How to Help Your ADD/ADHD Child with Nutrition
So if my common-sense food strategy doesn’t work for your child, I strongly urge you to go to this web site: www.feingold.org, which is the home of the updated Feingold program. I’m not associated with this program in any way, and I’m no longer familiar with the specifics, but it does offer a chance to keep your child off drugs, and that’s why I urge you to check it out if my strategy doesn’t work.
Now to my food program:
1. No sugar, including corn syrup, fructose, and honey, and no caffeine.
2. No additives, including food coloring and natural and artificial flavors.
3. No chemicals, including preservatives, MSG, and artificial sweeteners.
You also need to be very careful with carbohydrates, especially the starchy ones, because our bodies quickly turn them into sugar. I’m not suggesting a low-carb diet – that would be extremely dangerous for a child. Instead, as an antidote, make sure your child eats her carbs with other foods. So if he wants a piece of toast, add some butter or peanut butter or a small piece of cheese. Combine fruit with a little protein as well. (Fruit juice, however, is a non-no, because it has so much sugar.)
As we all know, protein is essential for energy and health, but it’s very hard to digest great globs of it at once. So spread your child’s protein out during the day, with the largest amounts in the afternoon. I know we Americans are used to eating big dinners, but that’s really counterproductive. First we sit for an hour, wiped out while our bodies try to digest all that food, and then we get a jolt of energy, just when we should be winding down and getting ready to go to sleep.
This is particularly rough on small children, who need early bedtimes. So if you can’t give your child her dinner by 6 p.m., arrange for her to have a hearty snack around 4, and then she can eat a very light dinner with you later.
Now we need to talk about food shopping. Over the past few years, food companies have been adding preservatives to everything from bread to mayonnaise. MSG has become increasingly popular as a flavor enhancer, especially when processors cut down on salt, and food coloring and/or preservatives are now used in non-food items like toothpaste and eye drops.
You have to become an additive detective, examining food labels and charts and deducing that if a toothpaste has color and a sweet taste, it’s going to have food coloring and artificial sweeteners in it. Same thing for vitamins and cough syrups and other medicines.
Speaking of vitamins, does your child really need to take them? If he eats a healthy variety of foods, including plenty of fruits and vegetables and enough protein, he’s probably getting everything he needs. I’m taller than both my parents were, and I never took vitamins as a child.
You also need to think about fortified foods, especially cereals. If your child is getting enough vitamins and minerals from her food, those extras could cause her to develop unpleasant sensitivities when she gets older.
I’m not a nutritionist, so I urge you to do some research. With the Internet and bookstores and libraries, there’s a wealth of material for you to study. You could also check with your pediatrician, but I want to warn you that doctors get very little training in nutrition. Remember, doctors are human, like the rest of us, and if you have doubts about what they tell you, check it out on your own. (This is a lesson I’ve learned from bitter personal experience.)
We also need to talk about water. The water from your tap has been treated with chemicals to purify it of other chemicals. If you run your cold water for a minute or two, you can usually sniff a metallic scent. So be sure to attach a water purifier to your kitchen faucet and be rigorous about changing the filter regularly.
The large health food store I go to is just like a fancy grocery store, with fresh baked organic bread, organic and conventional produce, a bakery, plenty of frozen food, organic chips and snacks, and even a deli with everything from poached salmon to meats without hormones or antibiotics.
I still read all the labels, though, because most of the frozen and prepared foods have a lot of salt and sugar and fat, even if they don’t have chemicals. I understand that you busy parents don’t always have the time to cook dinner every night, so just be careful about what you buy. And do consider simplifying your meals – you could heat up a frozen casserole you made over the weekend, stir-fry a light meal, or have a salad and sandwiches.
Or your could eat out, just as long as you avoid the fast-food places. They use large doses of salt and sugar and fat to make their food have a taste, and they put preservatives in anything they can, including the buns, ketchup, and dipping sauces. Even if you ordered a salad, there’s still a good chance that they would have sprayed it with a chemical or three to keep the lettuce from wilting. And then the dressing is going to be loaded with chemicals.
Unfortunately, the same thing could be true at a restaurant, since many restaurants buy their food from wholesalers who buy it from the same companies that put the chemicals in the food at your grocery store. So you’re going to have to be careful about where you eat, and you’re going to have to ask a lot of questions about the food.
If I were you, right about now I’d be thinking, “How on earth am I going to get my child to do all this?” So try to put yourself in your child’s shoes for a minute. He wants to please you and do well in school, but no matter how hard he tries, he just can’t sit still long enough to do his schoolwork. So she ends up surrounded by people who keep picking at her until they make her feel like a miserable failure.
He could take a pill, of course, but all drugs have side effects, so he’d still feel surrounded by people watching and monitoring him.
There is another choice, however, and this is what you need to explain to your child. Like the rest of us, children want and need to have some control over their lives. ADD/ADHD has taken this control away from your child, but she can take it back if she starts controlling what she eats.
I don’t have any children of my own, but I know from my teaching experience that children want and need limits, and that they relish challenges. So make your child as full a partner as you can in this food program.
You can start by explaining, as I’ve done, about food and allergies, and then talk specifically about sugar and caffeine. Help your child figure out which foods are safe to eat, and then work together to create a week of menus.
Then go food shopping together. If your child is old enough to read, look at the labels together. If he’s not, then read them to him. Remember that younger children can do less than older ones, so gear your planning and shopping to suit your child’s energy levels and attention span. You may have to do most of the planning and shopping at the beginning, but as your child starts eating better and getting stronger, she’ll be able to participate more and more.
This isn’t going to be easy for either of you. Cutting out fast food and being so careful in restaurants is going to interfere with your social lives. And this program is going to take a lot more work from you and a tremendous amount of discipline from your child.
But, as you already know, ADD/ADHD is an insidious time gobbler anyway, so why not put in the time doing the preventive work, instead of being struck in the face with frustration and ambushed by unexpected disasters?
