My Testimonial: Is your child out of control?

Looking back, I thought my role as a parent was going to be a breeze. Besides, how hard could parenting be after teaching a class of thirty children. Staying home and raising them would be a piece of cake. I have always been a positive person so my kids will most likely be easy going too- so I thought. After my second child turned two, my rose colored glasses began to get foggy. My role as a disciplinarian was being tested in ways that I wasn't prepared for. My children entered the world of artificially colored foods, preservatives in almost every bite, and a world of processed foods that could make any kid's head spin (or at least those children who were sensitive to the stuff). I was ignorant. I thought that the foods that I ate and that my family ate were safe and that the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) was out for our best interests.
So I went on, wondering, crying, reading, and taking my child to an occupational therapist for having some sort of conduct disorder, an autistic spectrum disorder, or whatever kind of label that would help define my child so that I could fix what was wrong. Let me first say this, no label was going to change how I thought about my son, it might only help me to help him better, but it was in no way to be used to define him (he would never know any term that was given to me).
He was four years old at the time and he was easily frustrated, he would hit and kick at his brothers or myself for reasons that were unexplainable. He could not be calmed by time-outs and holding him would only induce more of the same. His motor-coordination was poor and his occupational therapist said that he could possibly have dysgraphia. It was odd to me since he used to (when he was two years old) draw pictures with nice detail and have good control of his pencil. That was not all she said, but it is not necessary to bring that up now. During the time I was acquiring all of the labels that my child possibly had, I learned something that changed our lives in the process. I mentioned to her that I was trying to eliminate sugars from his diet so that he might act differently. I was acting on a hunch. She mentioned casually that I might also want to eliminate red dye 40.
In a quest to make my son better, I tried just eliminating red dye 40. First, I eliminated his favorite drink - Strawberry Nesquick Milk. I noticed a significant difference in his behavior. My husband and I began eliminating everything with red dye and saw positive changes in our son's behavior. Each time he was accidentally offered red dye 40, his behavior was significantly worse. His eyes had a "dye-induced look" that I could detect after having seen his transition time after time again proceeding him eating something with red dye 40. He looked depressed and had trouble responding correctly to the stimuli around him. His perception of reality became distorted. This I came to realize by seeing how he handled minor disturbances and how his explanation for his behavior was exceedingly irrational.
With each month improvements were made in our search for healthy foods. We decided to eliminate all synthetically-dyed foods. Our reasoning was that the dyes are created using petroleum. It does not add to the value of the food and can in fact be harmful. We chose not to eat foods with carmine or cochineal because it is derived from the cochineal bug. These changes that were made helped our son significantly. He is now in first grade and has very beautiful handwriting. He has good drawing skills and grip of his pencil. He has good behavior and makes high grades in his subjects. He has many friends now. He shows empathy and understanding of how his behavior and communication effects others and can adjust his behavior accordingly.
If you know of a child who is suffering from low-impulse control or who acts aggressively and irrationally - perhaps kicking or punching, I recommend taking a look at his diet and eliminated all synthetic artificial dyes. I can only say that for our family it has been a blessing to get this piece of the missing puzzle to turn our child back into the person he was supposed to be.