My six year old rarely sits still. It’s typical for him to be rocking in his seat, jumping on furniture, or just fidgeting. I didn’t believe in ADHD before he came along. I always believed it was just a label that society slapped on people who didn’t conform – people who learned and behaved differently. I thought of it more as a personality type than a disorder. I’m ADD too (without the H) according to a shrink I saw 15 years ago. She put me on meds for a time, but I didn’t notice any difference. I went off them and continued on with my life.

My son’s behaviour over the past 3-4 years has caused me to revisit the issue of ADHD. He’s impulsive, distracted, hyper, loud, talkative, and frequently gets in trouble at school. Not because he’s trying to be difficult. He really can’t control his impulses. He’s made a believer out of me.

Despite all this, I still found his behaviour tonite to be somewhat unusual. He kept spinning around and around the living room floor while my husband was reading to him and his brother. He’d spin like a dozen times, sit down next to his Dad and look at the pictures for a moment, then twirl back out and repeat the process. I was even compelled to pull out my phone and make a video of it. Then he started running laps through our kitchen and living room, all the while making growling noises. And at bed time he kept talking to himself out loud (where he usually keeps trying to talk to me). Fortunately he fell asleep quickly.

But as I sat down to watch some TV and write my daily blog post, I found myself trying to find a reason for tonite’s hyperactivity. And my thoughts turned to food.

I originally suspected food dyes as being problematic as I once thought that there were issues with MMM’s But the reactions have been inconsistent enough that I haven’t banned them and am not convinced they are the problem. He did have some about 30 minutes before dinner from his Halloween stash, but it wasn’t a large quantity.

So, I got online to research what other foods could cause reactions. I was very disturbed to find out about a category of foods called Salicylates, which includes most of the fruits that he eats. And the riper, the more concentrated. He did have some very ripe strawberries tonight with his dinner.

I’m hoping this is not the culprit. His diet is so limited already. I’d hate to remove the majority of healthy foods that he eats. However it’s looking like I will need to keep an eye on this and possibly do some food challenges.

Oh. Joy.