Specialized ARFID Therapy for Adults in New York

What ARFID Looks Like for Adults

What looks like picky eating from the outside is a list of maybe a dozen foods you can reliably eat, prepared specific ways, from brands you trust. The list has nothing to do with preference. Your body has been keeping a working inventory of what doesn't trigger a gag, what doesn't set off a fear response, what doesn't feel intolerable.

The hardest part is the people who've known you the longest. Decades in, your family still acts surprised when you order plain pasta. Your siblings still tell the stories about the foods you wouldn't eat as a kid. The label "picky" is the family lore that hasn't changed.

You eat before you go out. You've packed snacks in your bag for in-law dinners since the second year of marriage. You've sat at restaurants ordering Diet Coke and a side of fries while the rest of the table ordered real meals. You've made hosting your thing, because hosting means controlling the menu.

Dinner parties at your own house have a routine. You plan the menu around what your guests will like, set out food you can't eat, and eat from the safe stash in the kitchen between courses. The party your guests remember is a different party from the one you experienced.

Underneath all of it, the shame of working around the eating on your own for years. The question in the background of your mind is whether the eating is the real you, and the rest of your life is the cover.

What ARFID Recovery Can Look Like

The family conversations around the dinner table change. The questions you spent your twenties answering stop coming. The label ARFID makes sense to them or it doesn't, but the eating becomes a non-topic. Your siblings stop telling the plain-pasta stories. Your family stops acting surprised at what you order. You sit through Sunday dinner and eat from the table.

You stop eating before you go out. The snack stash in your bag stops being insurance. You sit at the in-laws' table and eat from it, and the drive home stops being a recap of who said what and what you didn't touch. The math you've been doing for years (how many crackers, how much water, how long before someone notices) stops being something you have to do.

You eat something at the local seafood place. You try the breakfast spot the hotel recommended. You stop spending the trip on a strategic eating plan and start spending it on the beach, the museums, and the people you came with.

You serve yourself a portion that matches what everyone else took, and you eat it during dinner with your friends. After the last guest leaves, you load the dishwasher and go to bed, instead of standing in the kitchen putting together the real meal of the night.

You're not going to wake up one morning loving everything. The work we’ll do together widens the range enough, so that the limits stop being what decides whether you accept the dinner invitation, whether you go on the work trip, and whether you stay through the family event.

Your body responds to the wider range of food. The deficiencies that have followed you for years start to come into normal range. The energy you've been pushing through your days on caffeine and willpower starts coming from the food you're eating. Your doctor reads the bloodwork and stops adding things to your supplement list.

The story about being too sensitive, too rigid, or too much work to feed stops being the story you're carrying about yourself. You eat what's served and the food on your plate stops being something you have to explain or justify. Your eating behavior stops being treated as the real story about you.

Getting Started with ARFID Therapy in New York

Cost: $300 per session

Insurance: Private-pay, with monthly superbills you can submit to your insurance for potential out-of-network reimbursement. HSA and FSA accounts can be used for payment.

Frequency: Weekly sessions, typically 45 minutes.

Length of treatment: Most clients see meaningful progress within 20 to 30 sessions over 6 to 12 months. ARFID is specialized work, and I keep a small caseload so each client gets the focused attention this kind of therapy requires.

Format: Secure, HIPAA-compliant video. You can join from your home, your office, or anywhere private with a stable connection.

About Your Adult ARFID Clinician: Grace Annan, LICSW, LCSW-QS

I'm Grace Annan, a licensed clinical social worker whose practice centers on adult ARFID, with related work in adult eating disorders, body image after body change, and adult ADHD and autism assessments.

My work uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for ARFID (CBT-AR), the evidence-based treatment developed at Harvard Medical School. Studies show about 7 out of 10 people no longer meet ARFID criteria after a course of CBT-AR. We work systematically through food exposure, sensory tolerance, and the daily-life impact of the eating limitations.

New York License: NY-103015

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Frequently Asked Questions

Can I do ARFID therapy online if I live anywhere in New York? Yes. I'm licensed to provide telehealth services to adults throughout New York. The sessions take place over a secure, HIPAA-compliant video platform.

How do I know if I have ARFID versus being a picky eater? ARFID is more than preference. It's a restricted way of eating that affects your health (nutritional deficiencies, weight concerns), your daily functioning (avoiding meals or social events), or causes significant distress. If your eating limitations have followed you into adulthood and are interfering with your life, that's the line where it moves from preference into something a clinician can help with.

Do you take insurance? No. I'm a private-pay therapist. I provide monthly superbills you can submit to your insurance company for potential reimbursement of out-of-network mental health services. Many PPO plans reimburse a portion of the fee.

What if I've never done therapy before? Many of my ARFID clients haven't. The focus is on practical skill-building and structured food exposure, not deep emotional processing. The work is concrete and the goals are clear.

What if my ARFID is connected to autism or ADHD? This is very common, and it's part of why I built my practice this way. Many adults with ARFID also have ADHD, autism, or sensory processing differences, and CBT-AR can be adapted to account for those. If you're not sure whether ADHD or autism is also part of your picture, I conduct adult assessments for both as a separate offering, so the work stays inside the same practice instead of getting split across providers.

What if I'm the one hosting and the people I'm cooking for are watching what I eat? Hosting is its own version of the food anxiety, and it shows up a lot in adult ARFID. We can work on practical strategies for what to serve and how to manage the social dynamics around your own eating, and on expanding the range of foods you can eat in front of others without it feeling exposing.

What if my work involves a lot of travel? Travel is one of the most common scenarios clients want to work on, and it's something we can build directly into the treatment plan. The sessions are virtual, so we can meet while you're on the road, and travel often gives us useful exposure scenarios to work with rather than disrupting treatment.

Do you offer support options besides individual ARFID therapy? Individual therapy is the format for this work because food exposure planning needs to be tailored to your specific tolerance and history.

Areas Served in New York

I provide online ARFID therapy to adults throughout New York, including Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island, Yonkers, White Plains, New Rochelle, Mount Vernon, Hempstead, Babylon, Huntington, Smithtown, Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Schenectady, Binghamton, Poughkeepsie, Newburgh, Saratoga Springs, Ithaca, and all surrounding communities. If you live anywhere in New York, you can work with me.

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