If you live with an eating disorder or a pattern of disordered eating habits, you might find that food prompts feelings of anxiety. Here’s how to deal.

For some, food is a source of pleasure in addition to being an essential part of life. But for others, it can be a source of stress. Eating disorders and anxiety have something of a complex relationship.

The signs and symptoms of eating disorders can depend on the type of eating disorder. Not to mention, they can vary from person to person. That said, they generally involve an extreme focus on food and eating habits, along with some kind of emotional distress related to food or eating.

Below, we’ll explore the link between anxiety and eating disorders and offer some guidance on finding support.

Many people with eating disorders also live with anxiety that goes beyond these feelings of food-related distress. In fact, as many as two-thirds of people with eating disorders also have an anxiety disorder at some point in life.

While it’s true they commonly occur together and involve some overlapping symptoms, neither directly causes the other. Eating disorders also don’t begin solely as an attempt to maintain control over challenging, painful, or unknown circumstances, though a need for control can absolutely play a part.

Many people living with both conditions notice symptoms of anxiety first, before symptoms of the eating disorder begin. Yet that doesn’t mean anxiety causes eating disorders — after all, not everyone who lives with anxiety will feel distress around food, or develop disordered eating habits.

Research from 2021 does suggest, however, that a co-occurring anxiety disorder or obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) may:

  • help maintain symptoms and behaviors associated with eating disorders
  • lead to more severe symptoms over time

In short, having anxiety doesn’t mean you’ll develop an eating disorder. But if you have both conditions, they may play off each other and lead to worse symptoms.

Keep in mind, too, that while eating disorders can certainly involve extreme fear and worry around food and eating, food-related anxiety doesn’t automatically translate to an anxiety disorder.

What’s more, some people with eating disorders might have feelings of guilt and shame, dysphoria or a distorted body image, and diminished self-confidence, but not anxiety.

Still, the fact remains: Anxiety and eating disorders involve plenty of overlap. One potential explanation lies in their shared risk factors:

  • Genetics: Evidence from family and twin studies suggests that genetic makeup plays a part in the development of eating disorders. You’re also more likely to have an anxiety disorder if a close family member has anxiety. Emerging research also suggests that eating disorders and anxiety disorders may involve similar genes.
  • Brain chemistry: Serotonin, a brain chemical that helps regulate mood, sleep, appetite, and other important bodily processes, appears to factor into both anxiety and eating disorders, though future research may offer more insight into its exact role.
  • Brain processes: With both anxiety disorders and eating disorders, you’re likely to pay more attention to things that seem threatening than things that don’t seem to pose a threat. Cognitive inflexibility, or difficulty coping with changes in your environment or routine, also tends to characterize both conditions.
  • Personality traits: Temperament and personality traits linked to both anxiety and eating disorders include neuroticism, perfectionism, harm avoidance, and difficulty tolerating uncertainty.
  • Childhood experiences: Experiencing abuse in childhood, particularly sexual abuse, is a risk factor for developing an eating disorder. When it comes to anxiety, any repeated negative or traumatic childhood experiences, including sexual abuse, are a risk factor.

This condition involves extreme, persistent, and overwhelming feelings of worry about everyday things and activities that don’t pose an actual threat to your safety.

Anxiety can eventually lead you to avoid any circumstances that trigger these feelings in order to help ease your distress.

Other key signs of GAD include:

  • feelings of restlessness, irritability, and a sense of being on edge
  • sleep issues, including fatigue and insomnia
  • “brain fog,” or difficulty concentrating or remembering things
  • physical symptoms, including stomach distress, muscle tension, and headaches

Different anxiety disorders involve related but distinct symptoms.

Other types of anxiety disorders include:

Again, eating disorders can show up differently from person to person. That means you could have an eating disorder even if your symptoms don’t exactly align with these criteria.

Also keep in mind that people of any gender and body size or shape can experience any eating disorder.

Many people with eating disorders don’t appear physically unhealthy, but their symptoms can still cause plenty of distress as well as serious health concerns.

Types of eating disorders:

Both anxiety and eating disorders can improve with treatment and support.

Treatment typically involves some combination of:

  • Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT): This approach helps you learn to recognize and address unwanted and unhelpful emotions and behaviors related to food and eating, along with other fears and worries. Experts recognize exposure therapy, a subtype of CBT, as an effective approach for both anxiety and eating disorders.
  • Family-based therapy: Therapists generally recommend involving family members in treatment. For parents of children with ARFID, a family-centered program may help parents and children work through the complications of the eating disorder.
  • Medications: Medications, including fluoxetine (Prozac), can be helpful for eating disorders. Medications for co-occurring anxiety conditions might include:
  • Support groups: The compassionate support and encouragement you receive from others also navigating eating disorder recovery can make support groups a valuable addition to your treatment toolbox. Of course, anxiety support groups can also have benefits.
  • Inpatient treatment: Eating disorder treatment facilities offer specialized care, round-the-clock medical attention, and mental health support.
  • Nutritional counseling: Registered dietitians with training in eating disorder recovery can offer guidance with creating an eating plan that helps you feel good and keeps you healthy.

If you think you or your child could have an eating disorder, it’s important to seek treatment sooner rather than later. Even if the disordered eating patterns you’ve noticed don’t fully meet the diagnostic criteria for a specific eating disorder, it’s worth getting support.

Without treatment, eating disorders often worsen over time and can have serious health consequences. Even if they don’t affect your physical health right away, they can still cause ongoing emotional distress that affects your everyday life and relationships.

Treatment is often successful, but overcoming an eating disorder generally does require professional help.

Therapy can offer a good place to start addressing negative or unwanted emotions around food and eating, and learn helpful strategies to cope with anxiety and distress. That said, it often requires a team of trained, supportive experts to work toward eating disorder recovery.

You can get support by contacting:

If you have anxiety about food, you’re certainly not alone.

Know that both anxiety and eating disorders can improve with the right treatment, but there’s no denying that recovery is a process. It can take time and effort.

By reaching out to ask for help, you’re taking an important first step — not just toward healing, but also toward regaining control of difficult or painful emotions.

Crystal Raypole writes for Healthline and Psych Central. Her fields of interest include Japanese translation, cooking, natural sciences, sex positivity, and mental health, along with books, books, and more books. In particular, she’s committed to helping decrease stigma around mental health issues. She lives in Washington with her son and a lovably recalcitrant cat.