Eating issues

When a child's relationship with food becomes a struggle, the whole family feels it. Mealtimes start to feel like battlegrounds. Parents oscillate between worry, frustration, and self-doubt. And parents may wonder whether what they're seeing is normal fussiness, a phase, or something that needs help.

This guide is for parents whose child is having difficulties with food, eating, or their relationship with their body, and who are trying to work out what to do next. It covers what we mean by "eating issues", how they differ from clinical eating disorders, how they show up at different ages, the link with anxiety and neurodivergence, what helps, what doesn't, and how counselling fits in. Where we mention something briefly that has its own deeper article on our site, you'll find a link to read more.

A note on scope before we go any further: This guide covers difficulties with food and eating in general, whether or not they turn out to be an eating disorder. If you think your child may have an eating disorder, such as anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder or ARFID, whatever their weight, please contact your GP without delay. Eating disorders need specialist medical, dietetic, and psychological input. The UK eating disorders charity Beat is the standard UK signposting resource for families in this position. Its helplines are free for any age and open 3pm to 8pm, Monday to Friday: 0808 801 0677 (England), 0808 801 0432 (Scotland), 0808 801 0433 (Wales) and 0808 801 0434 (Northern Ireland).

What do we mean by 'eating issues'?

When we talk about eating issues we mean the range of difficulties with food, eating, or mealtimes that cause real distress for the young person and the family, whether or not they meet the criteria for an eating disorder. Common patterns include:

• Selective or restrictive eating: A narrow list of accepted-foods, refusal of whole food groups, intense anxiety around new foods.
• Mealtime anxiety: Worry, tension, or distress around eating in front of others or eating at all.
• Emotional eating: Using food to manage difficult feelings, comfort, or boredom.
• Body-driven eating patterns: Skipping meals, cutting out foods, or limiting portions because of body image concerns. Our body image page covers the wider territory.
• Rigid food rules: "Good" and "bad" food categories, anxiety about specific ingredients, rigid timings.
• Loss of pleasure in food: Eating as a chore, an obligation, or a source of stress rather than enjoyment.
• Significant disconnection from hunger and fullness signals: Eating only at scheduled times because the body's own signals aren't trusted or noticed.

These patterns sit on a spectrum. At the milder end, many young people move through brief phases of selective eating, mealtime tension, or emotional eating without long-term consequence. At the more entrenched end, the same patterns can be part of an eating disorder, or can come before one. The honest answer is that the boundary is not always obvious from the outside. When you are unsure, GP advice is the right next step.

Eating issues and eating disorders

NICE guidance on eating disorders (NG69) sets out how eating disorders should be recognised and treated.^[1] In brief, the main types in children and young people are below. These are short descriptions, not diagnostic criteria: only a proper clinical assessment can diagnose an eating disorder.

• Anorexia nervosa: Significant restriction of food intake, with associated weight loss or failure to gain weight expected for development, intense fear of weight gain, and disturbance in how the young person experiences their own body.
• Bulimia nervosa: Recurrent episodes of binge eating followed by compensatory behaviours (vomiting, laxative use, excessive exercise, fasting).
• Binge eating disorder: Recurrent binge episodes without the compensatory behaviours.
• ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder): Restrictive eating that is not driven by body image concerns. Often linked to sensory sensitivity, fear of vomiting or choking, or low interest in food. It often occurs alongside autism.
• OSFED (Other Specified Feeding or Eating Disorder): A category that captures clinically significant disordered eating that doesn't fit the criteria for the above.

Signs to raise with your GP as soon as you can include:

• Significant weight loss, or weight that has dropped off the child's growth curve.
• Persistent food restriction, calorie counting, or elimination of whole food groups.
• Purging behaviours (vomiting, laxative use, compulsive exercise).
• Sustained preoccupation with weight and body shape.
• Loss of menstrual periods in girls who have started menstruating.
• Withdrawal from social eating situations that would otherwise matter to the young person.

These signs are prompts, not a checklist. A young person can be struggling with food without showing them, and some of these changes can have other explanations. If you are worried, speak to your GP either way. If you are seeing any of these signs, contact your GP promptly and explain what you have noticed. They can check your child's physical health and arrange a specialist referral if it is needed. Weight on its own is not a reliable guide, so mention your worries even if your child's weight hasn't changed. Finding Therapy is not a specialist eating disorder service. Eating disorders need specialist care from a team that looks after physical and mental health together.

If this feels frightening, you are far from alone. Eating difficulties have become much more common in recent years, and with the right help, recovery is possible. NHS England notes that its survey methods changed between 2017 and 2023, so the exact size of the rise should be read with some caution.

ARFID: a specific note

ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder) is sometimes confused with anorexia nervosa but is clinically distinct. It is not usually driven by body image. Instead, ARFID can involve sensitivity to the texture, smell or look of food, fear of what might happen when eating (such as being sick, choking or an allergic reaction), low interest in food, or a mix of these.

A 2020 systematic scoping review in Psychiatry Research summarised the rapidly growing evidence base on ARFID:

ARFID can produce significant weight loss, growth delay, and nutritional deficiency, and where this is the case, specialist medical input is needed alongside any psychological work.

ARFID is a relatively new diagnosis. If your child has been described for years as an "extreme fussy eater" and you suspect there is more going on, ARFID is worth raising with your GP. Specialist NHS and private support for ARFID exists, though what is available varies a lot from area to area and waiting lists can be long. Your GP or local eating disorders service can tell you what exists near you. Our Autism page covers the wider neurodivergent picture for families where ARFID and autism appear together.

Why young people develop eating issues

There is rarely a single cause. Common contributing factors include:

• Anxiety: Many young people use control over food as a way to manage broader anxiety. Our anxiety page covers the wider picture.
• Body image concerns: Worries about appearance, weight, or shape, which for some young people can be heightened by social media. Our body image page covers this in depth.
• Sensory sensitivity: This can be more common in autistic young people. Specific food textures, smells, or appearances can be genuinely intolerable. This is not fussiness; it is sensory processing difference.
• Family stress, transitions, or change: Eating issues often emerge or worsen during periods of family disruption.
• Peer pressure and friendship dynamics: Particularly during early-to-mid adolescence.
• Bereavement and loss: Our bereavement hub covers the wider grief picture; grief can affect appetite.
• Emotional regulation difficulties: Food can become a way to manage feelings that the young person finds hard to name or process in other ways.
• Co-occurring mental health conditions: Depression, OCD, and anxiety disorders can all bring changes in eating.

For many young people, eating issues are a sign that they are finding it hard to manage their feelings, and food has become the place where that shows. Every child is different, though, and the mix of reasons will be unique to each person.

Eating issues at different ages

Under sevens: Some selectivity at this age is developmentally normal. Many children move through phases of refusing previously-accepted foods, eating very narrowly, and being intensely particular about how food is presented. This is usually not a clinical concern. It’s worth flagging to a GP or health visitor when the child's food list is very narrow, when weight or growth is affected, when meals are sustained sources of significant family distress, or when sensory sensitivities are evident.

Primary-age children (8 to 11): Eating issues at this age can include sustained selective eating (sometimes signalling ARFID), early body image concerns, or anxiety around mealtimes. It’s worth taking seriously, particularly if a previously varied eater has narrowed sharply, or if comments about weight, shape, or appearance start to appear in their language. Getting alongside it early is easier than waiting, and a prompt GP conversation is the right step if you’re worried.

Early adolescents (11 to 14): Body-image-driven eating issues can begin around this age, particularly in girls: in 2023, eating disorders were about four times as common in girls aged 11 to 16 as in boys^[2]. Restriction, calorie awareness, cutting out food groups, refusing to eat in front of others, and dropping out of family meals can all appear at this stage. ARFID can also become more visible at this age as social eating demands rise.

Older teenagers and young adults (15 and over): Eating issues at this age can consolidate into longer-term patterns or, with support, soften. In a 2023 NHS survey, eating disorders were more common among 17 to 19 year olds than among 11 to 16 year olds ^[2]. The signs that warrant urgent escalation (significant weight loss, purging behaviours, restrictive eating that is interfering with daily life) need prompt GP input and specialist care, at this age as at any other.

Eating issues and neurodivergence

Research has found that eating difficulties and neurodivergence often go together ^[3], ^[4]. Being autistic or having ADHD is not the problem in itself. The difficulty tends to come from sensory needs, a need for predictability, or mealtime expectations that do not fit.

Autistic traits come up more often in anorexia than you would expect by chance. But the honest picture is that nobody can put a reliable number on it: studies have used very different tools and groups, and the research on young people points to lower rates than the older adult studies did ^[5]. What matters for your child is not a statistic but whether sensory needs and a need for predictability are part of what is making eating hard.

Several things can play a part, though each child is different:

• Many Autistic young people are sensitive to food textures, smells, appearance, or temperature, and research has found ARFID often occurs alongside autism ^[3].
• Routine and predictability matter to many Autistic young people, and food can become tied up with a need for sameness. New or unfamiliar foods can feel genuinely threatening.
• Interoception (the sense of what is happening inside the body, including hunger and fullness) is different for some Autistic and ADHD young people, which can make typical mealtime expectations very hard to meet.
• Research in children and adults has found a link between ADHD and binge eating, possibly related to differences in impulsivity and reward^[4].

For neurodivergent young people, eating support needs to be neuro-affirming. Forcing an Autistic child to eat foods that are sensorily intolerable, or treating ARFID as ordinary fussiness to be pushed through, can increase their distress and make eating harder. Our Autism hub and ADHD hub cover the wider neuro-affirming approach.

Eating issues, anxiety, and depression

Eating issues often occur alongside other difficulties, including:

• Anxiety disorders: Particularly social anxiety, generalised anxiety, and OCD. Food often becomes the territory on which anxiety is expressed.
• Depression: Appetite changes (eating significantly more or less) are a common feature of depression in young people. Our depression page covers this.
• Body image difficulties: Most body-image-driven eating issues sit alongside wider body image concerns. Our body image page covers this.
• Trauma or significant loss. Grief and trauma often affect appetite, eating patterns, and the felt sense of safety around food. Our separate bereavement and trauma pages cover the loss dimension.

At the milder end, where eating issues are part of a wider mental health picture, it often helps to support the underlying experience, not only the food. A young person whose anxiety is being expressed through food may find eating easier once the anxiety is supported, even without anyone working directly on the food. That is not true across the board. Where an eating disorder is suspected, eating enough and physical health come first, and specialist treatment leads; the underlying work runs alongside it rather than ahead of it.

What it's like for parents

Food is one of the most fundamental forms of parental care, and a child who is not eating, or eating in ways that feel risky, or making mealtimes a daily battle, leaves parents feeling deeply, viscerally distressed. The instinct to push (just one more bite) can make things harder, and so can the instinct to give up (let them eat whatever they want, just to get something in). There is a steadier middle way, and the sections below cover what tends to help. You don't have to work it out alone: your GP and a counsellor can help you find what works for your child.

You may also be carrying judgement. From extended family, school, friends or health professionals who don't know your child. "Just put the food on the table, they'll eat when they're hungry." "You're being too soft." "My child eats everything." These comments miss the particular reality of an eating issue, which is that the difficulty is not behavioural in the simple sense, but emotional, sensory, or psychological underneath.

You may also be worrying about getting it wrong. Saying too much. Saying too little. Commenting on what they eat. Not commenting on what they eat. The fear of "tipping them over into an eating disorder" can become an ever-present background voice.

What to say and what not to say

A few things that tend to help:

• Keep mealtimes calm and pressure-free where you can. Many children eat less, not more, when they are stressed. Lowering the emotional temperature in the room often helps.
• Be curious about what's underneath. "How is mealtime feeling for you?" or "What's the bit that's hard?" are often more useful than "Why aren't you eating?"
• Validate without confirming. When your child says "I'm disgusting for eating that", the instinct is to argue. Instead, it can help to acknowledge the feeling without confirming the content: "It sounds like that was a hard moment. I'm sorry."
• Talk about food in non-moral terms. Food is fuel, comfort, social glue, sometimes pleasure, and sometimes not. Avoid framing specific foods as "good" or "bad", or eating as something to be earned or punished.

A few things that tend not to help:

• Insistence and battles, for example "You're not leaving the table until..." This often leads to shutdown, tears, or compliance through distress rather than genuine engagement with food.
• Bribes or rewards for eating can make eating feel like something the child does for someone else, rather than for themselves.
• Comments on weight, shape, or amount eaten, even well-intentioned remarks ("you must be hungry today" / "you've hardly touched it") often land more heavily than intended.
• Discussing food in moral terms around the child. "I shouldn't have had that." "That was so naughty." Children absorb these patterns.
• Banning food groups as a primary response often worsens the relationship with the banned food rather than addressing what's underneath.

What you can do as a parent

Several things can help at home.

If your child has, or may have, an eating disorder, the advice below does not replace the meal plan or support from their GP or eating disorder team. Follow their guidance first.

Reduce pressure at the table: Pressure tends to make eating issues harder, while calm, consistent, low-stakes meals often help.

Eat together where you can: Shared family meals, without phones, with the focus on connection rather than on what's being eaten, can help. They model normal eating without instructing it.

Offer variety without insisting: For ordinary selective eating, putting familiar foods alongside something new on the plate, with no expectation of trying the new thing, can gently build familiarity without pressure. If your child has ARFID or is restricting what they eat, follow the advice of their GP or specialist team.

Protect the relationship as well as the food: A child who feels safe and loved at mealtimes is more likely to eat over time than a child who feels battled and shamed. If your child's GP or eating disorder team has given you nutritional advice, follow it, and keep the relationship as warm as you can while you do.

Look at your own relationship with food: Children absorb our patterns. Do you eat regularly? Do you talk about food in moral terms? Do you diet visibly? These can all shape how children think about food. The work, where possible, is to model the relationship with food you'd want your child to have.

Audit social media use: particularly for body and food-focused content, particularly during early adolescence. For some young people, eating worries are reinforced by content they are being served daily.

Look after yourself: Sustained worry about a child's eating is genuinely depleting. Your own support, peer connection, and rest are important.

When to seek professional help

It is worth seeking professional help when:

• Mealtimes have become regular sources of significant family distress.
• Your child is struggling with overwhelming feelings around food or body image.
• They are avoiding meals, family occasions, or foods they once enjoyed.
• Eating issues are affecting school, friendships, or daily life.
• You're noticing signs of anxiety, panic, or shutdown linked to eating.
• You feel out of your depth or nothing seems to be helping.

If you think your child may have an eating disorder, contact your GP promptly and explain what you are seeing, whether or not their weight has changed. The GP can check their physical health and arrange specialist assessment if it is needed. Time matters with eating disorders. Beat's helpline for England is 0808 801 0677, open 3pm to 8pm, Monday to Friday. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own numbers, listed near the top of this page.

If you are worried about your child's health

Eating disorders can affect physical health, and a child can be seriously unwell even if they seem well. Get urgent medical help if your child has any of these warning signs, which are based on guidance for GPs on medical emergencies in eating disorders ^[6] and NHS advice ^[7]:

• Faints or collapses, or keeps feeling faint or dizzy, especially when standing up
• Has a heartbeat that feels very slow, racing or irregular
• Is refusing to drink, or has stopped eating altogether
• Is losing weight very quickly
• Is very cold or can't get warm, or seems confused
• Struggles to sit up from lying down or to stand up from a squat
• Is being sick many times a day, or there is blood in their vomit

If your child has collapsed or fainted, has chest pain ^[8], has a racing or irregular heartbeat that does not settle, is vomiting blood, is confused, or you believe they are in immediate danger, call 999 or go to A&E. For the other signs, contact your GP for an urgent same-day appointment, or call NHS 111.

You do not have to be sure how serious it is. If you’re frightened and cannot tell, call 111 and describe what you are seeing. Beat's helpline is there for support and information; it is not a medical or emergency service, and neither is Finding Therapy.

How counselling helps with eating issues

At Finding Therapy our work is integrative talking therapy. The counsellors work relationally, building a trusting space with the young person, and then drawing on the approaches that suit that particular young person's needs. The therapeutic relationship is an important part of the work, alongside appropriate assessment and interventions.

The three-level meta-analysis by Roest and colleagues of 99 studies on child and adolescent psychotherapy found that the therapeutic relationship is consistently associated with better outcomes across types of therapy.^[9] For a young person whose eating issues are tied to anxiety, control, shame, or sensory experience, the experience of being seen, accepted, and not battled can itself be part of the change.

In practice, integrative talking therapy for eating issues typically involves:

• Building a safe, calm space where the young person can talk about food, feelings, and their body without judgement or pressure.
• Exploring what might be contributing. For some young people, eating is tied up with feelings or a need for control; for others, sensory differences or other factors play a bigger part.
• Working on the relationship with the body more broadly, particularly where body image and eating sit together. Our body image page explores this territory in detail.
• Creative approaches (where appropriate). Mood trackers, drawing, food-feelings journals, and platform-based interactive work. These open up territory that direct conversation often can't reach.
• Mindfulness and self-compassion work where helpful, particularly around the self-critical voice that often runs alongside eating issues.
• Specific evidence-based techniques (where appropriate). Structured approaches like Enhanced Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT-E) or ARFID-specific strategies inform how some counsellors work, where they have that training. Where a young person needs one of these as a treatment in its own right, that belongs with a specialist eating disorder service.
• Working with parents and the family system where appropriate, including conversations about household culture around food.

A reminder on scope. Finding Therapy is not a specialist eating disorder service. Where an eating disorder is suspected or diagnosed, counselling with us can only ever be an extra support alongside specialist medical, dietetic and CAMHS care, where that is clinically appropriate and agreed with the team looking after your child.

A clinical perspective from one of our counsellors

Samantha Taitt, NCPS (Accred), a Finding Therapy counsellor with experience in supporting children and young people with eating issues, shares how she works in her sessions:

"In my role as a children and young people's counsellor, I have extensive experience supporting eating issues. I've completed training in evidence-based treatments such as Enhanced Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT-E), which is specifically designed for eating disorders. Additionally, I've had specialised training in ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder), enabling me to support young people with a wide range of eating difficulties. I've also undertaken mindfulness training and actively engage with Beat's professional development offerings to enhance my understanding and support for those affected. My work spans schools, clinics, and online settings, where I help young people understand and manage their relationship with food and their bodies."

"From the very first session, my priority is to create a safe, calm, and supportive space where young people feel comfortable sharing their experiences without judgment. I check in on how eating issues affect their daily life and wellbeing, and I always move at a pace that feels manageable for them."

"Online therapy via the Finding Therapy platform offers distinct advantages for this work. Being in a familiar home environment helps many young people feel less anxious and more in control. The platform's interactive tools such as mood trackers, drawing boards, and "food feelings journal" canvases allow us to explore emotions and patterns in a creative, non-threatening way. This is often more engaging than traditional video calls and helps young people express feelings that can be difficult to put into words."

"My approach is tailored to each young person's needs. Drawing on my CBT-E and ARFID training, we explore how emotions connect to eating habits, identify unhelpful patterns and triggers, and develop healthier coping strategies and self-care routines. Mindfulness practices support young people in building awareness and compassion towards themselves, which can be helpful in recovery. Encouraging self-acceptance and respect for their body is central to every session."

"Some young people begin to notice positive changes early on, such as feeling less anxious around meals, talking more openly about their feelings, or developing a kinder relationship with themselves. Recovery is often a gradual process, and it's normal for young people to return at different life stages. Progress is different for every young person, and I'm glad to offer ongoing support when it's needed."

"My message to young people and families is this: you are not alone, and with understanding, patience, and the right support, positive change is possible."

Training and experience vary between our counsellors, and not all of them have the same eating disorder training as Samantha. Finding Therapy is not a specialist eating disorder service. If your child needs eating disorder treatment, that comes from a specialist team, and counselling with us can only ever sit alongside it.

Why online therapy can suit eating issues work

Online therapy can be a particularly good fit for eating issues work. The familiar home environment is often the place where eating issues actually play out, and being able to engage with therapy from that environment, rather than from a clinical room, can lower the threshold to honesty.

For young people whose eating issues are tied to social anxiety (eating in front of others, going to social events, eating at school), the online setting can reduce an immediate layer of exposure that an in-person clinic would impose.

A note on the limits of online therapy in this space: for young people who have, or may have, an eating disorder, online generalist counselling is not the right main support. Medical monitoring, dietetic input, and specialist eating disorder services are needed. Online counselling can be part of the wider picture for some of these families but is not a substitute for medical care. Online counselling isn't right for every situation: where there is a significant risk to safety, a safeguarding concern, or a need for more intensive or specialist assessment, other support may be better.

Recovery: what it actually looks like

Recovery from eating issues does not mean a young person never has a difficult moment around food. Many adults still do, from time to time. Recovery can mean that food no longer dominates and mealtimes feel calmer. It can also mean a more settled relationship with their body, and a different outlet for feelings that were being expressed through food.

Progress is often uneven. Setbacks happen. Periods of stress, change, or pressure can produce flares. This is not failure. It is often part of how recovery looks in real life. With time, the right support, and consistent work at home, meaningful change is possible. What the right support looks like depends on the kind of eating difficulty and how serious it is, and for some young people it will mean a specialist eating disorder service.

For young people whose eating issues are part of a wider clinical eating disorder, recovery is a longer and more layered process involving multi-disciplinary care. The principles of patience, kindness, and consistent support apply throughout.

A final word

If your child is struggling with food, eating, or their relationship with their body, it can help to remember that this is not simply vanity, fussiness, or wilfulness. Eating issues are often linked to more than one thing, whether emotional, sensory, developmental or medical, and with the right support they can be understood and worked with.

At Finding Therapy, our counsellors are experienced in supporting young people with difficulties around food, eating and body image. We are not a specialist eating disorder service: where a child needs medical or dietetic input, or an eating disorder is suspected, we work alongside specialist services rather than instead of them. If you'd like to talk to someone experienced in this, browse our directory of children's and young people's counsellors, or book a free consultation and you'll speak to our Head of Counselling, who can help with a recommendation.