Cleansing for Kids

[widemouthedfrog]

Hi,

My daughter is entering grade one this year, and although we eat a mostly organic whole food diet, I sometimes allow her to eat things that are not the best food choices. For example, yesterday she went to a birthday party and she ate cake with bright pink icing (yum!).

I allow her to eat these things because I think that a little bit of give on the nutrition front will make her less desperate to eat these things all of the time. We talk a fair bit about what she needs to eat to make her body healthy. I am relatively comfortable with our diet the way it is.

However, after a binge of something like pink cake icing, I feel like I need to boost her body with something wholesome. Any suggestions for what this could be? Green juice? Vitamin C? I want her to be able to process the nasties in this food.

Thoughts?

[Cupressa]

I think cleansing is not appropriate for children this young, at least the way we usually think of it. If she normally eats a healthy diet, her body should be able to process occasional junk with ease.

Did she actually "binge" on the pink icing, or did she just have a piece of cake with it? If it was the latter, then her normal diet should be the "wholesome" counterpoint to that. If she "binged", you may need to reevaluate how sufficient her diet is. Children need a lot of healthy fat, and if she isn't getting enough, she may crave high-fat foods like icing. Or, if she already has a carbohydrate heavy diet, she may be having some blood sugar swings that contribute to the desire to eat too many sweets.

I would definitely offer green juice and other high micro-nutrient foods, but also protein and fat. She may be having a growth spurt!