Nutrition Tips for the Brain!

Karin, is a former lawyer turned functional medicine nutritionist (among many other hats!). She has been in the wellness space for the past 20 years. She’s the daughter of a doctor who found herself grappling with two autoimmune disorders, but found limited success from the conventional route of medicine. Now she’s a culinary nutritionist who specializes in using food as an approach for wellness, in a family-friendly and accessible way.

In her clinic, she was seeing alarming statistics on the rise. She saw an increase in cognitive issues for children.

In the US, 1 in 5 has mental health issues with a 43% increase in ADHD since COVID.

Karin said, “from a functional medicine perspective, it doesn’t matter whether I’m treating cancer, ADHD, or autoimmune disease, what functional medicine says is that there is a root cause for the disease or issue. There are root causes that can affect your symptoms and the way you feel.”

The root causes of ADHD are things like nutritional deficiencies. Vitamin D, iron, B12, folate, magnesium - very often we can see through a blood test that you can be deficient, normal, and optimal ranges (there is a big difference between the three).

If you want to feel optimal,
your levels should be optimal.

Sometimes supplementing kids with nutrients can help bring down the intensity of the symptoms. It’s not that it’s going to cure the problem, but we want to bring down the intensity of the symptoms. Sometimes supplementing after a blood test is a great place to start.

Another significant root cause can often be sleep. Very often, a diagnosis of ADHD can be a false diagnosis in the wake of a sleep issue. The fact that you’re asleep, doesn’t mean you’re getting a restorative sleep. Mouth breathing, asthma, allergies, sleep apnea, etc. can keep you from a deep restorative sleep which means the next day you present with ADHD like behavior.

Your gut is a big root cause. Your gut houses your microbiome and these microbes break down food, they create neurotransmitters, they support your immune system, etc. For a long time, we thought were brain issues, we now know are issues of the gut.

Other root causes:

Food sensitivities - not allergies, but can cause inflammation (gluten, dairy, etc).
Diet - could be low in protein or fatty acids
Underlying diseases such as celiac disease
Heavy metal accumulation

Trigger foods for kids with ADHD:

Juices

Cereals

Added sugars

The wrong types of fats (seed oils, etc)

Let's consider FOCUS foods:

food to focus on that helps us focus.

A super powerful part of this is helping kids make the connection. Start with making the connection in the brain. If they’re saying I feel ______ ask them about what foods they’ve eaten and how their food choices may impact them. We’re trying to help them learn to take in food as fuel, and the proper foods to prevent crashes.

Kari asked, “what about food dyes?”

There are a few well known chemical triggers that can exacerbate symptoms:

Sugar
Food dyes

Food dyes are banned in many other countries including the UK and Australia.

MSG - Monosodium Glutamate

So we as moms are often the leaders in the home, but we have the opportunity to empower them to choose and make the better choice because it’s good for your body. We can remind our kids that ADHD isn’t a negative thing, but they need to learn strategies to learn how to help them perform optimally and making good food choices is part of that.