Anyone else have eating disorders? ARFID?

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I have always had problems with food. I used to drink beer almost every day and cook dinner late at night, right before I went to bed. Of course, that is not healthy. I was quite overweight then.

But four years ago I changed my eating habits, stopped drinking beer, and lost weight from 106 kg to 76 kg. But I started to become restrictive with food. Only ate a little and of the same kind. For a while I only ate ice cream. But now I only eat 1-2 portions of skim milk with muesli. Hardly anything else. I am deficient in several vitamins and iron.

I have an eating disorder called ARFID
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avoidant/ ... e_disorder

I wonder if there are more people with this type of problem, and how you are trying to get better? I am in contact with the habilitation at the psychiatric ward and have regular video calls, where I will try to make small changes at a time.

raises hand, present!

Congrats on not drinking beer anymore and the health improvements!

Yeah, I've been told I have the ARFID before I knew what it was. I was a very picky eater as a child. There were lots of foods I refused to eat. For example, outside of Crunch bars, KitKats, and Peanut M&M's, I did not eat chocolate at all. No cake, no ice cream, nothing. And don't think I was going to fall for that Neapolitan! Also, I eat using a system that consumes an even ratio of each item at a time and save the best piece for last. My foods could not touch at all as a kid, while now it's liquids and different temp foods that I don't like touching. As I hit adolescence and was active in athletics, I ate a lot a lot, though still quite picky.

As an adult that wasn't active, my eating habits became basically eating once a day. If I was really busy or overwhelmed, I would forget to eat sometimes. I also have a chronic GI issue that can be uncomfortable to painful, so that makes me avoid eating sometimes too. There are occasions where the food will be ready to eat, and I will postpone eating, pace around, or try to distract myself while eating to get the food down. I just don't find it enjoyable or it can even be a drag. I get the rest-and-digest bad sometimes where I'll feel slow, dumb, and easily irritable if I have to focus or be productive. When I had a 9-5 job, I would often skip eating during lunch or eat something very light so I could still function. Having food in my stomach is distracting and requires "coping". I can also feel very bloated after eating to the point that sitting upright hurts. This isn't always, and sometimes I feel better after eating. I haven't noticed a pattern yet, but I'm thinking that my mental energy points and mood before eating probably play an influential factor. Additionally, blood work has found me to be deficient in several vitamins B and iron.

Things that have worked for me
1. Set a daily time by when I have to eat, and have an easy to make meal always ready. My goal is that if I don't eat by 2p, I have to stop what I'm doing and make noodles to eat.
2. Exercise! When I exercise, I start getting very hungry and shovel food in my mouth.
3. Don't schedule anything important or mentally exhausting for 1-2 hours after eating to recover
4, Take supplements to make up for nutrients that I might be short on
5. Eat while distracted, such as while watching a movie or YouTube (I don't know if this is recommended, but it can help me)
6. Plan to eat with someone to hold me accountable
7. Have Ensures ready as a backup
8. Ate is the past-tense of eat
9er. ADHD meds help because prepping food and eating is easier to complete
10. Consider that eating is more important that many other tasks, so prioritize that. Basically, I need to plan to eat.

Bonus: A meme!

Thanks for the tips!

Eating RFIDs would definitely be an eating disorder. And if I had to, I wouldn't chew.

^ lol