Home Forums Blogs Articles Photos Videos Contact FAQ

Feingold diet - Introduction

Feingold diet - Introduction: Encyclopedia II - Feingold diet - Introduction

Feingold strongly recommended that the hyperactive child help prepare the special foods and encouraged the entire family to participate in the dietary program. Parents are also advised to avoid certain over-the-counter and prescription drugs and to limit their purchases of mouthwash, toothpaste, cough drops, perfume, and various other nonfood products to those published in FAUS's annual "Food List and Shopping Guide." Feingold's followers now claim that asthma, bedwetting, ear infections, eye-muscle disorders, seizures, sleep disorder ...

Feingold diet: Encyclopedia II - Feingold diet - Introduction

Feingold diet - Introduction

Feingold's followers now claim that asthma, bedwetting, ear infections, eye-muscle disorders, seizures, sleep disorders, stomach aches, and a long list of other symptoms may respond to the Feingold program and that sensitivity to synthetic additives and/or salicylates may be a factor in antisocial traits, compulsive aggression, self-mutilation, difficulty in reasoning, stuttering, and exceptional clumsiness. The "Symptom Checklist" on the Feingold Association of the United States (FAUS) web site includes many additional problems.

Current recommendations advise a two-stage plan that begins by eliminating artificial colors and flavors; the antixoidants BHA, BHT, and TBHQ; aspirin-containing products; and foods containing natural salicylates. If improvement occurs for four to six weeks, certain foods can be "carefully reintroduced" one at a time^[1]. However, the Feingold Cookbook (published in 1979 and distributed for many years) warns:

A successful response to the diet depends on 100 percent compliance. The slightest infraction can lead to failure: a single bite or drink can cause an undesirable response that may persist for seventy-two hours or more^[2].

Many parents who have followed Feingold's recommendations have reported improvement in their children's behavior. FAUS, which has local chapters throughout the country, claims that fidgetiness, poor sleeping habits, short attention span, self-mutilation, antisocial traits, muscle incoordination, memory deficits, asthma, bedwetting, headaches, hives, seizures, and many other problems may respond to the Feingold program^[3]. However, carefully designed experiments fail to support the idea that additives are responsible for such symptoms in the vast majority of children. Most improvement, if any occurs, appears related to changes in family dynamics, such as paying more attention to the children. Experts have also noted that the foods recommended in Feingold's 1975 book Why Your Child Is Hyperactive^[4] included some that were high in salicylates and excluded others that were low in salicylates.