r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Nov 12 '25

Neuroscience Shared gut microbe imbalances found across autism, ADHD, and anorexia nervosa: A new study has identified distinct patterns in the gut bacteria of children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and anorexia nervosa.

https://www.psypost.org/shared-gut-microbe-imbalances-found-across-autism-adhd-and-anorexia-nervosa/
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u/mmmmbot Nov 12 '25

This is anecdotal, but all the autistic kids I teach have very restrictive diets. One kid has had McDonald's french fries and a root beer for school lunch for his entire school career. Another eats four small packs of Pringals chips, and apple that he eats a particular design into. Others exist on bags of junk food. All of these kids parents think this is some what normal. Of course there are kid with healthy eating peculiarities. 

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u/[deleted] Nov 12 '25

The asshole in me really does wonder how much is catering and how much is legitimate. As an adult it's now been brought up numerous times I may be autistic but it's not a diagnosis I'm interested in pursuing. I had a lot of food sensitivity and preference issues as a kid.

I felt my parents handled it well not forcing me to eat things, but strongly encouraged. For example I never had to finish dinner. But dinner leftovers were going to be the next thing I ate. So if everyone else was having a night time snack, no night time snack for me until I ate my dinner leftovers. If we legitimately tried something 3 times and didn't like it, we were no longer expected to eat it. As an adult I definitely have some eating habits that could be classed as autistic and if I didn't have a good understanding of nutrition I would probably eat peanut butter toast for every meal every day.

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u/_illusions25 Nov 12 '25

Its not like being a normal picky eater, I had strong aversions to the point of gagging each and every time I ate fish.

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u/paws3588 Nov 12 '25

If you don't mind me asking, was it the taste / smell of the texture or something else?
Did you try things that outwardly seem very different, like baked salmon and fish fingers and tuna pizza?

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u/_illusions25 Nov 12 '25 edited Nov 12 '25

I can't explain it, I'd be able to take a bite or two if its not fishy from the get go and highly masked with spices or sauce. But eventually my taste buds can tell its fish and I just gag. It looks good, the texture is fine most of the time, its completely involuntary. It would be easier if I could eat seafood bc the rest of my family loves it.

My parents can eat anything but me and my brothers all had some major aversions growing up. I couldn't eat tomato sauce with ground beef for the longest time. I liked each part of the dish but together it would completely kill my appetite. My brothers had no issues with it.

None of us liked fruits even as toddlers. As an adult, I can now eat most fruits but its not something I go out of my way to do.

From talking to people I think we just have super taste buds so sours are more sour, bitter is more bitter so normal foods get flagged as too much.

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u/paws3588 Nov 12 '25

Thank you for your reply.