ARFID, COVID-19, Hoarding and Angels on Earth

The world is already a scary enough place for our ARFID friends. This current state of panic that the world is in thanks to COVID-19 has been weighing on my mind heavily over the last several days as the illness is infiltrating our area. We have in the past had a hard time tracking down my son's crackers (one of only FOUR solid foods he will consume) when the world wasn't battling a pandemic. While the world is out there hoarding toilet paper and cleaning supplies, I was worried about one thing and one thing only - Alex's safe foods. I left for the store yesterday with peace of mind knowing that we had about 12 unopened boxes of his crackers so I had myself convinced that walking into the store, if I found them, I found them. If I didn't, I didn't. I walked into an alternate dimension. It was like straight out of a movie and like I should be expecting zombie's to pop out every turn. Shelves after shelves, section after section, all sold out of common goods. Seeing there was no hand soap, I could feel my breathe quickening. No toilet paper, okay. I expected that I told myself. Walking past the pasta section, the panic was settling in even more. Not for Alex, but for myself. Spaghetti is MY safe food. But I've adapted over the years and found other foods that I can be comfortable with so I breathed through it.

Then we made the turn down the cracker aisle. My heart sank. Every last box of his crackers were gone.

I could feel the tears welling up. My chest was hurting as I couldn't control my breathing. We've struggled finding these crackers before when there wasn't a pandemic... but I've told you that already. It was the only thought that kept circling in my brain. Logically, we weren't in a position to panic. Remember I said we had about 12 unopened boxes on hand. It was the idea of not knowing what our future is and how chaotic life is going to get if they shut down life as we know it for the foreseeable future. Those 12 boxes, might last us 2 weeks. What were we going to do after that if the stock wasn't made available? ARFID doesn't care that there's a pandemic going on. ARFID doesn't care. I posted to Facebook, asking my friends and family to keep an eye out for his red box of crackers. Within minutes, offers to check other stores were being made. Within hours, people were reaching out about people they knew that worked for Meijer to help us get some sent our way and by the next morning I even had someone who knew someone on the corporate level looking to help.

Faith was restored that things would be okay. He has so many angels out there looking out for him that we'd make it work one way or another.

We had leads that Highland MIGHT have been restored this morning so we made a trip out there. To our amazement, they were there, sitting on the shelf seemingly just for him. Once again, tears started to well up, but from relief. I had him pose once more for a picture and posted to Facebook that we had found them, jokingly (well, honestly) saying I needed to figure out our budget to decide how much to buy. While we were checking out, a family friend had seen my latest post and paypal'ed me almost the EXACT amount needed to cover the boxes that I was buying. The boxes that I was getting that would've otherwise completely depleted the budget I had to get us through til Friday.

This whole experience is scary, whether you are worried about the virus itself, your loved ones, being out of work or your kids being out of school. It's important to not let the negative overwhelm the good. There are genuinely good people put into your path for a reason. While our ARFID community is facing a tough time, it's important to check in on others and offer assistance wherever we can. Whatever happens in the days, weeks, and months to come, help one another. On another note, if anyone wants to know how elearning is going for my boys...

I'm kidding, I'm kidding! They are both excellent little home-schoolers! Stay healthy friends!