ADHD of the Christian Kind - List Archives: Diets

Diets

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RE: Feingold Diet Explained

Dr. Feingold was a pediatrician who shifted his specialty to child allergies, then treatment of both adults and children.

In his book, Why Your Child is Hyperactive, Dr. Feingold explains that some children are allergic and some just intollerant to artificial colors, flavorings and salicylates found in many fruits and veggies.

With the diet, you eliminate ALL of the offenders from the diet, and the child's behavior is supposed to change.

I have to tell you that it is working with my 4yo who is hyperactive (probably ADHD--not diagnosed yet). After just a few days without the offending foods, he is very calm and, for the first time in his life, teachable.

The older children are not affected yet. Dr. Feingold states that young children are the quickest to react to changes, and older children can take four to seven weeks to show change.

Yesterday, I served deli Roast Beef with cheese on tortillas for dinner (they were really good) and within 20 minutes Daniel was bouncing off the walls. I am not sure which chemical he is reacting to, but it was obvious there was something in that roast beef.

I will have to cook my own meats for lunches from now on: no more deli meat.

If you would like more information, you can visit the Feingold Association.

The Feingold Association has a membership fee (something around $50) to get their materials about going on the diet. I did not want to spend that money so I checked the above-mentioned book out from the library and went on the diet using that information.

I received a newsletter from the Feingold Association that states you MUST have all their information to truly identify all the offending foods because labels are just not accurate, but I am doing it on my own.

I am also putting together my own nutritional supplements based on the information in "God's Recipe" (see http://www.ns.net/users/BrandiV/index.html) because I hate any "miracle" cure where membership and lots of money are required.

RE: Feingold Diet

I am wondering about the Feingold diet. Is it hard to do? And you really DO see a difference?

The Feingold Diet really does work for those children who are sensitive to artificial colors, flavors and salicylates (naturally occurring chemicals found in most fruits and some veggies).

My 4yo was transformed within days to a calm, normal child. He has since gotten hyper again, but I think it is the bread I am using. I will have to start making my own bread again.

The diet is hard, especially on mom as you hear the complaints from your children, but if it helps, it will be well worth it.

I recommend membership to the Feingold Association which provides you all the dietary information, where you can find acceptable fast foods, restaurants foods, name brands, etc. I haven't had the money to sign up, but will probably do so real soon.

Dear _____ and those interested in an elimination diet,
_____(age 11) and _____(age 9) were both very food sensitive as infants. As a long term breast feeding mom, I had to avoid milk and dairy product for myself while feeding them and still had lots of problems with "colic" , rashes, ect. Our pediatrician has been practicing for about 20 years and says our children have more food allergies than any he has ever seen. So I was motivated to go at it gung ho when doing the elimination diet to try to get at the bottom of things.

I was interested in evaluating for both food allergies and salicylate sensitivities so this is what I did:

Evaluate your diet to see what foods your children eat a lot of and seem to crave. Eliminate those for sure. Eliminate common allergens such as wheat and milk and any foods containing those products.
Make a list of foods you don't eat very much and use these in planning a week long baseline diet. Rice is rarely a problem so you can use tons of it in those early days of working with allergies. Boiled rice, puffed rice from the natural foods coop, rice noodles, rice cakes ect. I bought a 25 pound sack of rice from the food coop every month. I also ground it for cooking in things.
Some people buy unusual meats like buffalo and stuff for the baseline, but we just had the usual unprocessed meats like beef and chicken.
For fruits, I bought a lot of melons of various kinds, and pineapple and pears and their juices. I also bought some nuts that we didn't usually eat. Also ate carrots and green beans.
We took allergy multicaps mixed with pineapple juice as this is not a nutritionally complete diet.
Eat the baseline diet and keep a behavior journal. I also journaled any rashes or joint pain as these are symptoms in our boys.
Add a suspected allergen back in a very large dose in as pure of form as possible-(-puffed wheat, milk free French type or pita bread rather than a mixture bread like a muffin if you were testing for wheat) eat a lot all day. Of course, stop if the child is feeling sick from it! Continue with the baseline and whatever you have just added for a few days before adding something else.
Keep adding things back one at a time and keeping a record. Remove foods that a child reacts to from the diet and test again in a couple of months or so.

This is a lot of work but is the best way of finding out what is bothering a child when multiple allergies/sensitivities are suspected.

I have followed the Feingold diet in principle without joining. I have been a heavy user of a natural foods warehouse and that has been very good for supplying what I need. Eating out is hard, especially in the beginning. But in time my children have been able to tolerate the "bad foods" in limited quantities. In the early days our best bet was Asian restaurants that advertised "no MSG". Of course NO sweet and sour sauce if your child is red dye sensitive :-)

What helped us the most was identifying all the culprits-which were different for _____ and _____--avoiding them, and eventually using a 4 day rotation diet for the protein allergens. Now ______ can drink milk and eat wheat, but he cannot tolerate my homeground white wheat!!!! I have heard that some people can tolerate this when they can't tolerate white flour, but in _____'s case it was just the opposite.

I too have found the Feingold Diet to help greatly with the hyperactivity part of ADHD, but have found Pine Bark and Grape Seed extract to help the most with the attention part. You might think of trying this. I have found a rather affordable place to get this if you would like more info, let me know. :)

My children have responded well to the Feingold diet. We are beginning day 10 today, so we have lots of time to see even more changes. _____ (4yo hyperactive) has shown the most dramatic changes. He has gone from totally hyperactive to being pretty normal. He is still energetic sometimes, but is not showing all the really "silly" behaviors he did before the diet. He has started "talking" to me. Before the diet, he was just silly all the time. Now, he will observe his surroundings and comment on what he sees. I still have to remind him to move his lips when he talks so I can understand him, but he is really so different since the diet. He rarely sneaks food, gets into things, or fights with his siblings. I thank the Lord for helping _____ and giving me the wisdom I need to help my children.

_____ (7yo-ADHD) has really calmed down, also. He still acts ADD (seems to have lost the hyperactivity) most of the time, but with a 7yo I believe he will have to be taught how "not" to act ADD. I am not giving him Ritalin at all any more. Dr. Feingold commented in his book Why your Child is Hyperactive, that it is not unusual for a child to get worse with the stimulants after being on the diet for a while. This seemed to be the case with _____. I would give him a 5mg dose of Ritalin and he seemed worse than before.

How do we find out if our children are allergic to wheat and dairy foods when these foods are in almost everything? I have suspected my 4yo lactose intolerant since I weaned him, and I wonder about the wheat. Is it true that those who are allergic to wheat do not react similarly to freshly ground wheat used in baked goods? Tell us all you know, please?

RE: Diet Restrictions --

Along that same topic we had great success with _____'s ADD while on this diet. Over Christmas we spent five days with ten people in a two bedroom apartment in Oregon. Even though _____ was not taking his medication and was only on this diet he did amazingly well without any major problems in relationship to his ADD. We were hoping that he would be able to go back to school with only the use of the diet, but that didn't work well. I think the stress of school was just to much for him. So he is still on his medications, but we are hoping that when we begin homeschooling that he can be off his meds and just use diet and possible some sort of vitamin/herb/mineral supplement.

Pickles --

While on the diet for bedwetting _____ couldn't have preservatives, colors, additives etc. We found that Kosher pickles do not have these things in them. I am not sure what the Feingold diet restrictions include, but you might want to check them out and see if they would be okay. I know that I was very dissappointed to find that normal pickles have all kinds of stuff in them.

RE: Elimination Diet

Our experience with the elimination diet was described in Dr. Doris Rapp's book Is This Your Child? An elimination diet doesn't mean to just eliminate those foods you suspect but to basically eliminate everything (with a few acceptable items to eat which were given in the book) for a period of time to cleanse out the system first and then, begin introducing foods in their pure form back into the diet. I think (I did this over 5 yrs. ago so I'm a little rusty) when it's the right day to introduce that food item, you do it 3 different times and note any change.

I think it took about a month to do the whole process. For example, after the "cleansing stage", on Day 1 you introduce milk (not sure which was the first one) 3 times. If there is a reaction, you keep the child off any products containing milk ( there are a jillion ingredients that are milk by-products...sigh). If there is no reaction, you may add that item back into the daily meals. Then, Day 2, you introduce such and such. It takes awhile to get through the whole process but very helpful. We discovered numerous allergies including wheat which was a nightmare. Someone recommended Ezekial bread but our son still went hyper on it. He ended up eating a white rye bread that was wheat-free.

Also, food amounts matter. One child could eat like 1/3 cup oatmeal but more than that resulted in hyperactivity.

Dr. Rapp also discusses that reactions that result in hyperactivity can be from environmental (cleansers, fragrances, and so on)causes. The best we found was to keep a daily journal and when he was hyper, record what he had just eaten, touched, and smelled to see any relationship. One child in the book went hyper from the smell of fireworks.

Our son has outgrown many of these allergies (thanks be to God) but the chemicals tend to be troublesome still. Sigh.

RE: Feingold Diet

We used the Feingold diet. Some children are sensitive to salicylates, while most are not. It is only helpful if your child is one who does react to salicylates. Salicylates are a naturally occurring compound found in higher levels in certain fruits and vegetables. Also, some children tend to react to artificial preservatives and coloring the same way they react to the naturally occurring salicylates. My son reacts to apples, berries, and cereal preserved with BHT. The diet in itself is not a "cure", but can be helpful for certain individuals.

The cost depends on what foods you have to avoid and what you replace them with. The packaged cereals from a food co-op are more expensive than the store brands of prepared cereal, but home cooked oatmeal is less expensive than either. For common fruits bananas and pears can be substituted for apples. Grapefruit can be substituted for oranges, but our son can doesn't have a problem with oranges as long as he didn't eat more than 1 a day. We didn't have much of a problem with the salicylate containing vegetables.

If you suspect a food sensitivity of some type, I would first do an elimination diet and to rule out wheat and dairy allergies, which are more common than salicylate sensitivity.

We have found that our 11 year-old doesn't seem to be nearly as food sensitive now as he did when he was 3 or 4 , when I first started working with all this. We still have problems with emotionally difficult type behaviors, but they aren't as food related.

RE: Feingold Association

I would really like to encourage you to pay the fee for Feingolds. They will send you a book with all the items that are acceptable for your region and then send you a monthly update. They have done all the legwork for you as far as research. In fact, if there are products not in the book, you only have to send in the info and they will research it for. It has been a lifesaver for us. I for one dont have the time to research all this alone. Also, you must be careful of not only what you find in the *food* but also in the pangrease and packaging. :( This is where doing it alone can be deceiving. :( Manufacturures dont have to list ingredients of anything other than the actual product. Besides, it is hard to know the exact names of all the different 'problem' ingredients. Feingolds will include in the package sample menus and many *very good* recipes! IMHO, if you are going to try an elimination diet, Feingolds is invaluable! :))) If you would like more info, let me know.

RE: Feingold Diet Acceptable foods

"For breakfast we eat Kix cereal, Shredded Wheat, "

These are not on the list as acceptable. I dont know what is wrong with them though. Just thought I would share this with you.

When we were first doing an elimination diet for _____ (then 3, now 11) I used the allergy multicaps from Twin Labs and mixed them with pineapple juice. He was reacting to so many things that I just wanted the vitamins to be a known non-alergen/sensitivity thing. In fact, we had SO much pineapple juice in those early days that none of us can stand it now!!!! But it was so wonderful to see the clear indications when something was added that _____ reacted to, that all the work was worth it.

RE: Lunch Meat

Michele's comment on the deli roast beef. We have found sodim nitrites in hot dogs and lunch meats to be an offender.

RE: Feingold

The book Why Your Child is Hyperactive contains the entire diet with menus and recipes. Lunches are somewhat limited, but Dr. Feingold recommends meat sandwiches made with leftover meat from dinner the night before. That is hard for us because there are rarely leftovers.

For lunch we eat organic peanut butter and honey, tuna salad, egg salad, chicken salad all using homemade mayonnaise and homemade bread. No pickles or mustard are allowed, one: because cucumbers are on the forbidden list, and two: they both contain artificial colors and flavors (can you believe that?)

For breakfast we eat any kind of eggs and toast, homemade pancakes, waffles, sometimes just peanut butter and honey toast, cinnamon toast and pineapple juice or milk.

Dinner is really tough when I don't have the time. Just cooked meat of any sort (no chicken or turkey with broth added), rice, bread, pasta, veggies and then dessert. I just make homemade cookies, fruit/honey yogurt, or scratch cakes and puddings.

I have made all this stuff yet, but this is what is allowed. If you visit the Feingold web site, the list of offending foods is there somewhere and then you just have to stay away from anything with artificial colors and flavorings and even natural flavorings when it doesn't indicate the origin.

RE: Feingold Diet

We are in week 4 or 5 of the Feingold Diet. Hang in there! We saw drastic results immediately only to have it all fall apart by the end of the week. They say the withdrawls can take a while to set in for some children and others seem to have a bad backlash several weeks in, but this will all subside. :) It can take as long as 6 weeks for things to even out, and things are expected to get worse before better for many due to withdrawls. :( I would suggest that you drop *everything* that is not in your book for the first 6 weeks. Remember that this is only for a season and that it will take time to find alternatives. They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up on wings of eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint. He is with you and will guide you through this time, wait upon Him. ;) If you need anything, let me know.... :)

On a more possitive note..... _____ says that his math is suddenly getting easier.... :))))) and I have noticed that _____ no longer has *fits* (he used to literally run from wall to wall banging into it like a ball in an arcade machine.... :( ) and that his unmerciful pestering of his younger siblings is decreasing. We are now able most days to accomplish more than just math and reading worktexts. Life is getting slowly better. :) Besides, I am learning to cook from 'scratch'!!! Wow, what a boost to the ego... ;)

A funny thing...... after several weeks on the diet, our girlscout cookies came in. :( I kept back my favorite (mint patties) and sent the rest to Dad in Saudi to remove the temptation from the house. Well.... I waited till all the little ones where fast asleep to sneak out my box and savor those wonderfully tasty morsels when...... YUCK!!!! After several weeks of no artificial colors, artificial flavors, and preservitives, THEY TASTED AWEFULL!!!!!!!! :Þ Truly! I made myself eat them because "I payed good money for these!", but needless to say, I think it cured me of 'cheating' for a while. :) There are such wonderful alternatives to just about everything you could imagine eating. There really isnt much need to cheat if you make the time to do a bit of home cooking. BTW, I have ordered the big Feingold Cookbook, so if you need any recipes, it should be in next week, just drop me a line. :)

RE: Day 4 of Feingold Diet

We are starting day 4 of the Feingold elimination diet. There has been a dramatic change in my hyperactive 4yo. He has calmed down so much he is talking to me, and taking correction and training. Instead of coming up to me and wiggling his whole body while sticking his face in my stomach, he will give me an appropriate, gentle hug. What a joy he is becoming.

He did sneak a sip of Dr. Pepper last night and for two hours was pretty obnoxious.

So far, though, the diet is having no effect on _____ (7yo-ADHD). I am being so careful, but found "oranges" in his multi-vitamins. I spent so much money buying natural vitamins with no artificial colors or flavors only to find the forbidden fruit. What to do? I guess I have to go back and find another one. But they are all fruit flavored.

Maybe I need to get vitamin drops. Does someone know of vitamins that fit within the Feingold elimination diet?

Since we have gone on the Feingold Diet, _____ stays dry about 2/3rds of the time.

Although _____ (7-ADHD) has shown improvement in the area of hyperactivity, it has not helped his attention deficit at all. Some days he seems more aggressive than others and I can't find a connection to anything in his diet.

_____ (4-hyperactive but not diagnosed ADHD yet) has completely calmed down and is just a normal little boy. He has started asking to do school, talks to me in complete sentences, and has such a sweet disposition. If he has anything with artificial flavors or colors, he goes ballistic.

I have been reintroducing fruits into their diet, and so far, no problem. We have had grapes, raspberries, and orange juice. _____ had two bad days but don't know if it was connected to the orange juice. I will try school next week without any orange juice and see how he does.

We had Taco Bell for dinner and _____ is running circles around the coffee table and _____ is acting grouchy. Some day I will learn that the fast food is not worth the hyperactivity afterward. Fortunately, the effects only last a few hours.

Your experience with the Fiengold diet is very similiar to ours. Apples are by far the worst food for _____ (ADD symptoms)---and extremely fast actiing in thier effect! Tomatoes also are not a problem here. When we are no longer renting, one of the first things I hope to do is plant an Asian pear tree, so that _____ can have a good supply of a crunchy fruit without sylicilates.

For those of you that do Feingold, last week my husband bought some cereal with colored marshmellows that didn't list BHT on the label and wanted to try _____ on it. _____ had it Monday through Thursday. _____ loved the cereal-of course!!! It was awful for his behavior. For those of you just starting to look at the Feingold diet, I would say that the two very worst offenders are packaged cereals and apples. (I took _____ to the natural foods store on Saturday and let him pick out 2 cereals that were okay by me.)

You are right about the cereals. Even Shredded Wheat is no good because they use BHT in the "packaging" to preserve the whole wheat flavor. BHT makes my kids hyper. But those marshmallows probably had colors and flavors. These make my kids absolutely bananas!

Well, after a couple of months on the Feingold Diet we have started reintroducing foods one at a time. Here are the results:

tomato products (without food colorings): no problems
grapes: major hyperactivity
apples: hyperactivity for all and meanness from Jonathan
strawberries (in jelly): no problem
anything with food coloring, artificial flavorings and unknown stuff: hyperactivity (this includes pepperoni, McDonald's fries (they contain TBHQ--whatever that is), chicken nuggets, anything from Taco Bell)

I am saddened by the problems with fruit. My children absolutely love fruit. I guess we will have to snack on popcorn, more popcorn, and even more popcorn (not microwave, of course, because of the artificial flavors and colorings).

There is only one prepared cold cereal that my children can eat: Grape Nut Flakes. They actually like it and it doesn't cause any problems. Although they like Shredded Wheat, its packaging contains BHT which causes problems with _____ and _____.

We also eat more hot oatmeal, corn bread, scratch meals and chocolate chip cookies using Guillard s ADHD, it did deal with much of the hyperactive behavior and totally calmed Daniel down (he is a different child today because of the diet).

Updated January 23, 1998

Right now, we are doing the elimination diet, and he is getting very tired of it. He has had very little to eat these past 4 days, as most of the foods that he likes are the ones that had to be taken away. He has told me he is not going to go another day without being able to eat bread, or have any sweets, or milk. I am hoping I can hold him off just one more day. I have seen a change in his behavior, but not a great big change. He is not as volatile, but he does still get upset. His temper tantrums do not last as long, although they were pretty good today, but it was over doing without the things he likes to eat, and my Mom is planning a big dinner this Sunday, as my brother is in for a visit (he is in the military, and will be leaving for Bosnia), she wants to have Thanksgiving dinner now, and _____ will have to miss a lot of his favorite foods. He says that I am torturing him. He says his head still hurts as much, and he still has an upset stomach, so I don't know if this diet has helped any, except to maybe state that it may not be food allergies. I will know more if a few days, as I start adding the foods back.