Red Dye 40 Intolerance in Children

My good friend Kelli at Stories of Natural Healing on Facebook, asked me to write about my experience with my daughters intolerance to the petroleum based food colorant Red Dye 40. 

I am not a medical professional or a nutritionist. I am just telling my story and relating my experiences with you, in hopes to get the word out that this stuff is bad for children and adults alike.

Since my daughter Allison began eating the “normal” foods kids of 2 and beyond are exposed to, her behavior change dramatically.  Every time we visited the doctor’s office I would mention some of the symptoms she was exhibiting and their suggestions were always the same: normal childhood behavior. At one time the nurse suggested giving her coffee to help her sleep (it would have the reverse affect and make her sleepy), we tried it, Allison threw up. My instinct was telling me this just isn’t normal. Always trust your instincts, they will never steer you wrong, and in this instance mine was spot on.

I started doing research on behavior problems and diet.  I just recently, fall of 2013, by some chance, discovered an article about red dye 40 and the affects it had on children. After reading, bells and whistles started going off. My daughter Allison had shown those same symptoms, symptoms we thought were linked to some behavioral problem, lack of discipline, too much sugar, or not enough sleep.

Her symptoms after eating any amount of the petroleum based food dye, found in most processed foods, include:

Sleeplessness

Confusion

Severe emotional melt downs

Combativeness and argumentative

We immediately stopped all red dye 40 intake. Cleaning out the cupboards of all the “bad” foods we replaced them with healthy alternatives and we started making a lot of her favorites from scratch. We started reading ALL labels carefully. Foods you would never suspect having a colorant added just might have it lurking in the ingredient list (even a brownie we purchased at the farmers market had it listed). From yogurt to chips, from chocolate to cake mix, it really is amazing how many “convenience foods” and foods that are geared towards children carry this harmful dye.

Since we nixed all red dye 40 from her diet we have seen a dramatic change in her mood. She is happy, bright, loving, focused, and her emotional melt downs are now the typical kind you expect from a 5 year old.

We did have one set back though. She ended up getting bronchitis a few weeks back and the medication* they put her on contained red dye 40. I really didn’t think much of it at the time, since it was prescribed by her doctor, but after the first dose of the stuff she was off the deep end with emotions, confusion, and sleeplessness. It was only after her father pointed out that it could be her medication that we really do have to watch EVERYTHING she eats or drinks and help guide her to make the healthy choices when she is at school or at a friend’s house.

I do have to note that I am really glad we discovered this intolerance before she was any older. I couldn’t even imagine what life would be like for her as she got older and we never had figured it out. What medications would she have been prescribed to help with her “mood swings”, would they have classified her as ADHD, would they have tried to prescribe her sleeping pills or some other useless drug that could have only worsened the problem? It is hard to say but, I am happy that we discovered that Red Dye 40 affected Allison in such a horrible way.

Maybe one of you reading this will discover your child or yourself are suffering from the same sort of symptoms. I hope that in some way it will guide you and your family into making a life changing decision to eat better, get rid of the processed foods, and discover the bounty of fresh and healthy local alternatives.

I know it has helped us really get back to basics with teaching the kids about organic gardening and where our food really comes from, making healthy choices when eating out, cooking foods we love to eat from scratch as a family, and best of all it has brought peace to our family, knowing we are making better choices for all of us and the emotional meltdowns and the fighting have all together stopped. She is now a very happy and content child all because we changed her diet.

last years colorful assorted veggies grown at Garden 118

*prescribed medication usually never has the ingredients listed so ask your pharmacist

Please leave a comment if you have any questions, or if you have suffered from similar experiences. I would love to hear from you.

And don't forget to check out Stories of Natural Healing on Facebook!