Paleo for kids

Kids today, am I right? Are they overactive, over-entitled, and do they spend too much time playing video games? Or are they overdiagnosed, overmedicated, and do they spend too little time eating good foods or playing outside?

There's a lot to complain about if you’re a parent or a teacher, or even a kid, but there are a lot of amazing things relating to the Paleo diet when it comes to children. Using the basic principles of a Paleo diet and lifestyle can be tremendously helpful when dealing with particularly nasty modern conditions like autism, diabetes, ADHD, and asthma. 

All these maladies seem to benefit from a basic or slightly modified Paleo approach.

The Guts of the Matter What we put in our bodies is extremely important, as detailed in the Nutrition Pillar. When we consume foods like grains, legumes, and dairy products, our digestive tract tends to weaken and inflame. An inflamed gut leaves the body more susceptible to things like colds and the flu, but it also creates an environment that is constantly inflamed and on red alert.

Constant inflammation is never a good thing, but elimination diets often are. Research has long shown that a gluten- (grains) and casein- (dairy) free diet can dramatically improve symptoms and dangerous behaviours in autistic children, and is often recommended to parents.

Asthmatics and seasonal allergy sufferers often report having their symptoms disappear after going Paleo. The removal of refined grains and sugars also keeps insulin levels consistent, which is huge for kids with diabetes or ADHD. Going Paleo isn’t just about what you can’t eat, though. It’s just as much about the bulk of the diet, which is quality animals and plants.

When meat, fish, fowl, eggs, veggies, tubers, nuts and fruits dominate the plate, it looks like the eater is on a powerful multivitamin that covers all of the nutritional bases. Far from missing out on essential vitamins and minerals, micronutrient measurements of a daily Paleo intake report amounts above and beyond the RDA estimates.

There is nothing a growing kid, pathologically ill or not, can’t get from a good Paleo approach. The bottom line is this: removing poisonous foods and adding real nutrition from the diet allows the gut to heal, which leads to a strong and balanced immune system.

A strong and balanced immune system is extremely important for growing kids. This is an issue that brings with it a ton of emotion. We all care about our kids, and we want to provide them with the best possible life.

We’ve got some fantastic tools these days, like the internet and the 7 Paleo Pillars, that make searching for and finding information easier. My wish is that the information you find also brings you hope.

Do some more research into what a Paleo approach can do for you and/or your kids. Google “[insert unfortunate malady here] and paleo diet.”

Let me know what you find.

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