ARFID (and all that it entails)

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I have a problem touching most wet things (e.g. wet wash rags whilst doing the laundry, etc.) but wet, mushy left-in-the-sink food is especially disgusting. I gag when I have to touch it, but I don’t think I’ve ever actually vomited. 

I feel like it would be better if I had those big yellow gloves you always see housewives wearing in old movies, but I don’t usually have to touch them for long (because yes, dishwashers are magical), so I just try to do it quickly and then scrub my hands like a surgeon prepping for surgery. 

omg yes. With only two permanent exceptions and one exception that actually went away when I was a kid, I’ve always hated melted/cooked cheese.

And the exceptions were always the really cheap, fake-ish cheeses like Kraft mac and cheese. Which lead to some pretty awkward situations when I ended up with any sort of “fancy” mac and cheese and was completely disgusted that it was like...actual cheese. 

The second best thing in life is when you try something new and it’s actually something you can eat

The best thing is when it’s actually really good for you.

Y’all. I just tried Soylent, (a meal replacement drink) for the first time the other day and it’s the best thing ever. I tried the Drink, not the Powder or the Coffiest, so I can’t speak for those, but it has a uniform texture (no grittiness or clumps) and a clean, simple taste. They just now came out with new flavors, too, but I’m very satisfied with this one. 

I just feel so happy about this and felt the need to share.

*Hugs you* I’m sorry you’ve had to deal with that, Anon. I understand how you feel. I found out about ARFID through some random article a family member sent me through facebook, and it was like a breath of fresh air to find out that there were others like me.

I think it’s a good idea to keep trying with that one. That’s happened to me before, but the fact that you were able to maybe like it once is a definite plus.

Sometimes food fluctuates for me, even foods I actually really like some days will make me want to gag. I think you should keep considering it for a while. Think about the food and try imagining the way it felt and tasted the first time. If you can remember certain the way the tastes and sensations felt at first when you thought you might like it, it might help you associate the food with good sensations.

And give it time. Sometimes your brain is just not in the mood to catalog another food, which wouldn’t be conducive to learning.

Also, whenever trying a new food, try eating small portions. It can be really easy to overstimulate with a new food, and make it go from “hey maybe” to “yeah uh-uh”. It usually helps for me to eat a small bit at a time with new food.

This is a very difficult thing to answer because I don’t know your boyfriend, and everyone experiences ARFID differently, but I’ll try my best. 

I think the thing that makes the biggest difference to me is just...nonchalant acceptance. For example, if the subject of specific food brands comes up and I mention that I only like a certain brand or that I really dislike another, it really makes me feel better when people are just like “Oh cool, we’ll keep that in mind”

For me, actions speak louder than words (but then again I’m a person who gets pretty closed off about things that make me feel vulnerable) so many things that help are just like...a family member making/purchasing one of my safe foods for me, or actively trying to learn how I prefer my foods (for example, I have a very specific way that I like most foods cooked -- how watery, how soft, how crunchy) and it really means a lot when my family and friends make an effort to see what those are. 

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Hi, I sent you a submission awhile ago about eating a sandwich next to tuna.

So to cut to the chase: I don’t know who else to ask about this, I’m at a get together for my youth group, I’m new and I don’t really know anyone so I was really excited when they invited me. It’s a taco party. I don’t eat tacos. In fact it’s one of the foods that freaks me out.

I’m used to brushing off eating and making excuses but idk, tonight is different. I really want these people to like me. I don’t want to tell them I have AFRID and I don’t want them to think I’m being rude. I’m not really sure what to do. Does anyone have any advice? Should I tell them? I don’t want them to look at me differently. I’m sure none of them have heard of AFRID before and I don’t want to be the new girl and the “different one.”

I know I shouldn’t be self conscious about this, I’m normally not, but I’m nervous.

-An AFRID whose freaking the f^ck out.

I encourage anyone who has advice to leave a comment or a reply!

As for me, if it makes you uncomfortable, you don’t have to tell them. I’ve been in situations almost just like this one and it always makes me feel super self-conscious and awkward. Usually in situations like that I just straight-up lie. Not great advice, I know, but that’s what I do.

Sometimes I just say “Yeah, I have weird allergies”, but tbh if it’s a get-to-know-you group, that might lead to people asking what specifically you’re allergic to.

Other times I say that I’ve already eaten. (Sometimes that’s true, actually. I pre-eat for most group activities) Make something up if you need to, like “Yeah, my family forgot I had an event and we already ate.” 

Most times I just say “I don’t know, my stomach is feeling kinda funny. I don’t think I should eat too much. I’ll just stick with a drink for now” It seems to work for most situations, and people usually just brush it off as having eaten something that disagreed with you.

Or you could just say “Oh I’m good, I’m not really a huge fan of Mexican food.” 

Really it all depends on what you’re comfortable with. If you decide once you get there that you don’t mind explaining about ARFID to them (or even just one of them) that’s great! But if you don’t feel 100% confident, you definitely don’t have to. 

I’ve gotten a few questions about food-training, so I decided to make a post for you all.

Food Training is basically just exposure therapy. (The thing used to help people with phobias.)

Disclaimer: Keep in mind that everyone is different, and no one’s limits are the same. What might work for one person might not work for another. I’ve only successfully managed to food-train a handful of foods, and I am definitely no dietitian.

The first step is finding a food to train on.

(You can do more than one if you feel up to it, but I prefer to stick to one at a time.)

For me, picking a compatible food is the most important part of this, and boils down to a few key components: Necessity, Availability, Timing, and Food-Hierarchy.

Necessity: Don’t food-train on something you picked out of a hat. Find something that you NEED for one reason or another. Whether that’s a nutritional requirement, a food that’s a common restaurant menu-item, a staple food near you, or something that your family/friends/household/etc have a vested interest in (like if your parents were pumpkin farmers and everything in your house had pumpkin in it but you don’t eat pumpkin). If you train on delicacies only eaten in the Himalayas with no intention of…ever going to the Himalayas, that’s not a great plan. Find something that would make DIFFERENCE IN YOUR LIFE if you were able to eat it.

Availability: If you decide to food-train on a $300 wheel of cheese, you’re probably going about this the wrong way. Food training takes a long time. Sometimes YEARS. It’s important that you can have something readily available in stores near you or relatively easy to make and that you can afford.

Timing: Sometimes whatever voodoo magic controlling my interest in food differs depending on the day. I don’t know what it is, but there are certain days where the idea of eating soup makes me want to gag, and yet other times (like every third Sunday under a waxing moon when the wind blows in an Easterly direction) I can look at it and say “…maybe……just…..maybe……” This is the time to food-train. This way you can associate the food with a better reaction. Some foods have more rigid feels, but others are kind of wishy washy. And some days they look more possible than others.

This ties into my final component

Position of the Food on the Food-Hierarchy: If you asked someone ((in the western world, at least)) without ARFID to choose between eating a brown, mushy banana and eating a banana slug, they would most likely choose the banana. They would think BOTH were a nasty option, but there’s one that a lot LESS disgusting than the other. This is what I personally think of as the Food-Hierarchy. It is different for every person, constantly in flux, and sometimes nigh-indistinguishable, but it’s a cornerstone for me in choosing foods. Trying to food-train on one of your “vomit-inducing” foods is going to be a lot harder and emotionally draining than some of your more “moderate disgust” foods.

When I decided to train with soup (which I’m currently doing now), I did so because it’s nutritious (which I need), a staple food where I live, cheap and easy to make, and relatively flexible on the Food-Hierarchy for me.

I will probably never food-train with casseroles. Because while they are all of the former things, they are MUCH more rigidly set into the “gag, disgusting, vomit” category of the Food-Hierarchy. It’s just not going to happen.

I probably won’t train with berries either. Because while they ARE more appealing on the Food-Hierarchy, it just…doesn’t seem like there’s an urgent need for me to eat berries? I can obtain their nutritional value from juices, and unless I’m going to be just eating them raw, they would probably come with more training than I really want to do (pie, cobbler, tarts, shortcake, etc). Also, they can get kinda pricey for good ones. And if they’re out of season when I’m in a better headspace for food-training, I’m gonna be kinda out of luck.

See how they all tie in?

The second step is figuring out if the food is modular.

Soup is very modular. Start with broth. When that’s tolerable, add one ingredient. When that’s tolerable, add another.

If you’re trying to eat spaghetti sauce, you can start by eating spaghetti while smelling the sauce. When that’s tolerable, put a little sauce on. Then more, then more, etc.

If you want to start eating crackers...that’s going to be a lot harder, because it isn’t as modular. That’s not to say it’s impossible, it’s just harder to piece it into little baby steps.

The third step is breaking those steps (if there are any) down even further.

First, try smelling it and holding it near your open mouth. (And make sure to actually breathe in through your open mouth. Don’t hold your breath)

When that’s tolerable, try putting it on your tongue and then removing it

When that’s tolerable, try holding it in your mouth for a while before removing it

Then chewing and spitting out

Then chewing and swallowing

And most importantly: Don’t Get Discouraged!

One of the biggest struggles is realizing how long this all takes. It will probably take me years to train one very specific recipe of soup. On the other hand, I have another food that only took a month or two. That’s just the way this cookie crumbles.

Even so, I’ll be honest with you: there are quite a few foods that I have started to train on and never been able to successfully train myself to eat.

However, the few foods this has worked for have helped make my life a lot easier, and I definitely recommend it.

So I wanted to submit this to your awesome ARFID blog because I’m so proud of myself and no one else understands. I ate a whole sandwich today at lunch even though I was sitting right next to a person eating one of my trigger foods!!!!!

(Love the blog)

Yay! That’s awesome! I’m so proud of you~

Hi! So first of all, I encourage all of my followers to pitch in with any advice they have because I know not all colleges are the same.

That being said, I’ve been going to college for about 3 years now. It took a while to find what I needed, but I eventually did find what worked for me. Here are some things I’ve found useful.

Most of our dining halls are buffet-style. You pay, go in, eat as much as you want, stay as long as you want, and then leave. For me, these are only useful if I have like a 4 hour gap (or longer) between classes. This is because I eat like bird and if I only dropped in for like a hour,I wouldn’t get anywhere near my money’s worth. I mostly just grab bagels and toast and rice and stuff like that anyway–great for quick energy but not great nutrition-wise, so I try not to do it too often.

In some buffet-style dining halls, they have these kiosk things for foods that take a staff member to help you. One of these is the stir-fry bar. Now don’t get me wrong, I would’t eat stir-fry if you paid me, but in mine it has lots of little ingredient buckets. So there’s a little tub of shaved carrots, a little tub of broccoli, etc. and they usually have white rice there, too. Although sometimes they only have brown rice and noodles and it makes me sad :( 

The other style of dining hall we have is completely a-la-carte (so you pay for every individual thing like in a grocery store) I tend to prefer this one, because I only pay for what I buy and the variety tends to be much larger. They have spaghetti and fries and a bagel & cereal stand, so I’m pretty much set there. 

We also have these “alternative food” corners that have everything from gluten free to vegan to organic foods. Often times these are where I find things like protein bars or protein shakes or nutritional drinks like Odwalla and Naked. These are great for packing in nutrients amid the sea of starches elsewhere.

One pitfall you might run into (depending entirely on where you live and what your campus is like) is that campus food is usually more expensive than what you would find at a grocery store. This means that if protein bars/shakes or chips or anything else that’s prepackaged is a main staple in your life, you might just want to go to the grocery store and buy it bulk.

ALWAYS KEEP CHANGE FOR VENDING MACHINES. I usually try to keep about $5 in 1-dollar bills and quarters. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve come out of a 4 hour lab just in time for the only dining halls that have food I like to close. Sometimes I have money to buy a candy bar or chips or something from a vending machine and it makes all the difference.

Speaking of emergency snacks: if you have any kind of non-perishable food that you eat (granola bars, crackers, peanuts, dried fruit, anything) TRY TO KEEP SOME WITH YOU AT ALL TIMES. You never know when a dining hall will suddenly change their recipes or the vending machines will be all out of things you eat or you just forgot to eat that morning or something. Put them in your backpack or purse for emergencies.

Some dorm complexes have kitchens. If your’s does, consider buying ingredients to make your own food. I cook most of my meals because I have very rigid specifications about most foods and I find that it’s easier to make it myself than to try to explain to someone else what I want.