Food Hoarding and Eating Disorders: A Hidden Symptom of Anorexia (My Story)

Picture a kitchen drawer stuffed with protein bars and a freezer packed with bread – not what most people expect from someone with anorexia, right? Yet food hoarding is one of the most misunderstood symptoms of eating disorders.

What Does Food Hoarding Look Like?

Above picture is what my "protein bar drawer" looked like before I went to eating disorder treatment in the summer of 2017. Even before I left home, I kept all of my precious bars and other protein snacks for when I came back. Little did I know I was going to be spending six months in treatment, instead of what I thought was going to be four weeks.

Excuse the poor quality of the photo, but I think it is so crucial that I post this. It beautifully illustrates how obsessed I was about having enough food in the house (if you can even call half of these bars real food). I always had to have my drawer stocked, and could never imagine having an empty kitchen.

The Paradox of Food Hoarding in Eating Disorders

Although it may seem counterintuitive for someone with a restrictive eating disorder, food hoarding is a very serious and important symptom to recognize in anorexia and other eating disorders. This contradiction often surprises people, which is exactly why we need to talk about it.

Food hoarding is one of those eating disorder behaviors that doesn't get picked up on consistently. Because people with restrictive eating disorders often tend to not eat, food hoarding is often not recognized as an eating disorder behavior.

But it is.

Why Do People with Eating Disorders Hoard Food?

Food is one of the basic needs of life; food scarcity anxiety is one of the biggest threats to human survival. The ability to hunt and gather food was essential to our development as a species. So if food did become scarce, we would have to move to find more food (the biological reason behind exercise urges with eating disorders) or die. Either way, life would be pretty stressful.

Food hoarding calms that stress.

Just imagine you lost your job and thus were running low on money. You would most likely feel extremely stressed, and not be able to calm down unless you have that job security again. In this example, your job loss is the weight you have lost, and the money you are running short on is a metaphor for the calories you are eating.

When us humans feel stressed or in potential danger, we feel a strong urge to gather and store items that are important to us. In other words, we feel more secure and less stressed when we know that we have a stockpile of essentials. This is the reason we hoard food. Our brains perceive food as scarce, and thus react by hoarding all the possible food.

My Personal Experience with Food Hoarding in Anorexia Recovery

When I was in quasi recovery, I hoarded all kinds of food, but mostly my "safe" foods. I would also buy anything that was "safe" and on sale – from artificially sweetened protein bars to non-fat, high-protein yogurt to low carb bread, you get the picture. I would actually freeze loaves and loaves of bread – so much that the rest of my family wouldn't even be able to fit their stuff in the freezer! So the freezer was always full, but didn't allow for very spontaneous eating. Just the way my eating disorder liked it. The knowledge that I had a lot of food stored in the house was calming to me.

Breaking Free from Food Hoarding (and Anorexia)

Through my own recovery journey and the research that led to my book How to Beat Extreme Hunger, I've discovered that overcoming food hoarding starts with understanding its root cause: your brain's response to perceived scarcity. The solution, while counterintuitive, is simple – you have to prove to your brain that you're not in a famine environment.

You do this by eating an abundance of food. When you feel the urge to save something, identify and classify this urge as an indication that your brain believes there is scarcity. While the eating disorder may try to convince you that you're "wrong" for eating, remember that anorexia distorts your belief system. The "right" action is the one that brings you closer to a life that's aligned with your healthy values. So, when you feel the urge to stockpile, the "right" choice is to eat more food! When you consistently show your brain that there is no scarcity, it will stop behaving as if there is.

If you recognize these behaviors in yourself, know that recovery is possible. I've been there, and I can tell you that freedom from food hoarding – and from your eating disorder – is worth every challenging step of the journey. Want a step-by-step guide to go from food obsessed to food freedom? Grab a copy of my extreme hunger book here!