Suddenly hate certain foods

Post Reply New Topic

I never had any problems regarding food. I could eat almost everything and I was never a picky eater.

But sudenly out of the blue, I hate alot of the foods and drinks that were once my favourites. There is a certain brand of iced coffee that I used to love. I drunk it atleast once in a week for years. But now I have one of th ese next to me, and I almost get a gag reflex

Anybody else experienced similar radical changes in tastes? Is there a relation to autism after all, or is it just „normal“?

Thank you alot for your replies, and sorry for my limited english knowledge.

Likely NOT autism-related. More likely a change in your body due to diet or illness.

But I am not a medical professional, so you would be better off consulting your own medical-care provider.

It sounds like you're pregnant. I had a lot of sudden changes in my food likes and dislikes when I was pregnant. Walking past a meat counter in the supermarket, I felt nauseous. Then later if someone offered me a turkey dinner, it was disgusting. Ice cream, on the other hand, was a sure winner. After pregnancy, these likes and dislikes returned to my normal baseline.

Now I realize as a male, it is extremely unlikely that you are pregnant. Are there any other changes in your biochemistry that might be involved? Did you start taking medication or supplements? Did you start or end a relationship or a job? Have you moved house?

It doesn't sound normal or autism related. Perhaps you should see a doctor to see if something is wrong.

Were you sick at any time in the recent past? If so, anything you ate or drank shortly before falling ill could have become associated in your mind with the illness. That would make the food or beverage item unappealing. Patients undergoing chemotherapy treatment, for example, have to be wary of this phenomenon. It is advisable for them to avoid their favorite foods right before they get a chemo treatment and fall ill.

I agree that it is best to consult a medical professional to be sure you understand the reason(s) for this change. It is more than likely that the explanation will be something minor. But it would be wise to get a medical consultation to be on the safe side.

Well I finished my apprenticeship a couple of weeks ago and I'm currently unemployed.
Looking for a job is extremely demoralizing for me, so it could be that.

Interesting phenomenon! I never heard of this, but I think, I want to read a little bit further into the topic. Does it have a name?

Thank you for all your advices! I'm gonna ask my doctor if it gets worse.

How people taste things has always been an interest of mine. I can't for the life of me see how people can drink IPA. It's disgusting, yet I see people chugging it where ever I go. Same thing for people who eat carrots, celery and ginger. I don't get it.

When I was younger I used to eat cucumbers. I lost my taste for them about 20-30 years ago. Then again, I've never liked pickles, so maybe that's why.

Anyway, our sense of taste changes as we age. Here's an in depth article about it.

https://www.bonappetit.com/entertaining ... nges-aging

I have this as well and it's happened to me since I was a kid. It's mostly about their smell/aroma. Things I used to like but can't stomach anymore are chocolate, coffee, cig kofte, mint/menthol, melon and watermelon, salami etc.

In this specific case, it would be known as a food aversion. But the phenomenon is more generally an example of operant conditioning, which is the positive or negative reinforcement of a specific behavior. That kind of conditioning is used for things like training a puppy. You tell the dog to sit, which initially he doesn't understand. Eventually, he randomly sits down right after you said the word "sit," at which point you feed the dog a bit of food as a reward. The puppy thus learns that it is good to place his hindquarters on the ground whenever he hears his human say "sit."

Operant condition is most successful when the reinforcement (positive or negative) occurs immediately after the behavior. In the case of food aversions from illness or chemotherapy, the brain ends up learning the wrong lesson. That is because the source of the illness is introduced a day or two before falling ill. The food you end up disliking just happens to be the thing you ate shortly before starting to feel sick. The subcortical part of your brain ends up thinking the illness is the result of eating the food rather than recognizing that the illness was caused by an earlier event.

IPA is all about the hops that are in it. Whilst you're probably never going to like them if you don't like any sort of strong hops flavour, it might be worth trying some different IPAs if it might just be a single offending type that's in a lot of them. Particularly in the US, cascade hops are widely used and certainly I think they give IPA a disgusting taste.

I used to really enjoy a lot of IPAs in the UK, then suddenly, every one I tasted was like washing up liquid (not that I've ever tasted washing up liquid, but you know, artificial citrus and soapy). Always a bit fussy about my IPAs, don't like them too hoppy, but could not figure out how one after the other, they could all taste horrible. Then I got a whiff of cascade hops on a brewery tour, which the brewer explained had become really popular in the UK too so that they were pretty much in everything IPA, and low and behold, they smelled just like washing up liquid. There are a few standard IPAs I'll drink, but I'm really wary of any microbrews or new ones and always give them a sniff first before attempting to taste them.

There's a lot to do with the genes that dictate how you process certain things in food that affect your taste; coriander (cilantro) for example, has something in it that can taste bitter to some people, and whether it tastes bitter is related to having certain genes. When I first got into a conversation with one academic at my university (I'm a PhD student), I happened to mention I thought coriander was disgusting (I think there were nibbles and dips and that's how it came up) and he went 'ah, you're one of those people!'