When Feeding Structure and Boundaries Feel Unsafe: Supporting Eating Challenges in Children Named “Oppositional”
An advanced training for clinicians ready to rethink oppositionality, feeding boundaries, and behavior through the lenses of nervous system safety, autonomy, demand avoidance, and regulation.
Many clinicians are taught that feeding challenges improve with more structure, consistency, and clear boundaries. While these approaches can help some children, others experience the opposite—mealtimes become more stressful, food refusal intensifies, and families find themselves increasingly overwhelmed.
These children are often labeled as oppositional, controlling, or resistant, and caregivers are encouraged to hold firmer boundaries and reduce accommodations. Yet despite everyone's efforts, feeding challenges often continue to escalate, leaving both families and clinicians feeling stuck.
This training explores a different perspective: what if feeding difficulties are less about compliance and more about safety, autonomy, and trust? Through the lenses of nervous system regulation, demand avoidance, and relationship-based care, clinicians will learn to better understand and support children whose feeding challenges may be rooted in experiences of threat rather than a lack of structure.
July 17 from 12 pm - 2 pm EDT.
Extended Access: Recording Available for 90 days
Open to professionals across disciplines
Speaker: Naureen Hunani, RD
We Want To Help You Feel Confident In Supporting Your Neurodivergent Clients So You Can Grow Your Practice!
About the Speaker
Naureen Hunani is a neurodivergent dietitian with over 18 years of clinical experience and the founder of RDs for Neurodiversity. Based in Montreal, Canada, she supports neurodivergent people of all ages navigating feeding and eating challenges, including ARFID. Naureen is also a clinical supervisor and speaker, sharing her expertise with clinicians and organizations committed to more affirming models of care.
Her work is grounded in an intersectional, justice-oriented lens—recognizing how neurodivergence, disability, culture, identity, and systemic oppression shape people’s feeding experiences and access to support. She is a strong advocate for the early identification of feeding differences and for increasing inclusion, acceptance, and safety in all feeding environments.
Naureen has presented at national and international conferences, and in November 2023 received the Nothing About Us Without Us Award from the Autistic Self Advocacy Network. She is passionate about supporting pro-justice, HAES®-aligned professionals in building more liberatory, accessible, and neurodiversity-affirming practices.