WHERE DO I START?

by Paula Bush, President of PAC & Family Nutritional Consultant

1.  The first thing you need to do no matter what the diagnosis is the elimination diet.   Do the elimination diet of your choice for 2 weeks before you reintroduce foods back into the diet.  Check for any reaction.  Typical reactions are - tired or wired, have them perform a reading, writing or drawing task and check performance level, spacey, talkative, whiny, irritable, aggressive, depressed, or doesn't seem to feel well.  The reaction should happen within an hour of trying the food.  This is called an immediate reaction.You should see an improvement in 5 - 10 days - sometimes as early as 48 hours.  It is also important to keep a food and behavioral journal while doing this.  Also write down weather patterns like rain (mold) or exposures to perfumes, paints, carpeting, etc.

2.  If you're still confused while doing the diet, rotate the foods.  Don't feed them anything anymore than every 4 days.  Remember the importance of keeping the food journal.  See if you can find a pattern.  Is the behavior every 2nd or 3rd day?   What foods did they eat on that day?  Was there a weather change or an exposure to a chemical?  If your child is reactive every time they eat anything sweet - even naturally sweet like fruit or pure maple sugar, you should suspect candida.  If you're still confused, it may be a delayed food reaction. A delayed reaction happens anywhere from a couple of hours to 4 days after ingesting the food.  You may want to consider getting the ELISA/ACT test.

3.  Any child with multiple food allergies usually has vitamin deficiencies. Work with a knowledgeable health care practitioner or consider having MetaMetrix laboratories check for vitamin/mineral/amino acid/fatty acid deficiencies. 

4.  After all of this, if they're still having seasonal fluctuations in behavior or learning, consider seeing an allergist and putting them on
allergy shots.  For instance, if every spring, your child's grades go down, it's a good chance that it's tree pollen.  In the fall, it's ragweed etc.

5.  If the child is still having problems after all of this, you may want to see a specialized therapist.  For vision related learning problems, see a vision therapist.   For sensory related problems, see a sensory therapist. For ADD that isn't corrected by diet and vitamins, you may want to consider biofeedback.

Paula Bush is the founder and President of Parents of Allergic Children in Richmond Virginia, as well as a Family Nutritional Consultant.  If you are having problems on where to start or what to do next contact Paula on 739-1495.

WEB LINKS

Feingold Association Symptoms Checklist

Studies on Diet Health and Behavior - Feingold Association