TOO AFRAID TO EAT

A growing number of families are encountering an eating disorder called ARFID, provoked not by a child's desire to change their body but by a fear of the food itself.

- By Caitlin Moscatello

LAURA STILL wonders how different things would be if she and her husband, Mark, had simply chosen another camp.

It was June 2021, and after months of virtual kindergarten, they sent their then-almost-6-year-old daughter to a summer program at a local school. The camp would be a brief reprieve before Amelia, an only child, started first grade, and Laura was sure she would love it. She was outgoing, the kind of kid who didn't hesitate to approach someone new on the playground and start a game.

So Laura was surprised when, after the first day, Amelia told her she didn’t want to go back. At pickup a few days later, she pleaded again not to return. She said the woman who ran the camp often yelled and, at lunchtime, wouldn't let Amelia leave the table until she finished all her food. Laura spoke to the woman—Amelia didn’t need to eat every morsel, she told her—and assumed the problem was resolved.

Camp ended, but over the next 12 months, Amelia would sometimes stuff her mouth with food, panic that it was too much to swallow, and spit it out. Laura told Amelia she needed to chew her food properly or she could choke. Amelia asked what would happen next. Two close family members had fallen severely ill with COVID, and one of them had died. Amelia became fixated on death. She wanted to know: What happens when you choke? You can't breathe? Well, what happens if you can't breathe? Then you die?