Children's behaviour and diet

fsdss

i am not saying this is it, however, when working with a family a while ago with a boy of similar behaviour ( i work with childrens behaviour), i asked the mum to do me a diary of food - school also did one on behaviour too. it became very clear in week 2 that whenever that particular child ate a tomato based product (spag bol sauce / pizza/tom sauce) he went a bit loopy, literally he was bouncing off the walls.
the mother removed these recipe's containing tomato from the weekly menu and introduced omega oils into his food - there was an immediate improvement.
i have seen this with all types of food / drink inc wheat / strawberries/ juice/ cola so whilst it may seem bazaar start doing a food diary and compare behaviour - it will be instantly recognisable!
if you do get any result from this, i would then ask the school nurse for a referral to a community dietician who can help you with meal planning.

any questions i will be happy to help via pm

Dontknowanymore

Thanks for all your replies, he is 6 years old, almost 7.

He's at my Mum's for the half term so when he comes back I will get on with starting a food diary, I do one myself so will be easy to do.

somethingsgottogive

The food diary sounds like a good idea - when you're doing it have a look at the ingredients on anything processed and note down things like colorings too.
Have you tried doing any sort of work books or phonics/numbers activities at home to see if you can improve his concentration at home? If he has a short attention span, would rewarding him with stickers 'if you do one more sum/one more minute' etc help?

Dontknowanymore

somethingsgottogive wrote: »

The food diary sounds like a good idea - when you're doing it have a look at the ingredients on anything processed and note down things like colorings too.
Have you tried doing any sort of work books or phonics/numbers activities at home to see if you can improve his concentration at home? If he has a short attention span, would rewarding him with stickers 'if you do one more sum/one more minute' etc help?

Well it's a struggle to get him to even do reading, spellings and maths at home at times, the teacher suggested that after half term we come up with a merit system at home in conjunction with the school so I am hoping that will help with that side of things.
It's such a shame because he is very intelligent and could me among the top in the class, but I am determined to do all I can to help him achieve his potential.

Loulou2010

Dontknowanymore wrote: »

Well it's a struggle to get him to even do reading, spellings and maths at home at times, the teacher suggested that after half term we come up with a merit system at home in conjunction with the school so I am hoping that will help with that side of things.
It's such a shame because he is very intelligent and could me among the top in the class, but I am determined to do all I can to help him achieve his potential.

will he do reading, spellings and maths things on the pc? just a thought?

jenhug

my friend found apple juice was the trigger in her daughter.

faithcecilia

Dontknowanymore wrote: »

It's such a shame because he is very intelligent and could me among the top in the class, but I am determined to do all I can to help him achieve his potential.

This could be important, he may well be bored and playing up because he is not challenged at school. I was always a good girl:A but had one terrible year in infant school where I was so far ahead I was bored rigid (I was reading novels at home while at school stuck with Peter and Jane). Maybe bring this up with his teacher if you think its likely.

onlyroz

Common food allergies are sugar (i.e. sucrose), cows milk, chocolate or oranges. There are many others - the only thing you can really do is try eliminating one at once and see what makes a difference. My brother had a sugar allergy when he was a kid - and would literally be bouncing off the walls, running around with "wild eyes". Once it was cut out of his diet, he became a completely different child. I also know another person who was allergic to cows milk - he became extremely violent whenever he had it. One of my close friends from school went totally wild whenever she had chocolate or oranges, but again was all sweetness and niceness when she didn't have them.

ailuro2

my DD turned into a different child after a visit tot he ice cream factory in Pizza Hut - after she went nuts a couple of times we figured out it must be the Smarties - she's not had them since - though DH says he feels decidedly odd if he eats them.

nedington

My son at that age was complete fidget also. Couldn't sit still, even when watching telly he would still be fiddling with something. We started to notice this was worse at certain times on certain days that tied in with what he had eaten. Some things would really zonk him out, other would have him acting like he was on speed. So for years we kept him off cheese things, pizza, etc and all fizzy drinks and sugary sweets but had never really pinned it down to specifics.
Then we saw an ad in Holland and Barrett for food allergy testing using vega testing. Some think Vega is nonsense, some thing it is fab. All I can say it once it had identified his "triggers" and we excluded them it was like a different kid. For a month we totally excluded them and it did involve a big lifestyle change for us all but it he is thriving on it.
Now at 14 he knows his own triggers and what to eat and what to avoid. He knows the reactions he will get and sometimes just goes with it if he wants to risk it -almost immediate diahorrea on milkshakes or ice cream for instance are worth it if you are home ! Yeast things that make him sluggish or sleepy only to be eaten when he can sleep afterwards for instance. School especially noticed the difference in him in the lessons after lunch once he monitored what he ate at lunch.

We also stopped him playing on handhelds or pc games. Banned them totally because whilst the handhelds did help him to concentrate the pc games made him aggressive.
But really, the food triggers were the thing that changed him to most, the results were almost overnight and I certainly suggest it is something to look into. You'll be suprised when you work right back in the ingrediants of things just what they contain. THe thing that suprised me most was the sugar in things like cornflakes, where you don't expect there to be sugar.