ARFID, Anorexia, Bulimia & Binge Eating: What Parents Need to Know with Dr. Erin Parks

Raising Good Humans

Dear Media, Aliza Pressman

Toddler, Sinai, Mount, Doctor, Mother, Science, Dear, Baby, Motherhood, Parenting, Psychology, Pressman, Education, Humans, Seedlings, Kids & Family, Adolescence, Children, Child, Childhood, Parent, Good, Raising, Infant, Media, Aliza

4.6 • 1.8K Ratings

🗓️ 28 October 2025

⏱️ 53 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this episode, I’m joined by clinical psychologist and Equip co-founder Dr. Erin Parks for a clear, compassionate guide to eating disorders. We sort through ARFID vs. picky eating, anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating; early signs to watch for (and what’s normal); how to talk about food and bodies at home; and when to step in and get help—so you know what to worry about, what to let go, and exactly where to start.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The following podcast is a Dear Media production.
0:09.6	Welcome to Raising Good Humans podcast.
0:12.1	I'm Dr. Lisa Pressman, and today's episode I'm talking with Dr. Aaron Parks, who's a clinical psychologist, researcher, and co-founder of Equip.
0:20.8	Dr. Parks has over 15 years of experience working with adolescents and adults in various
0:25.5	eating disorder treatment settings. And then she co-founded Equip and is on faculty in the
0:31.6	Department of Psychiatry at UC San Diego. This is a really helpful episode to learn about eating disorders, when to worry, when to
0:42.2	not worry, things that you can do for prevention, signs to look for. And we're talking about
0:49.5	the range of eating disorders from anorexia, binge eating, and also things like ARFID,
0:57.5	which are a little bit less known, more than picky eating. It's a serious food restriction.
1:03.7	I wanted to talk with Dr. Aaron about ways that parents can support their kids, set up healthy eating in the house
1:12.1	and body images, and also when to worry and what to do about it. So I want to start with the basics.
1:21.2	I want to sort of calibrate. So we're all talking about the same thing. When we talk about
1:26.3	eating disorders, what are we talking about? Such a great question. Eating disorders is actually an umbrella term,
1:32.5	and there are about 10 different diagnoses that fall under that umbrella. The first one is
1:37.7	ARFID. It's an acronym that stands for avoidant, restrictive food intake disorder. And you can kind
1:43.4	to think about it as picky eating
1:45.0	gone awry. This usually starts around toddlerhood. And these are kids who will grow into adults
1:50.7	who have extreme picky eating. And this picky eating either impacts them physically. So we will
1:56.9	sometimes see a 10 year old who weighs the same as when they were six, or it impacts them
2:01.6	socially. It's hard for them to go out to a restaurant or be at a party that's serving food
2:07.8	because there's so few foods that they eat. So that is one diagnosis. Another diagnosis is
2:12.7	anorexia. I think this is what most people think about. I would say this is like the Hollywood
	...

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