Aspies For Freedom

HI!   my name is emma, im 28 from the uk. i have 4 daughters, with my 9 year old recently being diagnosed with autistic spectrum disorder, with sensory sensetivity and secondary anxiety. she is also dyslexic, and also  known as CHLOE.  chloe is high functioning and attends a mainstream school, she gets on well here(some of the time) most of the teachers havent got a clue about asd, nor dyslexia apparantly.
I have always known that she was different,( her extremely difficult behaviour gave this away) and was not surprised at all with the diagnosis, and as much as im an expert on her, i feel very lost now.  you would never know to look at her that there is anything wrong, apart from being very young for a 9 year old, so i sometimes feel a bit of a fraud when im looking for help!
My main concern at the moment is her eating habits, she has always had an obsession with food..she loves it , and will eat 24 hours a day if i allowed her to, if i didn't control this then she would be overweight. luckily she is also very active and a wonderfull dancer.  could anybody please tell me if this is a problen usually connected to asd,  She is just starting to realis that there is a pattern to eating habits i.e eat when you are hungry, at specified times, this seems to be disturbing her a bit, as she seems torn between the compulsion of wanting to eat and her desperate desire to control it. i hope this makes sence to somebody.
thankyou[/b]

Hi Emma! Welcome to AFF. I don't know if this is common to autism, but I have a similar problem with always wanting to eat. (I'm not hungry, just want to experience the taste/textures)

Hello and Welcome to AFF, Emma!  :smile:

Hi Emma,

You might want to take your daughter to see a child psychologist. Her eating habits could be a soothing activity as it might be unconsciously linked to her secondary anxiety.

Anxiety is common among AS and auts. I have a serious anxiety problem myself.

Have you given Chloe information about how to choose healthy foods?  Eating for comfort may not be a problem if she is eating fruits and veggies.  Pomegranates are one of my favorite foods when I get in a mood to eat all day; they're very good for you, the seeds are pretty, and there are so many individual seeds that you can eat a pomegranate for hours!   :smile:

My 13 yr old is the same. Always has  been.  If its not tied down he wants to eat it.  So we keep lots of fruit, nuts, popcorn and things like that for him.  I also take real fruit juice and make popcicles out of them and he loves to eat these.  But he doesn't eat if he is upset,  his is just the joy of eating.  And I must say, he has the most sensitive taste buds of any one I know.  He always lets me know if there isn't enough garlic (his fav.) in something. :grin:

Hi Emma, just a very rare possibility, dont want to alarm you, but there may be a connection between ASDs and prader willi syndrome which causes constant hunger.
I dont know if the hunger your daughter has is literally making her want to eat all the time, or if its just more than usual for her age.

Some information is here -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prader-Willi_syndrome

We make it clear to our children that they do not have to ask for fruit or fromage frais, both of these are unlimited, anything else needs to be discussed before helping themselves.  We always have lots of apples, oranges, grapes, bananas and in the fridge, carrots, cherry tomatoes, cucumber as well as the little fromage frais pots.

Hi Emma,
You mentioned that your daughter has a sensory sensitivity. Maybe your daughter deals with anxiety by chewing on things. Have you tried giving her gum or other things she can chew on to see if she craves having something in her mouth to chew on rather than food to eat? When my daughter gets excited or anxious she starts pulling people's ear lobes and pinching. When she does this we give her a little chunck of playdoh or modeling clay for her to pinch and then it relaxes her.
Just a thought, Annie

I agree with this. When my son is anxious he just picks at bits and pieces of food all the time without being hungry. In fact, usually he's a very picky eater.
Anxiety can cause binge eating too, as unfortunately I have experienced on myself  :cry:

The sensory explanation is quite interesting too.