Being known as and referred to by your eating disorder is weird, complicated, annoying, upsetting. Like I get it, I'm so severely restrictive in my safe foods that it comes out eventually to everyone I have more than maybe a few conversations with, and depending on context is one of the first things I'm forced to disclose about myself.
I'm known as smiley fry kid by a local queer youth program because the first program I went to was a 4 day overnight camp, and because of how restrictive I am the only thing any one ever saw me eat was smile fries, which I had to disclose on the form prior to ever attending.
I didn't find out until recently when I was able to start attending the other programs they run that's what the staff referred to me as. Which like yeah, I'm well aware that is honestly the easiest way to clearly describe who I am to someone for them to easily pick me out, its easy clear communication. I also know fully well if I talked to them and told them not to refer to me that way, they would stop. It's not being used maliciously in anyway.
It's still so complicated to be referred to that way. It's not usually the most important thing about me to a person, however often it is part of the most defining things about me. I don’t want to be defined by it. I doubt they even realize they're doing that. Most of the time is because no one understands how serious it is, how severely it impacts my life. I'm not just picky. I'm restrictive, both in the amount of safe foods I have and how much I actually eat.
I've been called things like smiley fry kid throughout my entire life. It is honestly the one I'm the most okay with but its not something I'd ever choose. I don’t expect anyone to know or understand, especially since I don't talk about it often.
It unintentionally kinda reinforces the shame, anxiety, etc that comes with arfid. That I'm not getting into, but need to write and bitch about the shame and anxiety that come with this fucking eating disorder.
Another thing is, often I've not even been called by an actual safe food. Smile fries aren't a safe food, they were just the only thing safe enough for me to force myself to eat made in anything that's not a deep fryer, even then, I was only ever eating a few of them. I couldn't even manage to force myself the last 2 days of camp last summer. Another was pudding kid in elementary school. It wasn't pudding. I lied and said it was when asked because of how much shame I felt about what it really was.
Anyways I'm not quite sure if this all makes sense and I'm not proofreading it
