Nutrition Therapy for ARFID Treatment
Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID) is a common feeding disorder that often displays as “extreme picky eating.” It very often begins in early childhood, and can progress, throughout adulthood.
Through a compassionate, patient and highly trained approach, we at Courage to Nourish can guide you or your loved one, through the process of slowly expanding on your preferred foods through a variety of methods.
If you or a loved one are experiencing any of the following, we would love to work together to help lower your stress and increase joy around meal times, feel more at ease in social situations surrounding food, and ensure that your body is getting adequate and balanced nutrition to support a healthy, fulfilling life:
- Do you or your child struggle with extreme picky eating and food aversions, making trying new foods overwhelming?
- Do you have a small list of “preferred foods” and are anxious about adding to that list?
- Do certain textures, smells, or simply how a food looks, cause a strong aversion?
We work hard to personalize this process to your specific needs. We help identify your specific motivators to stay engaged, and will work alongside you as barriers and challenges arise.
How we’ll work with you
- Personalized food exposures together in session and goal setting for at home
- Creating a plan for experiments with new tastes and textures with your input and directions
- Meal planning, if needed, to support you in adequately nourishing your body
- Processing around fears and barriers with identified foods
- Coordination of care between members of the team, like a physician, therapist, or speech therapist
- Evaluation and of growth charts, when applicable
- Family sessions, when applicable
- Sampling food from restaurants together in session, when applicable
- Discussing small goals to overall improve your relationship with food
- Email and text support
We align ourselves with the Health at Every Size© or HAES© approach and value diversity and inclusion.
We believe every individual deserves compassionate and adequate care. Not only do we work through a weight inclusive framework, but we also promote anti-racism, gender inclusivity and aim to make our nutrition counseling a safe and non-judgmental space for ALL humans. If health is something you’d like to work toward, we focus on health promoting behaviors instead of changing body shape and size. We do not provide diet or weight loss services. We welcome and encourage conversations about how various identities our clients hold impact their relationship with food, body and movement. Our team is committed to learning, growing and taking action when it comes to advocating for our clients' wellbeing.
Read more about HAES by visiting The Association For Size Diversity and Health (ASDAH)'s website.
Please also consider visiting our Resources page.
Interested in finding out more?
Tell us more about how we can help you.
