Sep 24, 20232 min read

What diet helps autistic children?

There’s so much debate out there about what diet is the best for autistic children! I’ve heard anecdotal stories about how changing a child’s diet can help autistic kids. But what does a special diet look like and what does the science behind them have to say?

If you’ve been looking into special diets, you may be familiar with some of these, but here are some popular ones:

1. Gluten-free casein free (GFCF) – for this diet, you’ll remove all foods that contain gluten, like wheat barley, and rye and casein such as milk and dairy.

2. Ketogenic diet – this diet is high-fat, low- or no-carbohydrate. You would increase the amount of fats and reduce all carbs to almost zero.

3. Mediterranean diet – this diet hosts a variety of foods: fruits, vegetables, fish, whole grains and healthy fats.

4. Nutritional supplements: some practitioners advise increasing particular nutritional supplements like vitamin B6, magnesium, omega-3 fatty acids and pre- or probiotics.

Unfortunately, in all of the diets I’ve listed above, there doesn’t seem to be conclusive evidence for any of them. So special diets are not generally supported by the research. That doesn’t mean that you can’t try it for your child. You’ll need to monitor what you do and what effect it has on your child, both positive and negative. For example, you may see less aggression, but you may also see a decrease in food consumption when familiar or well-liked foods aren’t on the plate. If something like this happens, you’ll have to decide which factor is more of a priority for your child. When you make changes, I I highly recommend giving it enough time (like a couple of weeks) and keeping some kind of reflective documentation. This will help you make decisions on what’s going to work or things you might want to trial again.

What this all really boils down to is finding what is right for YOUR child. When it comes to autistic children, there’s no one size fits all. Yes, some children have reacted differently to different diets or dietary tweaks, but what works for your child will largely be dependent on what you try and whether the differences you’ve noticed are beneficial enough to continue.