My daughter only eats pizza. AMA

[IThinkILikeThisLittleLight]

She has ARFID

Posting to give some insight into what life with ARFID is like

I think my brother had/ has this- he was extremely restricted as a child, lived off plain sandwiches, crisps, chips and soft cheese (with the occasional pizza- always the same brand). He would also eat some McDonald’s items. My parents got all sorts of advice around ‘just serve the food and don’t offer and alternative’, and he’d just not eat- as others have said, he’d rather have starved. In hindsight, I also wonder if he has undiagnosed ASD.

Another poster mentioned that going to university helped them, and it was definitely the case for DB- it was almost like immersion therapy for him I think, but he was able to control his exposure fully. He came home willing to eat (most) of a roast dinner for the first time in his life.

The only thing I wanted to say (and I’m really sorry if this upsets anyone) is that it had a huge impact on my own childhood. We couldn’t eat out, every meal was centred about what he’d eat, my parents were highly anxious about his nutrition etc etc. He developed constipation and my diet was changed in hopes that it’d encourage him to eat higher fibre foods. It dominated our lives and I think has had a negative impact on my mental health as a child- I did end up with an eating disorder as a teen and suspect that a (small) part of this starting was seeing food as a thing to be feared/ controlled from a very young age. I now find my own DC being fussy about food (and they are ‘just’ fussy) very ‘triggering’ now and have to consciously remind myself that it’s not the same as DB’s issues.

I have a couple of friends who have children with AFRID now, and fully empathise with you OP. Sounds like your DD has a lovely supportive circle around her- and what a great school!

This post has been really helpful, thank you. I have a relative who I now realise has a mild form of AFRID. I’ve always been understanding and assumed it was part of their ASD but it’s really interesting to hear more about it.

Her older siblings arand prefer 'proper meals' They're over 18 now and have always had normal appetites.

We do go out for birthdays and such, she just has desserts or sometimes chips.

They understand that she's got an eating disorder and they've never really bothered about it. They know that whatever I'm cooking for tea I will.be making a pizza alongside it.

They don't want pizza every night, it would drive them mad.

I fully sympathise in the situation you're in. It sounds very tough. I'm interested by the amount of other people who have experience here.

I am genuinely curious though, would children in a starving country, say parts of Africa and currently in Gaza still have a chance of developing something like this, I think they likely would lap up what they're given, no questions asked, because food is scarce.

Not saying you could have avoided it as we are a western country and not in that situation but given it's psychological it would be an interesting study.

This had already been discussed if you read the thread.

Does she eat chocolate, biscuits, sweets, ice cream etc?

My daughter had a childhood friend who had an extremely restrictive diet at primary school that has continued to adult hood. It must be extremely difficult for all concerned. Interestingly her mother has food issues herself. She is very picky about what she eats, aversions to whole food groups, yo yo dieting etc. I used to wonder whether the two were connected but perhaps not.

Could be connected, I believe a lot of these have can have a genetic link.

I notice these kids with ARFID safe foods are junk foods like pepperoni pizza, chicken nuggets, crisps, chocolate waffles and never cabbage or pears.Funny that.

At the same time however i wonder if ARFID is like a type of autism, especially with it lasting so long into adulthood and people with it 9/10 having autism. DD9 is not autistic

It's not a type of autism as lots of NT children and adults have ARFID. But I think a lot of autistic people do have a variety of food problems and eating disorders, including ARFID.

I think perhaps the difference is that you are more likely to be able to expand your diet and get better from ARFID if you are NT. It's an eating disorder so is curable and is not necessarily a life long condition. But it's harder (maybe impossible) to get over if you have the physical sensory problems associated with autism rather than 'just' the psychological issue of ARFID.

I had what was probably ARFID as a child. I ate apples, fishfingers, carrots, chips, vanilla ice cream and ready salted crisps. Luckily for me, that made one relatively balanced meal. I had:
breakfast - apple
lunch - fishfingers, carrot, crisps, apple
tea - fishfingers, chips, carrot, ice cream
snacks - carrots, apples, crisps
Every day. No variety.

It changed as a young teenager because I became anorexic instead so everything but the carrots and apples went and lots of other low calorie foods came in because the obsession with keeping calorie numbers low overcame the repulsion of other foods. It's like one eating disorder cured the other but I was better off with ARFID!

Bland and consistent is key, the more processed it is the less it will deviate in taste, texture or appearance.

An apple can be a different size, shape, colour, texture, smell. A birdseye chicken dipper is very uniform.

i was a fussy eater when I was a child. It wasn’t to the extreme of Arfid but I was very limited and had issues with the textures of some foods and couldn’t cope with some foods touching others. I’m much better now. But I think a lot of the junk food type foods being safe foods is because their texture is pretty consistent. You don’t get that with things like fruit which can be squishy, crunchy, sour, sweet. Actual roast chicken can be very chewy, nuggets aren’t.

I just want to say it’s so lovely that you are so understanding of your daughter’s condition. When I was a child this sort of thing wasn’t known/talked about and it was miserable for both me and my parents.

I did improve though I’m not a super adventurous eater. For me, things changed when I left home and went to university and I kind of forced myself to try things due to not wanting to look “weird”.

I am actually quite grateful for this thread. As I mentioned upthread I have a child with severe OCD whose eating is very restricted. I am asked frequently about how he seems to fixate on unhealthy foods - all the fun foods - as opposed to the healthier stuff. And it's not asked in a pleasant enquiring way, but in a 'oh, isn't it funny ...?' kind of way. With my son it is partly because he doesn't like the idea of me touching the food due to fears of contamination. But I'm glad I read on here about the fact that prepackaged foods are consistent. Thinking about it, he knows what he's getting every time I open yet another bag of pretzels or give him (Lidl) curly fries or Bird's Eye beefburgers. If I overcook something or the manufacturer changes the recipe, he immediately notices the difference in flavour or texture and just won't eat it. He had a brand of fish finger at his auntie's house a few years ago that he didn't like and hasn't eaten any fish finger of any description since. Previously it was all he would eat. He eventually moved on to chicken goujons after a period of just chips and cucumber. If he didn't get to eat the food he is comfortable with, he wouldn't eat. And he is already extremely thin.

The comments about the dangers of pepperoni aren't helpful at all. When my son saw a dietician earlier in the year in relation to his Crohn's Disease, I was dreading what she would say about his limited diet. But she focused on the positives, pointing out that he was getting iron/calcium etc from various foods. And she recommended a multivitamin (which he wouldn't take, but we found another one!) She knows about his OCD and agreed that moving towards other foods was perhaps for another day.

It's been nice to see some discussion of ARFID on here recently - I struggled a lot as a child with it, was down to about 5 or 6 safe foods. With help I'm a lot better in adulthood but there are still multiple times a week I have to stop eating something because it's 'wrong' and then I can't eat for the rest of the day and I'm very restricted to brand/type of foods. It's exhausting, very embarrassing (my job involves a fair amount of client schmoozing, which can get awkward in restaurants) and tends to get worse again in periods of stress.

I hope your daughter gets a bit better when she gets older, as I did - it's certainly helped make my life less restricted.

A tone deaf comment on a thread where the OP is getting a lot of helpful and positive advice from other parents who have experienced similar issues.

Until you’ve walked in their shoes and understand the complexities of the issue it’s easier not to comment rather than sneer

@Funnywonder

Oh don't worry about the processed meat thing. I've had years as a veggie and vegan in the past, and really believed the hype until my uncle calculated the cancer stats for me based on WHO data - yeah there's a link but SO low. Being a no. 1 carcinogen doesn't mean it causes equal rates of cancer.

Meanwhile everyone is ignoring just how staggering strong the relationship is between alcohol and breast cancer.

If you CBA to read the thread then maybe don't comment.

This is very interesting, thanks for sharing. Is the temperature of the food/drink relevant? Ie would she eat the pizza cold or hot, or if the juice was refrigerated instead of room temp would that be an issue?

Thank you @IThinkILikeThisLittleLight for highlighting the issue of ARFID. It is so misunderstood as a condition and as a lifestyle, for want of a better word, for the families and friends of those affected. I think both of mine have ARFID to differing degrees, DS16 more so, and I do suspect he is autistic. DS12 is a little less severe, isn't really showing any other signs of autism as far as I can tell, but he is the one under a dietician currently. She has suggested he probably has ARFID and has asked for him to be referred to CYPS, but we had a letter last week to say this has been refused, presumably they don't see it as a serious enough need at this stage.
He is on the 1st centile for weight, but otherwise is healthy and doing well at school. He will not eat breakfast or his packed lunch at school, so crams in all his food intake to an evening, which is always the same thing such as dry toast, crusty rolls, bananas, yoghurt, Ritz crackers, ice cream, and up until the past few weeks, weetabix or cornflakes. He now asks for cereal without the milk, but I do get him to have a small amount of milk.
DS16 has his potato-based safe foods like ready salted crisps, waffles, chips, McDonalds fries, fries to go, but thankfully he does eat a good fruit/veg salad bowl every day. He is 6'3" and is desperate to put on weight and eat normally. He has tried himself to have a go of the food I make for my own meals, but he just cannot cope with the texture or taste and feels like he is going to be sick. It makes him so frustrated and sad, depressed really. He's never gone out with friends for fear of having to deal with food wherever it is they might go, and has never been on a school trip away because of it.
As a family, I really have to think about holidays and days out, making sure I can either take food with me that I know they'll have, or that there will be a shop that has things they'll eat. We recently went on holiday to Germany, and thank god for the Lidl down the road where we could get bread, baguettes, crisps and bananas.
I really like the analogy you made about spiders, OP. Spot on. It's not just about encouraging your child to 'get over' their fear of food, it's so much more than that. Both of my kids really really want to overcome this, but how they do it, I really don't know. It is so interesting to see on this thread how many others are dealing with ARFID, and the similarities in safe foods which I suppose I didn't really understand until recently. DS16 relies on Walkers ready salted crisps, and I used to think it was just a preference. I see now how vital those crisps are to him, and to others. If you've never had experience of ARFID yourself or as a parent, it seems like another aspect of fussy eating, but it is so serious. I hope we can all somehow find a way to overcome this.

Omg you haven't got a clue what you are talking about. The utter ignorance.

Do you blame your parents for your lack of ability to use correct spelling and punctuation? That is a serious parenting fail too.

Unless of course you're dyslexic, which is a medical condition, that your parents wouldn't have any control over, however hard they tried to correct you... 😏

Do you also consider it a parenting fail if someone is anorexic? Or asthmatic? Or autistic?

Again, I hope this post helps some people understand that ARFID isn't fussy eating and isn't anybody 'fault'.