Tuesday, August 13, 2013

ADHD and Diet, Clean Eating


I've been seeing numerous mentions recently about the effect of diet on children with ADHD and it's causing me to rethink the effect that junk food has on adults as well.  The most startling statistic I read about ADHD stated:  America prescribes more than 80% of the stimulant medications for ADHD. 

I'll be honest, I love junk food, in fact a bag of chips and a candy bar are more appealing to me than most any pie or cake that I've eaten.  I've craved salt most of my life and now that I have blood pressure issues, chips are the exception for me.  When I do buy them for guests, I can devour what's left in the bag in one sitting.

Both of my adult children have adopted more healthy eating habits and that has also been on my mind lately.  There are so many factors involved when considering a major shift in diet.  Do I need to exclude gluten like some experts claim or is it enough to begin eating "clean" which seems to mean avoiding all processed foods.   I happily discovered on a Prevention website that clean eating doesn't require avoidance of all packaged products but it does require a close examination of labels.  I might be better off to avoid the packaged foods altogether but it helps to have some quick options available. I think most all of these packaged options will include gluten.  I tend to grab a freezer meal more often than I cook so this would be a major shift for me.  I did find a website, Skinny Mom's Kitchen, that has some great ideas for homemade freezer meals

Well for now, I have some research to do as I decide to focus on eating clean or go a bit further and go gluten free.