Читать книгу They Are What You Feed Them: How Food Can Improve Your Child’s Behaviour, Mood and Learning - Dr Richardson Alex - Страница 32

‘What have I been doing wrong?’ is a question I’ve heard from countless parents—parents who care deeply about their child, and who have tried every which way to solve their child’s problems, and still not succeeded. Things have not been turning out as they hoped—and, like most parents, they are prepared to take more than their fair share of the responsibility. They have ‘tried everything’, following all the best advice they could get—and still things don’t seem to be working out.

You, like some of them, may have had no idea of the effects of a poor diet (nor indeed what really constitutes a poor diet) before now. Or you may have read up a great deal on the subject already, and cried ‘If only I’d known this before…’ Whatever the case may be, you need to focus on where you are now. What’s past is past: you need to let go of any feelings of guilt or anger towards yourself or ‘the establishment’, and use today as the starting point.

The most important things for you to focus on are the ones that you can most easily influence, govern and control. Those things really should include what you put into your own and your child’s mouth.

Although many other factors are also important, good nutrition is simply crucial to your child’s health, well-being and functioning. Your child’s eating habits are affecting his or her behaviour, learning and mood now, and they will continue to do so in the future. Please remember it took a long time to get to where you are, so don’t expect things to improve instantly. In some cases (for example, after excluding additives to which your child reacts badly) improvements can happen almost ‘overnight’. In most cases, however, the benefits from improving your child’s diet are far more likely to happen gradually. It may take weeks, months—or even years in very severe cases—but with a diet that actually suits your child, happen it will.