Autism and Anorexia

I don’t personally have anorexia but I have lived with a girl that had it for 3 years so I feel I know what it’s like to have it. This is however never going to be the same as having it myself.

Now that the disclaimer is out of the way into the article.

Anorexia is a Greek word meaning loss of appetite. I have been suffering from this loss recently but I don’t completely stop eating. I also don’t binge or throw up which is more characteristic of bulimia.

I just don’t want to eat the food that is around me. At my in laws it’s not easy to get something else being that it is rural so the nearest shop is 2 miles away.

So I do my best with what is available. Often there is lots of ingredients but there for specific meals that are already planned so finding something that isn’t already allocated is difficult. Anorexia is after all about a lack of control in your life so you control the one thing that you can, your food intake. It is also about the emotions connected with certain foods, meals, places or people. When your body is constantly full of hormones you struggle to eat as your body isn’t accepting anything in case it needs to run away from a threat.

Being that my nutritional needs vary quite a lot from day to day means that I can’t know in advance what I’m going to want to eat. I rely on cravings or instinct to tell me what I need to eat. For that to work I need to see what it is that I’m after. If nothing looks interesting then I won’t have a hunger for it. This is why I’m always looking for new tastes and flavour combinations to inspire me. I guess I do have autistic eating habits after all.

Sometimes I just eat to fill a hole so I don’t starve myself. I also can’t think when I’m hungry and do get hangry. (Angry because I’m hungry). I call this kind of eating mechanical eating as your eating simply because you need to. This also often happens when I have a cold and can’t smell or taste anything. This happens surprisingly frequently. If only every wine in the world didn’t have sulphites/sulphates in it.

I’ve managed to eliminate squash(fruit cordial), juice drinks like j20, processed lemon and lime juice, pork pies and other processed meat and food products. I don’t often have wine but one glass seems to be enough to block up my senses and it takes forever to get back on track. Eating an orange daily keeps it at bay until I stop then it returns so I’m not sure that really cures it.

The only thing that seems to work is to get drunk to clear my system but as soon as I have some champagne then I’m back to square one again. It doesn’t seem as bad with red wine and I don’t cook with wine vinegar but since I’m trying to balance my food now I’m wondering does it need that contrast like red wine in chili or white wine in risotto?