Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Article showing food link for 60% of ADHD kids

I do believe that food alone can have profound effects. I was breast-feeding when we were trying to sort out DS's food allergies. I ended up being on a severely restricted diet for almost a year. Similar to the study, I ate turkey, chicken and pork, fruits and vegetables and various grains (OK -- I cheated and had wheat occasionally). When I finished breast-feeding and added foods back into my diet, I noticed that certain foods affected my mood and energy level. Wheat saps my energy. Anything with flax seeds, makes me have severe mood swings. I won't bore you with more details but you get the idea.

The hard part is following a restricted diet in the first place. With food sensitivities, as opposed to true food allergies, it's hard because you are asking a kid to abstain from eating things that they have always been able to eat. Once you get through the restricted part, I agree with Kerry that if the kid can make the connection between food and how they feel, they will advocate for themselves.

I will toss out this anecdote about food and ADHD. I have ADHD that was untreated as a child but have experimented in recent years with diet. One thing that made a notable difference to me was cutting out all bread (wheat, basically).

I found after a week of not eating it that my thinking and mood was �smoother� not in a dramatic sense, but in a consistently more stable sense. Like my mind was better balanced. Also, when I would occasionally break the diet and eat a sandwich, I noticed almost immediately a mild tingling seemingly behind my eyes and an increased fuzziness in my brain from that point forward if I continued eating bread.

I�ve done this trial multiple times with the same results so I believe the results are valid at least in my case.

The flip side to this is that certain things partially medicate ADHD symptoms, so drinking caffeine for me helps with some of the symptoms. If I cut out caffeine, I get the benefits of a more stable mood and better rest, but then my ADHD symptoms worsen.

Another somewhat related story is that if I eat anything with ginko biloba I get mild to severe panic attacks. It was quite scary since I'd never had a true panic attack before in my life--the kind that make you want to run in mental fright out the door away from yourself, basically--and it took several episodes to make the connection that it was the ginko biloba (I was eating health bars with ginko in them). It's something worth remembering because today with all the herbs and heatlh food being promoted with all sorts of ingredients whose effects have not been well studied.

Pru - not surprising that you find caffeinated drinks helpful. Caffeine is a stimulant that works in a manner similar to Ritalin. Nicotine is another stimulant that some untreated people with ADHD use to self medicate. I don't recommend the later!

There's lots of new research about wheat sensitivities, allergies etc. You aren't the only one that does well without it! Don't know anything about ginko biloba - but again, many "health" foods and herbal remedies can be as potent as more traditional drugs. The reaction you had sounds terrible.

Slightly off-topic, but I have been trying to give my DS11 some caffeine in the morning to see how he responds (no ADHD diagnosis yet, but pretty certainly 2E of some kind).

I haven't found anything he is willing to drink. We tried green tea (tastes like grass), Chai tea (tastes weird), black tea with sugar (OK but I don't like it in the morning), ice tea (ditto, plus it has too much sugar), hot cocao with a bit of coffee in it (did you put something in my hot chocolate?).

I purchased some 100mg caffiene pills (supposed to be similar to a cup of coffee), but feel nervous about trying them. Especially since the label says in CAPITAL letters "do not give to children."

Any suggestions?

I personally would not give them for the obvious warning. If things are serious enough to warrant testing, you will want to keep caffiene out of his system. When tested for ADHD I had to first stop all caffeiene and wait two weeks for the test because it takes that long to get out.

I have been thinking about getting ds to drink caffeine also because he gets migraines. I've tried straight ice tea (he won't drink it)and Arnold Palmer's half-and-half (half lemonade, half ice tea (again, he won't drink it). Those might work for you. I have heard you can buy caffeineated water, but I haven't seen it for sale around here.

Some "Vitamin Water" flavors have caffeine. I'm not sure how much compared to tea.

Thanks! I checked out the VitaminWater web site. The "energy" type has 50 mg caffeine (about 1/2 cup of coffee) and doesn't seem to have any really bad stuff (except sugar) - I'm going to give it a try.

Pru, yes that's a good point - I won't give him any caffeine within 2 weeks of his testing (not until early May).

My dd likes green and white teas but it sounds like that's not working for you. The other thing she likes is "mocha milk:" milk with a little coffee in it (more milk than coffee). We do non dairy milks which have some sweetener as well.

Mocha milk sounds good -- does your DD drink it hot or cold?