I am 24 years old, and i feel my picky eating has gotten so much worse. I know this is not what parents of picky eaters want to hear (hah) but here goes.
When I was younger, in K-12, I would have my mom pack me a pb&j every single day for lunch, and I'd eat one for breakfast. It would have to be cut into 9 pieces. I wouldn't go out to open-lunch in high school with my friends because I did not want to eat anything different. I have also always had to drink fruit juice with every meal. To this day, I refuse to eat if I don't have a juice to drink with it. Drinking water with food disgusts me.
I tried to eat more normal in college, but ended up gaining a lot of weight and I felt I wasnt taking enough time to savor my food and was eating stuff I didnt really enjoy. I did decide in college though that I wanted to quit eating meat and I decided to start liking vegetables (so that's good news - my tastes did change to like "healthier" foods!) After college, I lost all the weight I had put on, but my habits got weird again...
But here's my current issue. I used to eat breakfast lunch and dinner, but now, since I am sitting at work all day and not as hungry, I eat only ONCE A DAY- dinner after work. I've become obsessed with eating one single thing again, but instead of pb&j, it is now a vegan burrito bowl every single day. I feel that it is healthy because it is beans and vegetables. And I eat multiple servings of guacamole with it, so I am getting plenty of calories So my first problem is eating once a day. Second is eating ONLY this burrito bowl every day. But the third and worst problem is, I don't ever want to eat it around other people.
Why? Because I like each thing in the bowl separated. So like, I mush all the guacamole to one corner, and separate out the corn, and I quite literally pick at my food, like eating each pepper one by one. I also like to sprinkle oregano and salt on it. And I eat SO SLOWLY. I want to make sure I enjoy each bite so I take upwards of 2 HOURS for me to finish. It's embarrassing, and it controls my life, but I don't WANT to eat anything else. Sometimes once a week I force myself to try to eat something different, but I actually feel upset when I don't eat this same thing.
It's an addiction, really it seems. Is this just picky eating? Is this worse? I honestly think this is some form of OCD or "disordered eating" since I have to have the same thing all the time and eat it so particularly. I think about food all the time and worry about my future. I think about trying to "get help" but then I just think, if I wanted to change, I could change. I enjoy eating this. I don't enjoy the embarrassment that I feel about how I eat. I feel like it prevents me from hanging out with my friends, and certainly from dating! I just think, who would ever want to date someone with these eating hangups?! They want to go get pizza or ice cream with their girlfriends. How could I ever have kids when I eat this way? "Mommy's taking two and a half hours to eat dinner again..." Most people enjoy food. Normal peoples' lives revolve around food in a GOOD way. And then there's me.