Hi all,
Well my daughter is 5 years old. She was diagnosed with Williams Syndrome at age 2. It's been a rough road here and there for us but we are learning to take one day at a time with her.
Recently back in January she started school. We are hoping to have her at mainstream school full time but took the advice of the special school she attended for kindy to go 3 days mainstream and 2 days special school. This worked great for 2 weeks. By week 3 however, all was not rosy! She really went off the rails and started to play up big time at mainstream to the point where she threatened to run away after the teacher already caught her once. It was so upsetting for us that week. After consulting with the special school again, we have dropped her hours back to just 2 hours mainstream school with one on one aid support every Monday and 4 days at Special School with the end result of hopefully increasing her time gradually at mainstream over the year and easing her into it. This last 2 weeks though, she has been great. We as her parents have also decided to treat her as though she has ADHD/ADD as WS people are prone to it so we decided to change her diet after getting comments back from mainstream that she was a totally different child after having some rice crisps that had a particular "natural" colour on them. We have since seen a dietitian who has also suggested we put her on an "elimination diet" which we will be starting next Monday. In the meantime though we have cut out all artificial preservatives, colours and flavours and already we have seen a huge difference in her.
I guess my question to all would be, with so many children these days being diagnosed with ADHD and ADD and other various behavioural disorders, would you be willing to change your child's diet in order to avoid medications or would you just put your child on medications and hope for the best, forgetting that putting a child on meds doesn't mean it will fix them as it could very well be the food we feed them that set them off and the meds and diet end up fighting inside your child's body! After reading so much information and talking to this dietitian, it is frightening to realize how much "they" add and process our foods that are actually suppose to be "natural". I know what we would do, and we are doing it. We want our daughter to be able to attend mainstream full time because she is not special school material, it has yet to be confirmed with an IQ test later this year, but we have been told she is only mildly affected with WS. We strongly feel that amending her diet will help with her already short attention span and behaviour but those who know a WS child or person, know that they are beautiful human beings that are so loving and affectionate, that's what we want to shine through, not the behaviour. So what does everyone else think, diet change or meds?!
No rude comments please and any personal experiences in this area, I would love to hear. Thanx and sorry it's a long one and I have put it here in Pregnancy and parenting as this is where I am most of the time. Thanx I believe 100% that what we put into our body contributes A LOT to what we feel and think (Not always the case though)
I have been raising my son on organic and all natural foods since he was cooking in the oven.I ate organic and natural food mostly (Although I couldn't escape the wrath of Ding Dongs and ice cream..and a few other goodies)
He has no behavior issues and no health issues (hopefully it stays that way) My niece on the other hand is fed Mc Donald's, chips, donuts, soda candy etc. and her first french fry was at the tiny age of 9 months.
She has had many colds and has behavior issues (although not too bad)
Like I said, I believe that food affects us but that is not always the case.Some kids aren't fed crap and have issues while others are and have no issues
I think that you should give the diet change a chance.What do you have to lose?
You should also try a Omega-3 supplement as well.My son loves these chews:
http://www.drsearsfamilyapproved.com/sho...
Good luck and hope all goes well I have a Adhd child, and yes we did try this food change but it wasn't helpful for our son.
If you beleive that just changing her food will help her, and have seen a improvement all ready, then by all means keep trying it. I mean if something works and you don't have to put those awfull meds in your childs body than go for it i say. (I wished this could of worked for ours)
Some of the diet change may be hard to deal with as she gets older and wants certain foods, or when it comes time for her to go to parties, and special events and she is the only one that can't have the cake or ice cream. But if you start early she may not miss these things either.
But Just be sure that this is really what is helping your child, I mean sometimes we will think this is working now and two weeks from now it may have no effect on her at all. So just be careful for setbacks, as we all know that they do happen.
but for now it seems like you are doing a great job at helping your child without medicine and i think that is wonderful :) Too many kids out there today that have to put these meds in their bodies every day just to have some kinda of function.
Best of luck to you and your daughter Dear Tanya,how lovely to hear a parent explore all ideas,you sound as if you know what to do,but it is not easy in this Society to go a more "alternative "way. Diet is just one of many.
Please give Drugs a miss,it is just not right !
You might like to read about other ways of healing like: Australian Bush-flower Remedies,Kinesiolgy,Reikie and Homeopathy.
When it comes to our Children ,we have to think outside the mainstream Square,and even if you have never thought about this before we all are more then just a Body! It is not just the Body that needs healing. Doreen Virtue has a lovely Book called :"The Crystal Children" It is helpful in understanding why there are so many "Alphabet" Children...
And please remember ,our children come to us to teach us,go with what your heart tells you,not your intellect!
I wish you and your Child love and peace! I am not an experienced Momma but I think the route you are going is the best. Changing her diet is more natural than just medicating her. Med's are only temporary and changing her diet is healthier for her physically and mentally. Good luck. You sound like such a good Momma xoxo I took meds growing up, my parents let me go off them as I wished, and I did when I was in middle school. In college I started them again. I personally would rather take the meds and be able to eat whatever I want. So there's an ADD patient's perspective for you.
I was diagnosed in about 1996 probably, and if the diet changing theory existed then, my parents didn't know about it. I didn't have a problem being on the meds. |
