There is mounting evidence which suggests that ADHD is caused by an intolerance to particular foods. Components or by-products of certain foods (like casein and gluten in dairy and wheat) affect the brain wave activation patterns, which in turn disrupts proper brain functioning. It certainly doesn’t help that most of the foods available in the supermarket are full of allergens like synthetic flavoring, artificial preservatives, artificial colors, gluten, and casein. If your child is resistant to the idea of eliminating these foods for good, one way you can cope with food intolerances is by “rotating” the foods he or she likes to eat.
A rotation diet divides foods according to food groups, then “rotates” them; you will eat biologically-related foods on one day then avoid them for four days. The rotation diet was especially designed to treat food intolerances, but it works for children with ADHD as well. Its benefits are threefold. iIt minimizes allergic reactions by giving the immune system time to heal itself. At the same time, it unmasks unknown food intolerances during the period of rotation. In the long term, a rotation diet can help a child become tolerant of the allergen he or she was once sensitive to.
The basic principles of doing the rotation diet are as follows:
- 1) Do not repeat eating a food until the fifth day after it was last eaten. This means that if peas were eaten on day 1, legumes should not be consumed until day 5. Four days is usually enough for each food item and all their traces to leave the body. During this time period, you can detect unknown food allergies, enabling you to identify which food causes which symptoms.
- 2) Foods that belong to the same botanical family can be consumed every other day. The basis of a food family is the biological origins, and it is likely that foods from that family contain the same allergens and trigger similar reactions. For instance, wheat, rye, and oats are all from the cereal grain family. You can give your child oatmeal on day 1, but oatmeal cannot be eaten again until day 5. To make planning meals a whole lot easier, consult a book on rotation diets and look for the charts that list down food families and the foods that fall under them.
- 3) Do not eat the same food twice during the same day. For instance, if your child had oatmeal for breakfast on day 1, oatmeal in other forms – be it in cookies or another bowl of oatmeal – should not be eaten until day 5.
To make the transition easy, start the rotation diet with the most easy food group to rotate – proteins. Rotate chicken, beef, eggs (if tolerated), fish, and so on, following the basic principles of the rotation diet. For the same day, you can rotate fruits or legumes. You will definitely have to rotate the cereal grains family and dairy because children with ADHD are usually intolerant of them. As the diet progresses, maintain a food diary to track meals and symptoms related to the foods. When you have identified a specific food intolerance, eliminate the food completely, then slowly re-introduce it rotation-style.
A rotation diet might seem confusing at the start but there are many books that will guide you step-by-step on how to get started. After several weeks, the rotation diet will simply become part of your routine, and in about a month, the benefits of the diet will be seen.
