November 5, 2023 • 29 mins
Navigating the murky waters of food dyes and their potential impact on children's behavior can be overwhelming. It's a topic that has puzzled scientists and parents alike, stirring up a sea of mixed research and inconclusive results. As a mother of neurodivergent children, I've walked this path, wrestling with research studies, and trying to make sense of it all. I've been sharing my personal journey and learnings about food dyes, guiding you on how to critically analyze these studies, and helping you draw your own conclusions.
In the midst of these perplexing questions, I emphasize the importance of safeguarding our children's relationship with food and maintaining a holistic perspective on their health. Join me in this conversation, where we lift the veil of shame associated with food, and aim to foster a healthy, responsible approach to eating.
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Questions about today's episode or do you have topic requests for future episodes? Please send your feedback via email to hello@crystalkarges.com or connect with Crystal on Instagram.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey there, mama, you're listening to the Lift the
Shame podcast.
I'm your host, crystal, mama ofFive and your family's
intuitive eating dietitian, hereto help you cut through the
diet culture clutter so you canenjoy feeding with food as a
family.
I'm on a mission to help youend the generational legacy of
diet culture in your home so youcan experience motherhood free
(00:22):
from food guilt and body shame.
Listen in weekly for guidanceon how you can ditch diet
culture, heal your relationshipwith food in your body and
confidently raise intuitiveeaters.
Let's dive in and lift theshame together.
Hey Mama, welcome back to theshow.
When this episode airs it willbe about a week post-Halloween,
(00:43):
so I'm hoping that everythingwent smoothly in your home.
I'm always eager to hear howthings go with the Halloween
candy situation, so if you haveany updates you'd like to share,
you can always connect with mevia email or Instagram.
I'd love to hear from you.
And one question that has comeup quite frequently is related
to this idea of the additives orfood coloring that's often in
(01:05):
the candy and sweets that ourkids may be consuming, and, as
we are rounding out this miniseries on kids and sweets, I
thought I would briefly addressthis in today's episode.
I just want to preface thisconversation by saying that I
realized this is a very nuancedtopic.
There's a lot of controversyaround it, and what I'm sharing
is simply just my opinion andalso just my lived experience as
(01:30):
a mother raising neurodivergentchildren, and so I also just
want to acknowledge that this isa very broad topic and I'm just
giving a bird's eye view of itin today's episode.
But if this is something thatinterests you and if you would
like to hear more informationabout it, please let me know.
I'd be happy to do a deeperdive and maybe do a part two
(01:51):
follow up on this.
But generally the questions thatI've been hearing more recently
, especially leading up toHalloween, is this idea that you
may feel okay with your childconsuming sugar.
Maybe that's not the thing thatyou're worried about.
Maybe what you're worried aboutis the additives or food
coloring, food dyes that are inthe sweets that your kids might
be consuming, and so I thought Iwould address that, because
(02:14):
there can be so much fearmongering around specific
ingredients in the foods thatour kids like and the foods that
our kids want to eat, andsometimes that can be inhibiting
us from allowing them thepermission that they need to
access these foods or to feellike they can normalize eating
these things, and this issomething I've dealt with
personally with my own kids.
(02:34):
I have two ADHD years and it'sinteresting to see the foods
that they gravitate towards andto understand if this idea of
food dyes in particular havingany impact on behavior is valid.
And this is where I think itcomes down to you.
I do really believe that it isan individual situation, and
(02:55):
this is why I think it's veryimportant that we learn our own
kids that we understand whatworks for them, what doesn't,
when it comes to eating routines, schedules, types of foods,
especially for something thathas a lot of nuance like food
dyes.
Maybe your child doesn'tnecessarily have an allergy or
intolerance, but maybe younotice certain behavioral
changes when they're consumingcertain foods versus others.
(03:17):
And this is where I just wantto clear out some of the clutter
for you, because there's also alot of mixed messages, not just
around additives and food dyesin our food and the things that
our children in particular mightbe consuming, but also around
sweets too.
There is a lot of fear mongeringagain, or myths circulating
that sugar causes hyperactivityin our children, and that has
(03:40):
largely been debunked, and Iwill actually include a blog
post for you if you'reinterested in reading more about
this as well as some of theresearch behind it, because this
idea that if our kids eat sugar, it's just going to cause them
to become hyper can become anissue if it prevents us from
allowing our kids access tofoods that they enjoy, which,
(04:01):
again, if we're restricting whatour children have access to,
that can be backfire andactually cause them to become
more obsessive about some ofthese foods that they're
gravitating towards so alongthat.
I also see this with the fooddyes and I'm going to focus
mostly on that for today'sepisode.
I know there's a lot of otheringredients that are in question
(04:22):
in the food industry, but fortoday's episode I just want to
focus on the food dyes inparticular.
Now, when it comes to theresearch that we've seen about
this, ultimately the research isvery inconclusive.
There is not enough scientificevidence that has warranted
changes in the regulation offood dyes and additives in the
(04:44):
food that we have access totoday by the FDA, and there are
certain controversies andlimitations of the research that
has been done on this topic.
So one thing to note forstudies that have shown some
evidence linking food dyes withbehavioral changes in children.
There are pretty significantlimitations to the research
(05:06):
studies that we have seen withthat, and that's something that
I wanted to just briefly talkthrough today, because a lot of
people can throw that out there,like this study showed this or
this study showed that, and Ithink it's really important that
we learn how to analyzeinformation, because it's really
easy to just take what peoplesay out word without
understanding what was thestructure of the study, what was
(05:27):
the design of the study?
What was the evidence behind it?
Were there any biases?
Potentially?
These are things that areimportant before we just take
away conclusions that maybe arenot clear or specific to that
study.
And this is something I've seena lot with food dyes and links
to hyperactivity, where peoplecan just throw that out there,
(05:49):
like studies have shown thatthere is a connection, and there
have been some studies thathave shown a statistically
significant increase inhyperactivity in some children
who were given food dyes.
However, when we look at thedesign of the study itself, we
see that there are manylimitations that can make some
of their conclusions problematic.
(06:11):
Some of these things includethings like the study design or
the sample size was pretty smalland a very small portion of the
general population.
These studies that have lookedat this connection typically
also use a mixture of artificialcolorings, which makes it
difficult to determine if thereis a specific coloring or
(06:32):
combination of additives thatmight be responsible for
observed effects, so that canmake it challenging to draw any
definitive conclusions.
There also is some ethicalconcerns in these studies in
which a mixture of additives wasgiven to young children, and
even in a controlled study, thismight not, and usually doesn't,
reflect typical dietarypatterns, meaning when this is
(06:55):
being looked at in a scientificstudy, they're usually giving a
higher quantity and concentratedquantity of food dyes to the
children who are being observedin this study, when that is not,
again, what we would typicallysee.
When a child's eating foodsthat has food dyes in it, it's
not like our kids are justdrinking food dyes, and this is
(07:17):
essentially one of the biglimitations that we see in these
studies is that it's notreflective of a typical eating
pattern, and that is a big pointto understand, because
typically when our kids areconsuming sweets or other things
that have food coloring in it,it's a very minimal amount
compared to what we're seeinggiven to these kids in these
studies.
(07:37):
The other thing to note is thatattempts to replicate these
studies findings have producedmixed results, so some support a
link between food additives andhyperactivity, while others do
not.
So this has been somethingthat's been very difficult to
replicate in the scientificcommunity, which makes it
difficult to draw any conclusiveevidence from this research.
(08:00):
There's not enough strongevidence to warrant, again,
changes in how food additivesare regulated by the FDA,
specifically here for the UnitedStates.
So what can we as parents dowith this information?
Because it isn't conclusive.
There's so much clutter outthere when it comes to this
topic.
There's a lot of controversyaround it, both in the
(08:21):
scientific community and in thegeneral population.
There's a lot ofmisunderstanding around it, and
I think this can make it reallychallenging as a parent when
you're navigating this with yourchild.
On one hand, you want yourchild to have a great
relationship with all foods.
You want to normalize sweetsfor them.
You want them to be able toself-regulate and not have any
of these foods up on a pedestal.
(08:41):
On the other hand, you may belegitimately concerned about
some of the ingredients that arein the foods that your child
might be consuming, and I getthat, especially as a parent
who's raising ADHDers, I feelthat too, where there is so much
confusion around this topic, itcan be hard to know what is the
best thing to do for my child,and this is where I just want to
(09:03):
give you some encouragement andalso help you to just see the
bigger picture at hand, and Ithink the best way to do this is
just to share from my ownpersonal experience with my
children.
So my ADHDers are.
I have a daughter who iscurrently 11, almost 12, and
then my son who's seven, andthey both are ADHDers.
And it's interesting because Ihave seen potential effects of
(09:27):
food dies in different ways anddifferent scenarios with them,
where my older daughter seems tobe largely unaffected by them,
whereas my younger son does seemto have some effect on him and
on his behavior and the way thatI found this out.
And I want to share this littlestory with you and again, this
is just from my own personalexperience, but when my son was
(09:48):
five, we were at a familybarbecue and there was a lot of
food out on tables, drinks, and,you know, the kids just had
free access to everything thatwas out there.
There's ton of food, sweets, alot of different things
happening at the time, and Ijust remember trying to help my
son with something at one pointand he was literally melting
(10:09):
down.
He was struggling, he wasscreaming, crying, just really
acting out of the norm, and Icouldn't understand it.
He wasn't sleep deprived, hehadn't missed a nap or anything,
he was off of naps.
Everything just seemed veryabnormal and I was trying to
rack my brain like what ishappening here.
His behavior seemed veryabnormal to me and,
(10:30):
interestingly, I saw that he wasdrinking cupfuls of a drink
that was kind of like in a bigpitcher on a table and I just
assumed that it was pinklemonade and I didn't really
know what it was at the time.
And I noticed that he had goneback several times to fill up
this huge red solo cup of thispink lemonade and which is
(10:51):
guzzling it down.
And finally I figured out thatwhat was in that huge pitcher
was actually crystal light andnot just regular pink lemonade.
And that kind of cued me inthat maybe he is reacting to
something that he's consumingfrom there, because, as we know,
crystal light is an artificialdrink.
(11:14):
It doesn't have real sugar, butit has plenty of other
ingredients to make it tastesweet as well as to make it look
pink, because this was pinklemonade.
And I just had a moment ofthought where I wondered is he
reacting to the high volume offood dyes that he's consuming in
(11:34):
this drink?
Because he was drinking so muchof it like he kept going back
and back, and at the time it wasjust a hypothesis, because we
typically don't drink thingslike crystal light or any type
of like diet sodas.
We usually just drink realstuff, like real lemonade, and
he really hadn't had a lot ofexposure to those types of
artificial drinks before.
(11:55):
So I just started to maybe putsome connections together,
thinking that maybe this hassomething to do with it.
And it wasn't something thatrigidly changed how I approached
food with my kids in any way.
I just became a little morecognizant of the fact that he
seemed to be more sensitivebehaviorally to food dies in
(12:16):
food, and I also just want topoint out that it wasn't the
norm that he would drinksomething like that, especially
in the quantities that he wasdrinking, and this is part of
the novelty of foods that ourkids are exposed to.
Maybe they're not seeing thosethings in our home, but when
they're seeing them outside inother places, it becomes
exciting and they want to have alot of it because they've never
(12:36):
really accessed that before.
And again, it wasn't that henever had lemonade or pink
lemonade before, but it was adrink that he enjoyed and he had
free access to it and he wasgoing back cup after cup after
cup and I honestly don't reallyknow how many cups that he ended
up drinking of that.
But I definitely noticed aeffect on him behaviorally,
where he seemed to really reallystruggle.
(12:56):
There was a lot ofdysregulation, emotional
dysregulation.
It really just felt or appearedlike he had no control over his
body and at that point I cuthim off from the crystal light
pink lemonade because I justfelt like this was having
somewhat of effect on him.
And, moving forward, it wasjust something that was in the
back of my mind.
Is he more sensitive to fooddies at this age?
(13:19):
And given just him being aneurodivergent child?
This is what's hard as parentsis that oftentimes we're just
navigating this on our ownwithout any conclusive evidence.
We're just observing what weknow of our own children.
And what's interesting is, onthe other hand, my older
daughter, who is an ADHD as well, did not appear to have the
same effect, and this is why Ido think it's important to look
(13:40):
at our children individually,because what affects one child
may not affect another child,and that's why I don't think we
can just lump all kids intogether and say all kids are
going to be negatively affectedbehaviorally by consuming food
dies.
I also think the quantity isimportant too, because, again,
my son was consuming a very,very large quantity of this
(14:02):
crystal light, and that is notsomething that is a typical
eating pattern for him, but itwas something that I just kept
in my mind, and we have beenmaking an effort to buy food and
ingredients that generally aredie free.
Now, that is not to say that wedon't also buy other foods that
do have food dye in them aswell.
(14:24):
We are definitely incorporatingmany different things in the
rotation here in our home, andone thing that I have found that
has worked well isincorporating sweets and
different things that they enjoyand having things available to
them on the regular that tend tobe die free.
We do a lot of grocery shoppingat Trader Joe's and they have a
(14:45):
ton of amazing candy optionsthat are free of food dye and
food coloring, and so those arethings that we tend to stock up
on more regularly and I justhave found that they're very
satiating, they taste great andmy kids enjoy them, and
especially for my son, who's nowseven.
He seems to do better withthose being the things that he's
having more frequently and moreirregularly.
(15:07):
But again, this is not to saythat we have a hard line in the
sand and aren't alsoincorporating other things, and
this is where I think, asparents, we have to be very
careful about how we'renavigating this.
And as an example, on Halloweenmy kids got so much candy I mean
so much candy we had them dumpit out at the end of the night
and it was like the entire floorwas covered with candy.
(15:30):
And what's funny is that my sonactually prefers over all the
candies that he likes.
His favorite candies areSkittles, any type of gummies,
and red vines and red licorice,and those are like his favorite
things.
And I just think it's kind offunny because those are the
candies that naturally will havemore of the food dyes in them.
(15:51):
He's not a chocolate kiddo.
He literally separated out allhis candy and just put all the
chocolates into our likecommunal family candy bowl and
he was like I don't want those,I just want these and that is
okay.
And I knew that it will be moreharmful to him and to his
relationship with food if I'mtoo rigid with the candy that he
(16:14):
has access to.
He got access to that candy.
He went trick-or-treating, hewas super pumped and excited
about all the candy that he gotand I know that, as a parent, if
I were to take those thingsaway from him, that rigidity
will actually make him becomemore obsessive with those
candies.
And so he gets to keep allthose candies and he's eating
(16:34):
them and enjoying them and he'sokay, he's fine.
Nothing outrageous is happening, he's not melting down, he's
doing great.
And we let our kids have theirHalloween candy pretty
frequently in the days followingHalloween, where they get to
have some with their meals andtheir snacks.
It's in the rotation, so he'seating a good variety of candy
and eating it pretty frequently.
(16:54):
At this point Now, I tell thisstory because I think it's so
important that, as parents, thatwe assess what are the pros and
cons of allowing our kids tohave these foods with
ingredients that we might beconcerned are affecting them,
versus restricting their accessto these foods, and it's very
easy to be consumed by thequality of ingredients that our
(17:16):
children are consuming andeating.
And this is where, especiallyif you're a parent who's
recovering from an eatingdisorder, you need to be careful
about that line that you'rewalking, because it's easy to
adapt this orthorexic type oftendency and how we feed our
kids, where we become soconcerned about the quality of
ingredients that they're eatingthat we have a short-sighted
(17:38):
view of what is necessary forthem to develop a positive and
trusting relationship with food,because the more of a big deal
we make out of certainingredients or foods or candies,
the more of a big deal theywill become in our child's mind.
And this is why I think there'snot a clear, one-size-fits
approach for this issue withfood dyes and sweets and our
(18:00):
children and their behavior, andespecially neurodivergent
children who could potentiallybe a little more susceptible to
some of the effects of theseadditives or food dyes.
I also just think it's reallyimportant to clarify and say
that neurodivergent conditions,so like ADHD or autism, these
are neurodevelopmentalconditions.
(18:22):
These are not caused by eatingcertain foods or having certain
ingredients incorporated intoour diet or our children's diet,
and I think this is one of themost misinformed myths about
food dyes and additives.
That is constantly perpetuatedand this creates so much stigma
around neurodivergent families.
Because, again, theseconditions are
(18:45):
neurodevelopmental.
They are largely andpredominantly influenced by
genetics and biological factors,and for us to perpetuate and by
us I mean diet culture at largeto perpetuate this idea that we
are causing our kids to haveautism or ADHD because we're
allowing them to have food withfood dyes is so misleading and
(19:07):
it's very harmful toneurodivergent families.
There is not a causative effectbetween consuming food dyes and
food additives andneurodevelopmental conditions
like ADHD and autism.
This is something that I thinkis really important and I feel
very passionate aboutchallenging this stigma because
I understand the effects of itfirsthand.
I do also understand to theimportance of validating what
(19:30):
you, as a parent, are observingin your child, because I think
sometimes it can feel like it'ssuch a black and white issue and
it's either you allow them oryou don't, and I think that
polarizing way of approachingthese types of issues creates
rigidity around food in itself,which makes food way more
complicated and chaotic than itneeds to be, and that's where we
(19:51):
start to develop food rules andour kids pick up on that and
that can now complicate theirrelationship with food.
So I always think it'simportant to approach these
issues with a lot of nuance andto explore the gray areas and I
don't think it's all or nothingor black and white and I think
it's important that you feelvalidated as a parent around any
potential observations thatyou're noticing with your child
(20:13):
and this is something I've seenanecdotally too with families
that I've worked with, some whonotice that their kids largely
seem unaffected by the food thatthey're eating, whereas others
seem to notice a directcorrelation between my child
eats this type of food and itreally affects their behavior or
their emotional state, and I dothink it's important that you
feel validated as a parent withwhat you're observing.
(20:34):
I also just want to say, as aword of caution, that sometimes
we have this like self fulfilledprophecy, where we are looking
for evidence to support a claimin our mind that we already
believe and there's actuallybeen studies that have shown
that that this was a study thatwas done on analyzing the
effects of sugar and behavior onchildren actually, and they
(20:56):
were looking at how parentsactually observed their children
after consuming a sugarybeverage.
But what was interesting is thatthe researchers kind of tricked
the parents and told theparents that their kids had
ingested a sugary beverage.
And then they wanted theparents to observe the child's
behavior.
And what was interesting is, inreality it was just the placebo
(21:19):
.
The researchers didn't give thekids a sugary beverage, they
just gave them I don't knowwater or sparkling water or
something like that, that didn'thave any added sugar in it.
And what was interesting wasthe parents.
Many of the parents reportedobserving that their child
seemed more hyperactive afterhaving a sugary beverage.
So the reason I tell you thisstudy and I think it's
(21:40):
interesting is because there issometimes a self fulfilling
prophecy where we are lookingfor evidence in our kids to
support a belief about ourchildren that we already have,
where it's like I think or Ibelieve that my child will be
hyperactive after they have thisor eat that, and then we're
looking for evidence to supportthat.
That's why these studies can bevery difficult, because there
(22:02):
is a subjective measure which isalways harder.
It's not this hard objectivecriteria.
A lot of it has to do with whatare we observing, and that's
why I think it's alwaysimportant to have an open mind
and consider the differentthings your child is exposed to
and how it might be affectingthem, and also this for children
as they get older being able tohave those conversations with
(22:23):
them where we can ask those selfreflective questions like, well
, how do you feel after havingthis?
How does that make you feel?
And these are things that I'mstarting to explore with my
older daughter, as she is anADHD error and we talk about
like, how do you feel after youhave this or eat that?
And is it difficult for you tofocus?
Are you having more symptomaticbehaviors, and not just with
(22:44):
food, but with many other things?
Food tends to be the culpritthat we put all the blame on,
but we have to remember that ourkids are not living in a vacuum
.
There's so many different otherfactors that can be also
influencing their behavior,their emotional state and all of
those things.
So what is the bottom line?
What is the takeaway?
I know I'm not really givingany conclusive evidence here,
(23:05):
and again, that is because thissubject doesn't have any
conclusive really takeaways atthis point.
What I think is important hereis keeping your eye on the big
picture at hand.
If you, as a parent, arefeeling stressed or obsessive
about the quality of food thatyour child is eating.
If you are feeling so stressedabout them, potentially eating
(23:27):
ingredients that feelquestionable to you, such as
food dyes or additives, thatstress is far worse for your
health and for your child'shealth than literally anything
your child can eat, and this iswhy I think we have to have this
big picture of you in mind,because we'd like to make it all
about the food Eat that don'teat.
This.
We have to remember that we'reliving in a world where all of
(23:49):
these foods exist and we cangatekeep all we want in our own
home and prevent our childrenfrom having access to certain
foods that include ingredientsthat feel questionable to us.
But the older they get and themore exposure they have to the
food, the more they get to thefood, to the world, they will
have more exposure to thesefoods in different shapes and
forms.
They're going to go to afriend's house or a birthday
(24:09):
party.
They're going to grow up and goto college and be able to buy
their own food.
They will be able to buy thingsthat we maybe never let them
have access to, and it will beharder for them to learn how to
regulate and eat these foods ifthey've never had the
opportunity, and this is why Ithink it's important that we
keep that big picture of you inmind.
That doesn't mean that you can'tinclude foods in your home Like
(24:32):
, for example, maybe it's yourpreference to buy candies that
don't have food dyes in them,and those are the things that
are largely in the rotation inyour home.
However, if your child does getaccess to those foods or is
showing interest in having thosefoods you know they saw
so-and-so at school, having afruit roll up, and now they're
all excited and they want to trythat and they're asking about
it and they're showing that highinterest.
(24:53):
That's where it's importantthat we are responsive to what
our kids are showing us and wecan find ways to tangibly and
proactively incorporate thosethings in our home so that our
child feels that they'reaccessible and doesn't now put
those foods or those candies upon a pedestal.
These are important things tokeep in mind.
We want to think about thelong-term goals.
(25:15):
We want our children to be ableto self-regulate, to have a
positive relationship with allfoods and to not feel like
certain things are inaccessibleor now they're internalizing
this belief or this message thatthese foods are bad, when those
things are becoming part oftheir eating experiences and the
rhetoric that they're buildingaround food.
They start to formulate guiltand shame around eating, and it
(25:38):
can create a damaging effect ontheir relationship with food
over the long term.
So, again, keeping the bigpicture in mind, what are the
things that you're keeping inthe rotation in your home?
What is your response to yourchild having exposure to some of
the foods or candies or sweetsor ingredients that maybe you
don't feel comfortable with, andhow can you find a middle
(26:00):
ground where you can beresponsive to the things that
your child is showing aninterest, while also being
supportive of their overallhealth and wellness?
I know it can be hard and Ihope this just gives you some
food for thought or some thingsto think about as you're
navigating this with your ownchildren.
This does tend to come uppost-Halloween a lot, which is
why I wanted to just touch onthis subject and again, as you
(26:21):
can see and are hearing, there'sa lot of nuance here and a lot
of other things that we canexplore.
So I'd love to hear from youand just hear.
What are your questions, whatare your concerns, what are
things that you're observing?
Ultimately, we want our childrento know that they are safe to
consume a variety of foodsunless they're allergic to
something right.
That's a different subject, butwe don't want our children to
(26:42):
internalize guilt or shame fromour projected fears that may be
coming out in our feedinginteractions with our children.
I know it can be hard topost-Halloween when our kids
have a large volume of candythat is not the norm for them
and they might be getting accessto a variety of different
candies that they don'tfrequently see, which can give
us some good data to work with.
Where do I need to potentiallyexpose my child or allow them to
(27:05):
have access to things that theydo enjoy but that I don't
regularly keep in my home?
This is a good point ofself-examination, self-awareness
, self-exploration to reallyassess how you're approaching
food and ask yourself am Igatekeeping something for my
child because I'm fearful ofthem eating that or how that
might affect them?
We want to remember that theeffects of restricting or
(27:29):
controlling feeding tactics areultimately more harmful for your
child's health than literallyanything they can consume.
That is definitely kind of abig picture takeaway that I do
want you to have, because it'sso easy to get consumed in all
this fear-mongering, messagingaround food dyes or additives or
all these inquestibleingredients, but we conveniently
(27:52):
gloss over the damaging effectsof kids feeling restricted or
controlling feeding tactics, andthe impact of that on our kids
and how they feel about food.
Again, that is more damaging, Iwould argue, to their overall
health and wellness thanallowing them to have access to
the foods that they do enjoy and, again, finding ways to
(28:12):
incorporate that in your homethat fits for your family.
I know.
For me, one thing that I justbecame more aware of, especially
after this Halloween, was theSkittle situation.
My son loves Skittles, and Idon't think I've been as
intentional about incorporatingjust plain old Skittles in our
house, and I definitely want tomake more of an effort to do
that, because I see how much heenjoys them, and he loves having
(28:34):
a pack of Skittles to throw inhis lunchbox and being able to
eat that food without any guiltor shame.
That is what I want for him,and so it was really helpful for
me to reflect on that throughthis past Halloween experience,
and I hope you've been able todo the same too, because, oh, my
friend, there is so much fearmongering information, and I
don't want you to be bogged downwith it.
I want you to be able to enjoyfood as a family free from all
(28:58):
this guilt and shame that sooften comes with the rhetoric
and messages out there that dietculture is just perpetuating
about food.
So I hope this gave you somefood for thought and just some
encouragement.
Again, I would love to hear fromyou if you want me to touch on
this subject in a deeper matter,if you want us to go on a deep
dive or revisit this and do apart two.
Let me know your thoughts andwe'll see if we can give you
(29:20):
some more resources andinformation around this.
But, as always, I just soappreciate you being here and
part of this community.
I am sending you so much loveand I cannot wait to connect
with you again next week.
Thank you for listening to thisweek's episode of the Lift the
Shame podcast.
For more tips and guidance onyour mother-her journey, come
connect with me on Instagram atCrystal Cargays.
(29:40):
Until next week, mama, I'll becheering you on.
Bye for now.
Hey there, mama, you're listening to the Lift the
Shame podcast.
I'm your host, crystal, mama ofFive and your family's
intuitive eating dietitian, hereto help you cut through the
diet culture clutter so you canenjoy feeding with food as a
family.
I'm on a mission to help youend the generational legacy of
diet culture in your home so youcan experience motherhood free
(00:22):
from food guilt and body shame.
Listen in weekly for guidanceon how you can ditch diet
culture, heal your relationshipwith food in your body and
confidently raise intuitiveeaters.
Let's dive in and lift theshame together.
Hey Mama, welcome back to theshow.
When this episode airs it willbe about a week post-Halloween,
(00:43):
so I'm hoping that everythingwent smoothly in your home.
I'm always eager to hear howthings go with the Halloween
candy situation, so if you haveany updates you'd like to share,
you can always connect with mevia email or Instagram.
I'd love to hear from you.
And one question that has comeup quite frequently is related
to this idea of the additives orfood coloring that's often in
(01:05):
the candy and sweets that ourkids may be consuming, and, as
we are rounding out this miniseries on kids and sweets, I
thought I would briefly addressthis in today's episode.
I just want to preface thisconversation by saying that I
realized this is a very nuancedtopic.
There's a lot of controversyaround it, and what I'm sharing
is simply just my opinion andalso just my lived experience as
(01:30):
a mother raising neurodivergentchildren, and so I also just
want to acknowledge that this isa very broad topic and I'm just
giving a bird's eye view of itin today's episode.
But if this is something thatinterests you and if you would
like to hear more informationabout it, please let me know.
I'd be happy to do a deeperdive and maybe do a part two
(01:51):
follow up on this.
But generally the questions thatI've been hearing more recently
, especially leading up toHalloween, is this idea that you
may feel okay with your childconsuming sugar.
Maybe that's not the thing thatyou're worried about.
Maybe what you're worried aboutis the additives or food
coloring, food dyes that are inthe sweets that your kids might
be consuming, and so I thought Iwould address that, because
(02:14):
there can be so much fearmongering around specific
ingredients in the foods thatour kids like and the foods that
our kids want to eat, andsometimes that can be inhibiting
us from allowing them thepermission that they need to
access these foods or to feellike they can normalize eating
these things, and this issomething I've dealt with
personally with my own kids.
(02:34):
I have two ADHD years and it'sinteresting to see the foods
that they gravitate towards andto understand if this idea of
food dyes in particular havingany impact on behavior is valid.
And this is where I think itcomes down to you.
I do really believe that it isan individual situation, and
(02:55):
this is why I think it's veryimportant that we learn our own
kids that we understand whatworks for them, what doesn't,
when it comes to eating routines, schedules, types of foods,
especially for something thathas a lot of nuance like food
dyes.
Maybe your child doesn'tnecessarily have an allergy or
intolerance, but maybe younotice certain behavioral
changes when they're consumingcertain foods versus others.
(03:17):
And this is where I just wantto clear out some of the clutter
for you, because there's also alot of mixed messages, not just
around additives and food dyesin our food and the things that
our children in particular mightbe consuming, but also around
sweets too.
There is a lot of fear mongeringagain, or myths circulating
that sugar causes hyperactivityin our children, and that has
(03:40):
largely been debunked, and Iwill actually include a blog
post for you if you'reinterested in reading more about
this as well as some of theresearch behind it, because this
idea that if our kids eat sugar, it's just going to cause them
to become hyper can become anissue if it prevents us from
allowing our kids access tofoods that they enjoy, which,
(04:01):
again, if we're restricting whatour children have access to,
that can be backfire andactually cause them to become
more obsessive about some ofthese foods that they're
gravitating towards so alongthat.
I also see this with the fooddyes and I'm going to focus
mostly on that for today'sepisode.
I know there's a lot of otheringredients that are in question
(04:22):
in the food industry, but fortoday's episode I just want to
focus on the food dyes inparticular.
Now, when it comes to theresearch that we've seen about
this, ultimately the research isvery inconclusive.
There is not enough scientificevidence that has warranted
changes in the regulation offood dyes and additives in the
(04:44):
food that we have access totoday by the FDA, and there are
certain controversies andlimitations of the research that
has been done on this topic.
So one thing to note forstudies that have shown some
evidence linking food dyes withbehavioral changes in children.
There are pretty significantlimitations to the research
(05:06):
studies that we have seen withthat, and that's something that
I wanted to just briefly talkthrough today, because a lot of
people can throw that out there,like this study showed this or
this study showed that, and Ithink it's really important that
we learn how to analyzeinformation, because it's really
easy to just take what peoplesay out word without
understanding what was thestructure of the study, what was
(05:27):
the design of the study?
What was the evidence behind it?
Were there any biases?
Potentially?
These are things that areimportant before we just take
away conclusions that maybe arenot clear or specific to that
study.
And this is something I've seena lot with food dyes and links
to hyperactivity, where peoplecan just throw that out there,
(05:49):
like studies have shown thatthere is a connection, and there
have been some studies thathave shown a statistically
significant increase inhyperactivity in some children
who were given food dyes.
However, when we look at thedesign of the study itself, we
see that there are manylimitations that can make some
of their conclusions problematic.
(06:11):
Some of these things includethings like the study design or
the sample size was pretty smalland a very small portion of the
general population.
These studies that have lookedat this connection typically
also use a mixture of artificialcolorings, which makes it
difficult to determine if thereis a specific coloring or
(06:32):
combination of additives thatmight be responsible for
observed effects, so that canmake it challenging to draw any
definitive conclusions.
There also is some ethicalconcerns in these studies in
which a mixture of additives wasgiven to young children, and
even in a controlled study, thismight not, and usually doesn't,
reflect typical dietarypatterns, meaning when this is
(06:55):
being looked at in a scientificstudy, they're usually giving a
higher quantity and concentratedquantity of food dyes to the
children who are being observedin this study, when that is not,
again, what we would typicallysee.
When a child's eating foodsthat has food dyes in it, it's
not like our kids are justdrinking food dyes, and this is
(07:17):
essentially one of the biglimitations that we see in these
studies is that it's notreflective of a typical eating
pattern, and that is a big pointto understand, because
typically when our kids areconsuming sweets or other things
that have food coloring in it,it's a very minimal amount
compared to what we're seeinggiven to these kids in these
studies.
(07:37):
The other thing to note is thatattempts to replicate these
studies findings have producedmixed results, so some support a
link between food additives andhyperactivity, while others do
not.
So this has been somethingthat's been very difficult to
replicate in the scientificcommunity, which makes it
difficult to draw any conclusiveevidence from this research.
(08:00):
There's not enough strongevidence to warrant, again,
changes in how food additivesare regulated by the FDA,
specifically here for the UnitedStates.
So what can we as parents dowith this information?
Because it isn't conclusive.
There's so much clutter outthere when it comes to this
topic.
There's a lot of controversyaround it, both in the
(08:21):
scientific community and in thegeneral population.
There's a lot ofmisunderstanding around it, and
I think this can make it reallychallenging as a parent when
you're navigating this with yourchild.
On one hand, you want yourchild to have a great
relationship with all foods.
You want to normalize sweetsfor them.
You want them to be able toself-regulate and not have any
of these foods up on a pedestal.
(08:41):
On the other hand, you may belegitimately concerned about
some of the ingredients that arein the foods that your child
might be consuming, and I getthat, especially as a parent
who's raising ADHDers, I feelthat too, where there is so much
confusion around this topic, itcan be hard to know what is the
best thing to do for my child,and this is where I just want to
(09:03):
give you some encouragement andalso help you to just see the
bigger picture at hand, and Ithink the best way to do this is
just to share from my ownpersonal experience with my
children.
So my ADHDers are.
I have a daughter who iscurrently 11, almost 12, and
then my son who's seven, andthey both are ADHDers.
And it's interesting because Ihave seen potential effects of
(09:27):
food dies in different ways anddifferent scenarios with them,
where my older daughter seems tobe largely unaffected by them,
whereas my younger son does seemto have some effect on him and
on his behavior and the way thatI found this out.
And I want to share this littlestory with you and again, this
is just from my own personalexperience, but when my son was
(09:48):
five, we were at a familybarbecue and there was a lot of
food out on tables, drinks, and,you know, the kids just had
free access to everything thatwas out there.
There's ton of food, sweets, alot of different things
happening at the time, and Ijust remember trying to help my
son with something at one pointand he was literally melting
(10:09):
down.
He was struggling, he wasscreaming, crying, just really
acting out of the norm, and Icouldn't understand it.
He wasn't sleep deprived, hehadn't missed a nap or anything,
he was off of naps.
Everything just seemed veryabnormal and I was trying to
rack my brain like what ishappening here.
His behavior seemed veryabnormal to me and,
(10:30):
interestingly, I saw that he wasdrinking cupfuls of a drink
that was kind of like in a bigpitcher on a table and I just
assumed that it was pinklemonade and I didn't really
know what it was at the time.
And I noticed that he had goneback several times to fill up
this huge red solo cup of thispink lemonade and which is
(10:51):
guzzling it down.
And finally I figured out thatwhat was in that huge pitcher
was actually crystal light andnot just regular pink lemonade.
And that kind of cued me inthat maybe he is reacting to
something that he's consumingfrom there, because, as we know,
crystal light is an artificialdrink.
(11:14):
It doesn't have real sugar, butit has plenty of other
ingredients to make it tastesweet as well as to make it look
pink, because this was pinklemonade.
And I just had a moment ofthought where I wondered is he
reacting to the high volume offood dyes that he's consuming in
(11:34):
this drink?
Because he was drinking so muchof it like he kept going back
and back, and at the time it wasjust a hypothesis, because we
typically don't drink thingslike crystal light or any type
of like diet sodas.
We usually just drink realstuff, like real lemonade, and
he really hadn't had a lot ofexposure to those types of
artificial drinks before.
(11:55):
So I just started to maybe putsome connections together,
thinking that maybe this hassomething to do with it.
And it wasn't something thatrigidly changed how I approached
food with my kids in any way.
I just became a little morecognizant of the fact that he
seemed to be more sensitivebehaviorally to food dies in
(12:16):
food, and I also just want topoint out that it wasn't the
norm that he would drinksomething like that, especially
in the quantities that he wasdrinking, and this is part of
the novelty of foods that ourkids are exposed to.
Maybe they're not seeing thosethings in our home, but when
they're seeing them outside inother places, it becomes
exciting and they want to have alot of it because they've never
(12:36):
really accessed that before.
And again, it wasn't that henever had lemonade or pink
lemonade before, but it was adrink that he enjoyed and he had
free access to it and he wasgoing back cup after cup after
cup and I honestly don't reallyknow how many cups that he ended
up drinking of that.
But I definitely noticed aeffect on him behaviorally,
where he seemed to really reallystruggle.
(12:56):
There was a lot ofdysregulation, emotional
dysregulation.
It really just felt or appearedlike he had no control over his
body and at that point I cuthim off from the crystal light
pink lemonade because I justfelt like this was having
somewhat of effect on him.
And, moving forward, it wasjust something that was in the
back of my mind.
Is he more sensitive to fooddies at this age?
(13:19):
And given just him being aneurodivergent child?
This is what's hard as parentsis that oftentimes we're just
navigating this on our ownwithout any conclusive evidence.
We're just observing what weknow of our own children.
And what's interesting is, onthe other hand, my older
daughter, who is an ADHD as well, did not appear to have the
same effect, and this is why Ido think it's important to look
(13:40):
at our children individually,because what affects one child
may not affect another child,and that's why I don't think we
can just lump all kids intogether and say all kids are
going to be negatively affectedbehaviorally by consuming food
dies.
I also think the quantity isimportant too, because, again,
my son was consuming a very,very large quantity of this
(14:02):
crystal light, and that is notsomething that is a typical
eating pattern for him, but itwas something that I just kept
in my mind, and we have beenmaking an effort to buy food and
ingredients that generally aredie free.
Now, that is not to say that wedon't also buy other foods that
do have food dye in them aswell.
(14:24):
We are definitely incorporatingmany different things in the
rotation here in our home, andone thing that I have found that
has worked well isincorporating sweets and
different things that they enjoyand having things available to
them on the regular that tend tobe die free.
We do a lot of grocery shoppingat Trader Joe's and they have a
(14:45):
ton of amazing candy optionsthat are free of food dye and
food coloring, and so those arethings that we tend to stock up
on more regularly and I justhave found that they're very
satiating, they taste great andmy kids enjoy them, and
especially for my son, who's nowseven.
He seems to do better withthose being the things that he's
having more frequently and moreirregularly.
(15:07):
But again, this is not to saythat we have a hard line in the
sand and aren't alsoincorporating other things, and
this is where I think, asparents, we have to be very
careful about how we'renavigating this.
And as an example, on Halloweenmy kids got so much candy I mean
so much candy we had them dumpit out at the end of the night
and it was like the entire floorwas covered with candy.
(15:30):
And what's funny is that my sonactually prefers over all the
candies that he likes.
His favorite candies areSkittles, any type of gummies,
and red vines and red licorice,and those are like his favorite
things.
And I just think it's kind offunny because those are the
candies that naturally will havemore of the food dyes in them.
(15:51):
He's not a chocolate kiddo.
He literally separated out allhis candy and just put all the
chocolates into our likecommunal family candy bowl and
he was like I don't want those,I just want these and that is
okay.
And I knew that it will be moreharmful to him and to his
relationship with food if I'mtoo rigid with the candy that he
(16:14):
has access to.
He got access to that candy.
He went trick-or-treating, hewas super pumped and excited
about all the candy that he gotand I know that, as a parent, if
I were to take those thingsaway from him, that rigidity
will actually make him becomemore obsessive with those
candies.
And so he gets to keep allthose candies and he's eating
(16:34):
them and enjoying them and he'sokay, he's fine.
Nothing outrageous is happening, he's not melting down, he's
doing great.
And we let our kids have theirHalloween candy pretty
frequently in the days followingHalloween, where they get to
have some with their meals andtheir snacks.
It's in the rotation, so he'seating a good variety of candy
and eating it pretty frequently.
(16:54):
At this point Now, I tell thisstory because I think it's so
important that, as parents, thatwe assess what are the pros and
cons of allowing our kids tohave these foods with
ingredients that we might beconcerned are affecting them,
versus restricting their accessto these foods, and it's very
easy to be consumed by thequality of ingredients that our
(17:16):
children are consuming andeating.
And this is where, especiallyif you're a parent who's
recovering from an eatingdisorder, you need to be careful
about that line that you'rewalking, because it's easy to
adapt this orthorexic type oftendency and how we feed our
kids, where we become soconcerned about the quality of
ingredients that they're eatingthat we have a short-sighted
(17:38):
view of what is necessary forthem to develop a positive and
trusting relationship with food,because the more of a big deal
we make out of certainingredients or foods or candies,
the more of a big deal theywill become in our child's mind.
And this is why I think there'snot a clear, one-size-fits
approach for this issue withfood dyes and sweets and our
(18:00):
children and their behavior, andespecially neurodivergent
children who could potentiallybe a little more susceptible to
some of the effects of theseadditives or food dyes.
I also just think it's reallyimportant to clarify and say
that neurodivergent conditions,so like ADHD or autism, these
are neurodevelopmentalconditions.
(18:22):
These are not caused by eatingcertain foods or having certain
ingredients incorporated intoour diet or our children's diet,
and I think this is one of themost misinformed myths about
food dyes and additives.
That is constantly perpetuatedand this creates so much stigma
around neurodivergent families.
Because, again, theseconditions are
(18:45):
neurodevelopmental.
They are largely andpredominantly influenced by
genetics and biological factors,and for us to perpetuate and by
us I mean diet culture at largeto perpetuate this idea that we
are causing our kids to haveautism or ADHD because we're
allowing them to have food withfood dyes is so misleading and
(19:07):
it's very harmful toneurodivergent families.
There is not a causative effectbetween consuming food dyes and
food additives andneurodevelopmental conditions
like ADHD and autism.
This is something that I thinkis really important and I feel
very passionate aboutchallenging this stigma because
I understand the effects of itfirsthand.
I do also understand to theimportance of validating what
(19:30):
you, as a parent, are observingin your child, because I think
sometimes it can feel like it'ssuch a black and white issue and
it's either you allow them oryou don't, and I think that
polarizing way of approachingthese types of issues creates
rigidity around food in itself,which makes food way more
complicated and chaotic than itneeds to be, and that's where we
(19:51):
start to develop food rules andour kids pick up on that and
that can now complicate theirrelationship with food.
So I always think it'simportant to approach these
issues with a lot of nuance andto explore the gray areas and I
don't think it's all or nothingor black and white and I think
it's important that you feelvalidated as a parent around any
potential observations thatyou're noticing with your child
(20:13):
and this is something I've seenanecdotally too with families
that I've worked with, some whonotice that their kids largely
seem unaffected by the food thatthey're eating, whereas others
seem to notice a directcorrelation between my child
eats this type of food and itreally affects their behavior or
their emotional state, and I dothink it's important that you
feel validated as a parent withwhat you're observing.
(20:34):
I also just want to say, as aword of caution, that sometimes
we have this like self fulfilledprophecy, where we are looking
for evidence to support a claimin our mind that we already
believe and there's actuallybeen studies that have shown
that that this was a study thatwas done on analyzing the
effects of sugar and behavior onchildren actually, and they
(20:56):
were looking at how parentsactually observed their children
after consuming a sugarybeverage.
But what was interesting is thatthe researchers kind of tricked
the parents and told theparents that their kids had
ingested a sugary beverage.
And then they wanted theparents to observe the child's
behavior.
And what was interesting is, inreality it was just the placebo
(21:19):
.
The researchers didn't give thekids a sugary beverage, they
just gave them I don't knowwater or sparkling water or
something like that, that didn'thave any added sugar in it.
And what was interesting wasthe parents.
Many of the parents reportedobserving that their child
seemed more hyperactive afterhaving a sugary beverage.
So the reason I tell you thisstudy and I think it's
(21:40):
interesting is because there issometimes a self fulfilling
prophecy where we are lookingfor evidence in our kids to
support a belief about ourchildren that we already have,
where it's like I think or Ibelieve that my child will be
hyperactive after they have thisor eat that, and then we're
looking for evidence to supportthat.
That's why these studies can bevery difficult, because there
(22:02):
is a subjective measure which isalways harder.
It's not this hard objectivecriteria.
A lot of it has to do with whatare we observing, and that's
why I think it's alwaysimportant to have an open mind
and consider the differentthings your child is exposed to
and how it might be affectingthem, and also this for children
as they get older being able tohave those conversations with
(22:23):
them where we can ask those selfreflective questions like, well
, how do you feel after havingthis?
How does that make you feel?
And these are things that I'mstarting to explore with my
older daughter, as she is anADHD error and we talk about
like, how do you feel after youhave this or eat that?
And is it difficult for you tofocus?
Are you having more symptomaticbehaviors, and not just with
(22:44):
food, but with many other things?
Food tends to be the culpritthat we put all the blame on,
but we have to remember that ourkids are not living in a vacuum
.
There's so many different otherfactors that can be also
influencing their behavior,their emotional state and all of
those things.
So what is the bottom line?
What is the takeaway?
I know I'm not really givingany conclusive evidence here,
(23:05):
and again, that is because thissubject doesn't have any
conclusive really takeaways atthis point.
What I think is important hereis keeping your eye on the big
picture at hand.
If you, as a parent, arefeeling stressed or obsessive
about the quality of food thatyour child is eating.
If you are feeling so stressedabout them, potentially eating
(23:27):
ingredients that feelquestionable to you, such as
food dyes or additives, thatstress is far worse for your
health and for your child'shealth than literally anything
your child can eat, and this iswhy I think we have to have this
big picture of you in mind,because we'd like to make it all
about the food Eat that don'teat.
This.
We have to remember that we'reliving in a world where all of
(23:49):
these foods exist and we cangatekeep all we want in our own
home and prevent our childrenfrom having access to certain
foods that include ingredientsthat feel questionable to us.
But the older they get and themore exposure they have to the
food, the more they get to thefood, to the world, they will
have more exposure to thesefoods in different shapes and
forms.
They're going to go to afriend's house or a birthday
(24:09):
party.
They're going to grow up and goto college and be able to buy
their own food.
They will be able to buy thingsthat we maybe never let them
have access to, and it will beharder for them to learn how to
regulate and eat these foods ifthey've never had the
opportunity, and this is why Ithink it's important that we
keep that big picture of you inmind.
That doesn't mean that you can'tinclude foods in your home Like
(24:32):
, for example, maybe it's yourpreference to buy candies that
don't have food dyes in them,and those are the things that
are largely in the rotation inyour home.
However, if your child does getaccess to those foods or is
showing interest in having thosefoods you know they saw
so-and-so at school, having afruit roll up, and now they're
all excited and they want to trythat and they're asking about
it and they're showing that highinterest.
(24:53):
That's where it's importantthat we are responsive to what
our kids are showing us and wecan find ways to tangibly and
proactively incorporate thosethings in our home so that our
child feels that they'reaccessible and doesn't now put
those foods or those candies upon a pedestal.
These are important things tokeep in mind.
We want to think about thelong-term goals.
(25:15):
We want our children to be ableto self-regulate, to have a
positive relationship with allfoods and to not feel like
certain things are inaccessibleor now they're internalizing
this belief or this message thatthese foods are bad, when those
things are becoming part oftheir eating experiences and the
rhetoric that they're buildingaround food.
They start to formulate guiltand shame around eating, and it
(25:38):
can create a damaging effect ontheir relationship with food
over the long term.
So, again, keeping the bigpicture in mind, what are the
things that you're keeping inthe rotation in your home?
What is your response to yourchild having exposure to some of
the foods or candies or sweetsor ingredients that maybe you
don't feel comfortable with, andhow can you find a middle
(26:00):
ground where you can beresponsive to the things that
your child is showing aninterest, while also being
supportive of their overallhealth and wellness?
I know it can be hard and Ihope this just gives you some
food for thought or some thingsto think about as you're
navigating this with your ownchildren.
This does tend to come uppost-Halloween a lot, which is
why I wanted to just touch onthis subject and again, as you
(26:21):
can see and are hearing, there'sa lot of nuance here and a lot
of other things that we canexplore.
So I'd love to hear from youand just hear.
What are your questions, whatare your concerns, what are
things that you're observing?
Ultimately, we want our childrento know that they are safe to
consume a variety of foodsunless they're allergic to
something right.
That's a different subject, butwe don't want our children to
(26:42):
internalize guilt or shame fromour projected fears that may be
coming out in our feedinginteractions with our children.
I know it can be hard topost-Halloween when our kids
have a large volume of candythat is not the norm for them
and they might be getting accessto a variety of different
candies that they don'tfrequently see, which can give
us some good data to work with.
Where do I need to potentiallyexpose my child or allow them to
(27:05):
have access to things that theydo enjoy but that I don't
regularly keep in my home?
This is a good point ofself-examination, self-awareness
, self-exploration to reallyassess how you're approaching
food and ask yourself am Igatekeeping something for my
child because I'm fearful ofthem eating that or how that
might affect them?
We want to remember that theeffects of restricting or
(27:29):
controlling feeding tactics areultimately more harmful for your
child's health than literallyanything they can consume.
That is definitely kind of abig picture takeaway that I do
want you to have, because it'sso easy to get consumed in all
this fear-mongering, messagingaround food dyes or additives or
all these inquestibleingredients, but we conveniently
(27:52):
gloss over the damaging effectsof kids feeling restricted or
controlling feeding tactics, andthe impact of that on our kids
and how they feel about food.
Again, that is more damaging, Iwould argue, to their overall
health and wellness thanallowing them to have access to
the foods that they do enjoy and, again, finding ways to
(28:12):
incorporate that in your homethat fits for your family.
I know.
For me, one thing that I justbecame more aware of, especially
after this Halloween, was theSkittle situation.
My son loves Skittles, and Idon't think I've been as
intentional about incorporatingjust plain old Skittles in our
house, and I definitely want tomake more of an effort to do
that, because I see how much heenjoys them, and he loves having
(28:34):
a pack of Skittles to throw inhis lunchbox and being able to
eat that food without any guiltor shame.
That is what I want for him,and so it was really helpful for
me to reflect on that throughthis past Halloween experience,
and I hope you've been able todo the same too, because, oh, my
friend, there is so much fearmongering information, and I
don't want you to be bogged downwith it.
I want you to be able to enjoyfood as a family free from all
(28:58):
this guilt and shame that sooften comes with the rhetoric
and messages out there that dietculture is just perpetuating
about food.
So I hope this gave you somefood for thought and just some
encouragement.
Again, I would love to hear fromyou if you want me to touch on
this subject in a deeper matter,if you want us to go on a deep
dive or revisit this and do apart two.
Let me know your thoughts andwe'll see if we can give you
(29:20):
some more resources andinformation around this.
But, as always, I just soappreciate you being here and
part of this community.
I am sending you so much loveand I cannot wait to connect
with you again next week.
Thank you for listening to thisweek's episode of the Lift the
Shame podcast.
For more tips and guidance onyour mother-her journey, come
connect with me on Instagram atCrystal Cargays.
(29:40):
Until next week, mama, I'll becheering you on.
Bye for now.
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