Parenting a child with ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder) can feel confusing and overwhelming. In this episode, Dr. Marianne Miller shares practical and compassionate strategies for parents who want to help their children eat with less fear and more confidence.

You will learn why pressure and negotiation tend to backfire, how to create low-stress mealtimes that build safety, and how to attune to your child’s sensory needs through a neurodivergent-affirming approach. Whether your child experiences food texture issues, fear of choking, or intense sensory overwhelm, this episode provides grounded, actionable steps for supporting eating with care and collaboration.

• Understanding ARFID beyond “picky eating” and recognizing it as a real eating disorder rooted in fear, sensory distress, or trauma

• Why pressure and negotiation can increase distress and decrease trust

• How sensory context affects eating and what small environmental changes can help

• Transitioning from authoritative to consent-based parenting that prioritizes autonomy and emotional safety

• Building trust through predictable, transparent, and compassionate mealtime practices

• Knowing when to seek professional ARFID-informed, trauma-aware, and neurodivergent-affirming support

This episode is for parents, caregivers, and family members who are trying to understand and support a child living with ARFID or selective eating. It is also helpful for therapists, dietitians, educators, and healthcare providers who want to better understand the family dynamics that shape mealtime stress and recovery.

Many families are told to use pressure or rewards to encourage eating. While this advice may seem helpful, it often increases distress for children with ARFID. In this episode, Dr. Marianne explains why traditional approaches like “one more bite” or “if you eat your veggies, you can have dessert” can erode trust and worsen fear.

Instead, you will hear how shifting toward collaboration, sensory awareness, and emotional safety supports genuine progress. Learning to trust your child’s signals and prioritize consent around food can transform your home and restore connection at the table.

This episode includes discussion of children’s eating distress, food avoidance, and anxiety around eating. Please listen with care if these topics may be sensitive for you or your family.

• ARFID Explained: What It Feels Like, Why It’s Misunderstood, & What Helps on Apple & Spotify.
• Why Sensory-Attuned Care Matters More Than Exposure in ARFID Treatment on Apple & Spotify.
• ARFID, PDA, and Autonomy: Why Pressure Makes Eating Harder on Apple & Spotify.
• Complexities of Treating ARFID: How a Neurodivergent-Affirming, Sensory-Attuned Approach Works on Apple & Spotify.

To learn more about supporting your child’s eating with compassion, visit drmariannemiller.com/arfid to explore Dr. Marianne’s ARFID & Selective Eating Course.

This self-paced, online course provides practical tools, scripts, and real-world examples to help parents reduce mealtime stress, build trust, and approach food in a supportive, neurodivergent-affirming way.

What should every therapist truly understand before working with clients who have eating disorders? In this insightful interview, Dr. Marianne Miller talks with Edie Stark, LCSW (@ediestarktherapy) about what ethical, inclusive care really means.

Together, they explore why “gold standard” approaches like Family-Based Treatment (FBT) often miss the mark for neurodivergent, fat, queer, and BIPOC clients. The conversation highlights the importance of cultural humility, anti-fat bias awareness, trauma-informed care, and intersectional understanding in every therapeutic setting.

Whether you are a clinician, a student, or someone in recovery who wants to understand what quality treatment should look like, this episode offers a thoughtful look at how therapists can grow, unlearn, and create safe, collaborative spaces for healing.

• Why “gold standard” models like Family-Based Treatment (FBT) do not fit everyone

• How anti-fat bias and wellness culture shape eating disorder care

• The importance of cultural humility and intersectionality in therapy

• Ways to create trauma-informed, consent-based, and collaborative care

• What ethical practice looks like when working with neurodivergent and marginalized clients

• How therapists can identify and challenge their own internalized biases

• Why eating disorder work requires humility, continual learning, and self-reflection

• Therapists and dietitians who want to provide ethical and inclusive eating disorder care

• Students and early-career clinicians who are beginning to work with eating disorders

• Supervisors and consultants who guide others in complex clinical cases

• People in recovery who want to understand what to expect from truly affirming treatment

• Anyone curious about how bias, culture, and power dynamics affect eating disorder recovery

• The Hidden Risks of Non-Specialized Eating Disorder Treatment on Apple & Spotify.
• The Diet/Wellness Industry, Accessibility, & Diet Culture on Apple & Spotify.
• Anti-Fat Bias & the Importance of Advocacy on Apple & Spotify.

Edie Stark, LCSW, is the founder of Stark Therapy Group in California and Edie Stark Consulting, where she supports therapists through business consulting, case consultation, and supervision. She’s also a feature writer for Psychology Today and advocates for ethical, media-accurate portrayals of eating disorders.

Connect with Edie on Instagram at @ediestarktherapy and @edies_edits, or visit ediestark.com.

Dr. Marianne Miller is a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist specializing in eating disorders, ARFID, and binge eating disorder. She practices in California, Texas, and Washington D.C., and teaches self-paced, virtual courses through her binge eating recovery membership and her course ARFID and Selective Eating.

Learn more at drmariannemiller.com or follow her on Instagram @drmariannemiller.

When eating disorders overlap with anxiety, OCD, or depression, recovery can feel especially complex. In this episode of Dr. Marianne-Land: An Eating Disorder Recovery Podcast, Dr. Marianne Miller, LMFT, explores how co-occurring mental health conditions interact with disordered eating and body image struggles. She explains how anxiety often fuels food rules and avoidance, how OCD rituals can merge with eating rituals, and how depression can make nourishment feel almost impossible.

Throughout the episode, Dr. Marianne shares intersectional case examples that reflect the diversity of real-world experiences. You will hear about a Black nonbinary person whose anorexia and depression are dismissed by medical providers, a South Asian immigrant coping with OCD and bulimia in a culture where discussing mental health is taboo, and others whose experiences reveal how systemic bias and identity shape recovery. This episode offers understanding, compassion, and realistic tools for healing when multiple conditions overlap.

You will learn how anxiety, OCD, and depression intersect with eating disorders, why eating disorders rarely exist alone, and how each condition influences the recovery process. Dr. Marianne explains why addressing only food behaviors is not enough and how integrative treatment supports both the mind and body. You will also hear about sensory-attuned strategies and community-based care that help people move toward safety, nourishment, and autonomy.

Eating disorders often coexist with anxiety, OCD, or depression because they share common roots in trauma, nervous system overwhelm, and attempts to create safety. Anxiety drives control and rigidity, OCD fuels compulsive rituals around food and body, and depression slows motivation and energy, making self-care harder. True recovery acknowledges these overlaps and treats the whole person.

Healing does not mean erasing anxiety, OCD, or depression. It means building a life that includes these realities while reducing their control over food and self-worth. Recovery becomes more sustainable when treatment honors a person’s full identity, including body size, race, gender, and neurotype.

This episode is for anyone who lives with an eating disorder and another mental health condition such as anxiety, OCD, or depression. It is also for clinicians, family members, and supporters who want to understand how co-occurring challenges interact and how to provide compassionate care.

This episode includes discussion of eating disorders, anxiety, OCD, and depression. Please take care while listening and pause if you need to.

• Anxiety, Meltdowns, Neurodiversity, & Eating Disorders on Apple & Spotify.
• Food, Fear, & Fixation: How OCD Shapes Eating Disorders on Apple & Spotify.
• Depression & Eating Disorders on Apple & Spotify.

For deeper guidance, visit drmariannemiller.com/arfid to explore Dr. Marianne’s ARFID and Selective Eating Course. The course offers neurodivergent-affirming, sensory-attuned strategies that apply to a wide range of eating struggles.

To learn about Dr. Marianne’s therapy services in California, Texas, and Washington, D.C., or to explore additional blog posts and podcast episodes, visit drmariannemiller.com.

In this insightful conversation, Dr. Marianne Miller sits down with Dr. Heather Rosen, a licensed clinical psychologist and certified Family-Based Treatment (FBT) supervisor and trainer, to explore how evidence-based treatments for eating disorders can evolve to meet the needs of neurodivergent clients and their families.

Dr. Rosen shares her background working in major hospital settings including Stanford University, Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, and Mount Sinai Hospital, and now in private practice in Westchester County, New York. Together, she and Dr. Miller unpack the heart of FBT—how involving families in treatment can strengthen recovery for adolescents and young adults with anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder, and ARFID.

This episode highlights how food becomes a metaphor for emotional pain, safety, and connection, and why treatment must go beyond meal plans to address the underlying need for autonomy, co-regulation, and family healing.

• What Family-Based Treatment (FBT) is and how it supports adolescent recovery

• The role of parents in managing eating disorder behaviors at home

• How FBT differs from other evidence-based treatments like CBT-E

• Adapting FBT for ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder) and neurodivergent clients

• Why flexibility and curiosity are essential when traditional exposure-based methods don’t fit

• Understanding food as communication: how eating (or not eating) expresses pain, fear, and the need for control

• Shifting from compliance-based models to collaborative, consent-based, and neuroaffirming care

• The importance of reducing mental health stigma and improving access to effective treatment

This conversation is for therapists, dietitians, parents, and educators who want to understand FBT in practice and how to make eating disorder treatment more inclusive for autistic and otherwise neurodivergent youth. It’s also for anyone curious about integrating compassion, family systems awareness, and sensory attunement into recovery work.

Dr. Heather Rosen, PhD Licensed Clinical Psychologist | Certified FBT Therapist & Supervisor Psychology Partners Group – Westchester County, NY Website: psychologypartnersgroup.com Instagram: @hrrosen

• Family-Based Treatment and Eating Disorders in Schools With JD Ouellette of Equip Health on Apple & Spotify.
• The Nitty Gritty on Family-Based Treatment for Anorexia (Maudsley Method) With Kelly McCullough @mytherapistkelly on Apple & Spotify.
• Complexities of Treating ARFID: How a Neurodivergent-Affirming, Sensory-Attuned Approach Works on Apple & Spotify.

Dr. Marianne Miller, PhD, LMFT, is a fat, neurodivergent eating disorder therapist specializing in ARFID, binge eating disorder, and complex recovery care. She offers therapy in California, Texas, and Washington, D.C., and provides global support through online courses and resources.

Learn more about Dr. Miller’s work and self-paced course on ARFID and Selective Eating at drmariannemiller.com/arfid.