Dr. Marianne-Land: An Eating Disorder Recovery Podcast21 Elo

Why Food Feels So Regulating: Autism, ADHD, Eating Disorders, & the Nervous System

Why can eating feel so calming, stimulating, or grounding? For many autistic people, ADHDers, and people with eating disorders, food does more than satisfy hunger. Eating can provide sensory input, emotional regulation, predictability, stimulation, and nervous system support.

In this solo episode, Dr. Marianne explores food as self-regulation, co-regulation, and stimming, including why chewing, crunching, sipping, familiar foods, and repetitive eating experiences may help a neurodivergent nervous system feel more organized. She also discusses how these needs can intersect with autism, ADHD, anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder, and ARFID.

What You'll Learn

You'll learn why autistic and ADHD people may use food for sensory regulation, how eating can function as a form of stimming, and why "emotional eating" doesn't always capture what's actually happening.

Dr. Marianne also explains why restriction can feel regulating for some people with anorexia, how food may help an overwhelmed or understimulated ADHD nervous system, why predictable safe foods can provide sensory security with ARFID, and how binge eating or bulimia can become intertwined with attempts to regulate distress.

Rather than asking only, "How do I stop this eating behavior?" Dr. Marianne encourages a different question: "What is my nervous system getting from this?"

Food, Stimming, & Neurodivergent Eating

Food can provide powerful sensory experiences through taste, temperature, texture, chewing, swallowing, crunching, and repetition. For some neurodivergent people, these sensations can help increase stimulation, reduce overwhelm, support focus, or create predictability.

Recovery doesn't have to mean eliminating food as a source of comfort or regulation. Instead, it can involve understanding what food provides and gradually expanding the ways your nervous system accesses safety, sensory input, connection, and support.

Eating Disorder & Neurodivergent-Affirming Support

If you're navigating ARFID, anorexia, bulimia, binge eating, autism, ADHD, sensory eating challenges, or neurodivergent eating disorder recovery, Dr. Marianne offers a neurodivergent-affirming, sensory-attuned, trauma-informed approach.

Dr. Marianne provides eating disorder therapy in California and Washington, D.C., including telehealth and in-person services in San Diego, as well as coaching and consultation worldwide.

Learn more about working with Dr. Marianne and find additional eating disorder and neurodivergence resources at drmariannemiller.com.

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Anorexia in a Larger Body: How to Talk About Your Eating Disorder When Others Don't Understand

Anorexia in a Larger Body: How to Talk About Your Eating Disorder When Others Don't Understand Can you have anorexia in a larger body? Yes. Yet weight stigma and stereotypes about what an eating disor...

19 Elo 17min

Harm Reduction & The Middle Place of Eating Disorder Recovery With "Slip" Author Mallary Tenore Tarpley, MFA

How can harm reduction support eating disorder recovery when full recovery feels complicated, nonlinear, or far away? Dr. Marianne welcomes back journalist, professor, and author Mallary Tenore Tarple...

17 Elo 27min

How to Manage Weight Restoration When Your Autistic Child Has Anorexia, ARFID, & a PDA Profile

How do you support weight restoration when your autistic child needs nutrition, but pressure around food makes eating even harder? For autistic children, teens, and adolescents with a PDA profile (Pat...

14 Elo 11min

My Eating Disorder Recovery Story Continued: Internalized Weight Bias in the Age of Ozempic

What happens to eating disorder recovery when the culture around you starts celebrating weight loss again? In this deeply personal solo episode, Dr. Marianne continues sharing her eating disorder reco...

12 Elo 20min

Is Healthmaxxing Disordered Eating? Protein, Fitness Trackers, & Eating Disorder Recovery With Amy Ornelas, RD

When does trying to be healthy cross the line into rigid or disordered eating? Healthmaxxing focuses on optimizing nutrition, protein, exercise, sleep, steps, and other health metrics. But for someone...

10 Elo 33min

Why Lived Experience Matters in Anorexia & Bulimia Recovery for Neurodivergent People: 5 Things I've Learned as Both a Therapist & Someone in Recovery

Does it matter whether your eating disorder therapist has personally recovered from anorexia or bulimia? In this solo episode of Dr. Marianne-Land, I explore that question from two perspectives: as an...

7 Elo 14min

Is It OCD, Perfectionism, or Both? Why It Matters in Eating Disorder Recovery

Many people with eating disorders get labeled as perfectionists. Sometimes that's accurate. Sometimes it's only part of the story. In this episode of the Dr. Marianne-Land Podcast, I explore the overl...

5 Elo 14min