Does your anxiety ever prevent you from eating, even when you're hungry?

I've heard of people losing their appetites due to anxiety or depression. But sometimes anxiety prevents me from eating, even though I get hungry as usual. It only happens when I'm at someone else's house or around other people. It's like I get "stage fright", and sort of freeze up and can't make myself eat, no matter how hungry I am.

I'm just curious as to how common this is.

No, actually I eat like a pig when I'm anxious.

However, I experience anxiety when faced with the prospect of eating in front of other people, so I don't. I eat alone in my room. I also hate it when people eat in front of me - I always have to leave the room. I think I have a phobia of the sounds people make when they eat.

I don't know how relevant that is.

I lost my appetite a few months ago. I had to force myself to eat at least one meal a day and even though I knew I was hungry, I just couldn't feel any pleasure from the food. It wasn't anxiety though, I feel. Probably depression, which is rare because I haven't felt that low in years.

I'm with you on stage fright, but not entirely. I eat less when I'm at another person's house but my appetite isn't scared away. I pay alot of attention to how I'm eating the food too. I'll only take small bites and make sure I make as few sounds, and that my mouth never opens whilst chewing. I should really stop doing that. Most people aren't paying that much attention to how a person eats I guess. (500)

With me it's the following:
Anxiety = complete lack of appetite
Depression = eat like crazy

It has to be a really bad case of anxiety for me to lose my appetite, but it has happened on afew occassions. It can be embarrasing at times, especially when someone asks "Why aren't you eating? Don't you like it?". Great, that puts me the spot even more. (-_-)'

It's relevant - the part I highlighted is along the lines of what I was talking about. I have trouble eating in front of people I don't know very well when I'm anxious. When I'm alone, anxiety doesn't tend to affect my eating habits too much as long as I have food around.

And I always get too to eat when someone has cooked something for me and expects me to eat it in front of them.

Everything about food is comforting for me. Feeding me is probably the easiest way to please me. I eat when I feel bad, I eat when I feel good, etc.

when i'm very depressed or very involved in something i'll just forget to eat since i don't feel hungry. the last time that happened i remembered was when we had the husband's freinds visit us about two and a half years ago. i'd been cleaning and painting when i realized during a break that i hadn't eaten in two days. when i was in my teens i was very shy and anxious around people and i would get heartburn frequently so i wouldn't eat then because of another problem.

Yeah, I can never eat when I'm nervous. It's the worst when I'm having to eat at someone elses house with their family, or going out to dinner with people I don't know that well. It's also bad because it makes the host think I don't like their food, when thats not the case at all!
I eat alot though when I'm depressed at home.

I don't eat much when I'm home because I rarely have any food. I hate having to go to the food store so I usually don't have much laying around for me to eat. Ever since I've gone back to college the anxiety of trying to keep up with all the work has made me lose my appetite quite often as well.

I know I should start eating more because I've been losing too much weight lately... but I worked hard to lose a lot of weight and I'm too afraid I'll put it back on.

If I'm excited about something I sometimes forget to eat.

Same for me.

I never used to eat a lot growing up, I remember when it was time to eat lunch at school I'd always just try to eat the least amount of food possible and get out to play as quick as I could. I'd often hide pieces of food which I hadn't been able to eat in my backpack.

I know exactly what you mean. For me, its almost like a sick feeling if I try to eat.