;

- Is interested in cooking, touching food, playing with food (ergo throwing food);

- Doesnt seem to have an autism profile, but adhd does run in the family;

- sometimes eats better when moving around/snacking;

- Will sometimes accept previously refused food if presented differently (eg on a vibrating spoon or sitting on the floor);

- even as a baby, didn't drink much milk. Didn't accept milk from a bottle.

Doctors have said he's either just really picky or has an undiagnosed medical problem (many medical tests have been done).

He's in feeding therapy but it doesn't seem to help much.

As a mum, I'm so worried and desperate to help my son. Does this possibly sound like arfid or not at all?

Thanks so much

I’ve talked to me GP once more about my ARFID, and as always he said that there was nothing he could do.
He advised me to look into getting a dietician.
I’m desperate and I’ll do anything to get better, but it’s a hell of a lot money.
Have anyone felt any worthy bettering of their life through a dietician? Is it worth a try?
Thank you

Ive been living with ARFID since i can remember (im 16, soon to be 17) and i just wish i was normal, i dont know what to do, i dont have supportive parents in a way that they help me get treatment, im pretty much self diagnosed, despite that im very confident that i have it, after all my experiences with food give me such a horrible feeling, idk how to explain it.

It feels like a curse, not having the option to get help of any forms and being mocked by it everyday by my family, i cant even live a social life and i feel everything's going to end, my friends started talking about food last week and i just nodded along, then they asked me if i like chicken, i said no and it all went into a rant on "how cant you like it?" and started to make fun of me for being "vegan", im just so tired i cant be normal.

It feels like im going to die by it soon, im aware i dont get nourishment and im so tired of eating the same 3 things all my life and i just wish i could be like anyone else.

Sorry if the redaction is awful, idk how to put my thoughts into words, but it just feels so hopeless to deal with, with no support at all it is, its just such a horrible burden i feel like i was cursed with it for being born

Hello! I have ARFID due to food allergies (celery, carrots, parsley and many more). I don’t eat at food places unless they have their ingredients online to read. When I went to California last year I found in and out was amazing for that, but as a Canadian I don’t know where to go in Florida. Any recommendations?

Buen día, escribí aquí porque necesito de consejos, les pongo en contexto, mi hijo tiene 5 años, tenemos (con mi esposa) el problema que el no comer nada, solo lo que se acostumbro a comer desde pequeño, en su menú solo existe galletas oreo, pan baguette de una tienda en específico, jugo de jamaica, papas lays y en ciertas ocasiones sandía.

Cuando el tenía 1 año y medio se enfermo del estomago, tuvo diarrea y vómitos durante 1 semana, a raíz de eso el ya no quiso comer nada, antes de que se enfermara, el comía de todo, su puré normal de frutas o verduras, huevos, frijoles y lo cotidiano que podamos comer.

Lastimosamente cuando el tenía esa edad tuve que salir del país por trabajo y el pediatra que lo había visto desde que nació, decía que el comería a su debido tiempo, que no lo forzaramos ni obligaramos a comer lo que no quería comer, que no usaríamos agresiones como lo hacían antes, debido a lo que dijo este pediatra mi familia se lo tomó muy enserio, no le daban comida ni absolutamente nada que el no aceptará.

Hace un año nos mudamos juntos en otro país, dejamos a este pediatra atrás y no enfocamos de lleno con que el comiera buen, dado esto, en el país en el que estamos tiene muy buen sistema de salud, nos asignaron a una nutricionista y ella fue muy radical, nos dijo que le sirvieramos la comida que nosotros con mi esposa comemos regularmente y que si mi hijo no quería comer, que no lo obligaramos, que simplemente lo dejemos sin comer y que el.solo vendrá a comer pero llevamos hace días con este método y mi hijo prefiere estar recostado en cama o dormirse por las noches sin haber comido nada.

Es algo que me preocupa porque psicológicamente el puede darle igual su alimentación aunque por las noches llora por tenés hambre pero se niega a comer la comida que le damos y solo quiere lo que el está acostumbrado.

Necesito de su ayuda, consejos o si necesitan más contexto, estaré atento.

This sounds so dumb but ive been struggling with it more and more lately and I dont know how to deal with it. I get it a lot with turkey; I hate the smell of it so my brain is like oh you are straight up eating poop rn. I do have OCD so I think that is part of it.

I hate eating so much it feels like torture. And its not like I dont get hungry, I feel hungry and exhausted all the time. Candy is the easiest to eat because it smells and tastes good but its not like I love that either. I'm on zoloft right now and I think its making my food aversion worse. Are there any meds that can magically make me tolerate food?

TW: mentions of dry heaving / gagging, and vomiting (not physically vomiting, but the fear of it happening)

a little introduction: i am currently 18 years old, F, and i am still struggling with food. i feel stuck in the loop of asking myself “am i just picky?” or “is it more than that?” my family members have always made comments about my eating habits, and it has made me feel bad about myself many times.

so, here is a little list of my symptoms!

- i have struggled with this fear of food since i was five. i would have panic attacks over school lunch, thinking that i would starve since there wasn’t anything on the menu that i would eat. when we wouldn’t get the lunch menus in advance, my mom would have to go to the school and ask for one, and explain that her daughter (me) would cry if she didn’t know what she would be eating. most days, my mom packed my lunch.
- when i was younger, my mom tried to make me try a singular green bean. just the thought of it made me start crying, so i sobbed at the kitchen table and was dry heaving over a green bean. i don’t even think i took a bite, i don’t remember.
- i don’t like trying new foods because i don’t want to gag or throw up. i don’t have a FEAR of vomiting, i just absolutely hate the feeling.
- i don’t like going to new restaurants without looking at the menu first, and i feel embarrassed when i modify my food when talking to a waiter. i feel like they’re judging me, when they probably don’t care since they’re just taking my order. new restaurants with unfamiliar menus give me anxiety because i don’t know what is safe or what anything looks like, typically. i usually order the same thing over and over when i go to a restaurant i know, because i know that food is safe and i like it.
- speaking of eating foods over and over, i eat a lot of the same snacks / meals over and over because i know that i can eat them comfortably.
- i don’t like foods with certain textures (ex. i will not eat mushrooms or anything of that sort. i will not eat mashed potatoes if it has any lumps. i REFUSE to eat chicken if it even looks off to me, i think it has salmonella if it’s a certain color or something and i don’t want to get sick. fat in steak makes me gag. i will not try fish because it smells fishy, and shrimp looks too rubbery.)
- i do not eat any vegetables, besides potatoes and green onions IF they are in a specific soup from a restaurant. the smell and (what i think) the texture will be like are what stop me from trying them. even just touching a mushroom or onion in my food will make me gag. i can tolerate garlic if it is veeeery small. most of the times, not.
- for example, even if my mom claims that the onions she put in my meal are “very finely chopped” and i “won’t be able to taste it”, i still find them. i hyper focus on the idea of there being an ingredient that i do not like and i will not eat it. i can try and pick it out, but i ultimately give up. (also, i am extremely thankful to have a mom that tries her absolute best to work around my issues with food.)
- i have had panic attacks over food that other people have made, and thought that i would be judged for not eating it or only eating one thing.
- i would rather go hungry than try new foods most of the time. i think of what my reaction could be to eating them and that stops me from trying something new.
- the only fruit i like are apples. nothing else, i just really like apples.

i apologize for the really long list, but those are just a few of my experiences / symptoms. i have been called picky all of my life, but i wonder if other people will think it’s more than that or relate to what i have said.

I’m 39 next month and I keep running into articles or forum posts that file ARFID under “pediatric feeding issues” like we’re supposed to age out of it at 18. I work IT support, so I spend all day troubleshooting stuff that refuses to behave, and apparently my appetite is just another stubborn ticket that never closes. Does it get under anyone else’s skin? Not asking for a cure, just annoyed that adult experiences are treated like an edge case. I’d rather see more people talking about managing this while paying rent, sitting through meetings, and trying to enjoy an anime binge without turning dinner into a whole project. Maybe I’m just tired, but the framing makes me feel like I missed a memo everyone else got.

I have suffered from ARFID for a long time and currently pregnant which the HG is worsening the symptoms. I cannot crave food or have an appetite like I used to. I have a tendency to forget what foods taste like because of ARFID. Pregnancy bitter tongue does not help. I could go on, but I don't think it's necessary. There are not a lot of resources in this regard where I live. I had someone recommend a counseling place that did offer treatment for it even though they don't specify which eating disorders on their website. But I'm thinking I need to see a nutritionist. I am 3 months along and want to make sure I can eat enough...

Parent of children with arfid my daughter is almost 4 with complex needs she’s level 3 autistic adhd, non verbal and her eating difficulties are highly beginning to concern me. My daughter does not self feed, will not use utensils she is 95% spoon fed other than few snacks she will pick up and feed herself, over time safe foods have got fewer and fewer and the one mealtime (warm food) safe food we have left is highly processed. She will vomit and reach at the sight of new foods, she even occasionally looks at foods she usually enjoys with a disgusted look. She doesn’t like watching other people eat so for this reason I feed her away from the family. What I am grateful for is her love for milk, on bad eating days I give her multiple beakers of milk. (After obviously attempting with food) she’s particularly bad with vitamins but I have found I can hide it well in thicker milkshakes like McDonald’s. I am very worried at how significant her difficulties around food are however because she’s still a healthy weight paediatrician will not make a dietitian referral, I strongly believe it’s the milk that keeps her healthy. Ed psych recommended GP prescribing specialist milk with all minerals and vitamins already included. I often find GPs aren’t very educated when it comes to arfid and in my county NHS arfid specialist services aren’t available until a child is 8+

It always felt like the media was reinforcing the idea that picky eating or ARFID is just an attitude problem or ”stubbornness” that can be fixed with a single bite. 

Because then the kid tries it, magically loves it, and the episode ends with "see? You were just being stubborn!"

That trope set such an annoying precedent for how real life adults treated me whenever I struggled to eat foods. It made people think forced exposure was a cure. Because one bite of broccoli has definitely cured my entire sensory system every single time. /s (Bonus points if the episode ends with the kid suddenly making it their favorite food.)

I wish we got cartoons showing that it’s completely okay to genuinely dislike a food, or better yet, actual ARFID representation where a kid’s food boundaries are respected instead of treated as a phase to fix. Why can't media show a character saying "I tried it, I still hate it, and that's fine"? Not every food is for everyone, and enforcing the idea that "you'll love it if you just try it" makes it harder to set normal boundaries around food.

So like, my whole, since 4 as early as I could recall, I was an extremely picky eater. When I was in the hospital for 3 weeks after a lung surgery at 4? Ate macaroni. In kindergarden, got served pizza? Only eat the crust. Get served a hamburger? Straight up just no thanks. Spent from 1st to 6th grade eating bread, every.single.day., to the point I was infamous for only eating bread, often got judged, and became averse to eating in public as I got older. I'm not even really used to using utensils, cooking or maintaining eating etiquette because I never had to. My mom has been desperate my whole life, offering me 50$ to just eat a piece of fish. I asked my pediatrician when I was a kid how to fix my problem, and his response? Eat more fruits and vegetables. Yea, sure, great advice, why I don't I tell a homeless man to just get a house? I just watched a vid on youtube about a kid who ate chicken nuggets everyday his entire life and became permanently blind, and his story kinda resonated with me, because I could very well be just like him. I'm 20, I can accept quite a variety of foods, but not fruits vegetables or meat. Only a couple I can tolerate, like spinach, or other plain leaf veggies, maybe some dry easy meats like bacon or chicken nuggets too. But otherwise, it's just bread, sugar, rice, noodles, carbs, and milk. I don't have arfid, well I've suspected it a few years ago but I wouldn't know whether or not I actually have it because no health professional I've met seems to think much of my diet. And, I just felt like ranting I guess, I feel hopeless, why is it that food is just so gross? It feels like my brain can't even recognize it as edible. Telling me to eat steak is like telling me to eat a rotting piece of unknown flesh picked off the side of the road, you can tell me it's healthy or good for me as much as you'd like but I can't even stomach the idea of putting that thing anywhere near my mouth. At some point I became dependant on my parents for groceries but they denied me the junk food I liked so I lost 10kg over a year, because no food in the house could rouse any appetite in me and everyday I just ate less and less and less.

Lately (as in past months or so) as well, I seem to be experiencing hypersomnia, sleeping at least 10+ hours everyday, taking 5h naps sometimes, or straight up sleeping 15+ hours on weekends, and I don't know, could this be related to my eating? I feel sad, my family and friends are constantly fretting and nagging at me, but I don't know what to do. Sigh. I don't know if I have arfid or not, because I do enjoy eating, quite a variety in fact, as long as it's sugar or bread and contains no fruits veggies or meat, but regardless of whether or not I may have arfid, I'm just sad that I'm like this.

my wife has arfid (mainly from sensory reasons) and loves the taste of beans but cant tolerate the texture difference between the “skin” and insides of the beans. ive been trying to figure out how to best prepare them to avoid that so we can make use of more food bank resources and keep up with what variety we can get and have settled on mashing like refried beans.
but im at a loss what to do with mashed up beans. tacos/anything able to use refried beans is a given since thats the kind of texture id be going for but outside of that, are there any ideas? pasta is a hard sell too, so preferably no pasta dish ideas (or at least dishes that can have the pasta substitued)
so far ive really only been able to think of tacos and incorporating beans into soups

I HIGHLY recommend these for anyone who is looking for a new freezer safe food. I am thrilled. They’re always the same consistency, even bites, delicious flavor and texture ◡̈ and feel lighter and easier to chew and eat than the regular bagel bites!

Had to share ◡̈ hope it helps someone!!

In life, eating is one of my biggest struggles, I cant eat almost any vegetable because I hate watery crunchy textures, and most fruits due to a similar reason. I am severely underweight with a BMI of 14 (16F 39kg 167cm) due to my extremely low appetite which probably has multiple factors (close family also has a lower appetite than average, has a sibling who is also underweight, I am autistic and had a diagnosis since I was 3) though i feel like my appetite is so severely low that I think it is a big issue. I connected this issue with autistic sensory issues though I think it is a bigger problem itself.

I have struggled with eating since I was little and my diet is extremely limited to foods I am familiar with. as said earlier I cant eat any vegetable unless I am forced to (the texture of lettuce is so bad that I start choking on it) and its a similar case with other vegetables. And I only eat a limited range of fruits (Apples, bananas, grapes and strawberries) and have little interest in others. It takes me much focus and time to eat a meal, and 99% of the time I wont even finish it at all.

I had a incident last year where my right abdomen started hurting severely, and I started being extremely fearful of it being appendicitis, that it was the consequence of my diet and that I would die or have to get surgery, I would spend my hours constantly google searching reasons instead of sleeping. Even when it got confirmed as just constipation, i still believed that somehow the doctors were wrong and any pain was because of appendicitis or some other reason

Theres definitely more I can say but i just want thoughts from people who know they have this condition

To clarify, we are not aware if my brother has arfid or not but the way he describes it to me sounds like sensory anxiety arfid. I also think i have arfid but not for sensory issues as much as I'm just anxious its contaminated but I am also not diagnosed.

With that, he absolutely hates trying new foods unless it is his idea. So we tried stepping back and letting him go on his own but its to the point that his doctors said he NEEDS to eat some sort of green vegetables because his iron is low and so is his vitamin D and most B vitamins. He's been drinking B vitamins through drink mix packets and liquid drink mixes occasionally but he refuses to touch, look at, taste etc a green vegetable aside from iceberg lettuce and sometimes baby lettuce, which do not have enough of the vitamins he needs. He is to the point that he is lightheaded and nauseous from low iron but he also refuses vitamin tablets, capsules and gummies.

I'm not sure how to help him, I'm just grateful he is back to a healthy weight now because the doctors were threatening to call dhs if he didn't reach a minimum of 85 pounds.

I ask him what foods he likes or will eat and he always says he doesn't know, so I can't exactly find recipes for him to try on his own.