Joe Wicks says junk food causes ADHD

I think this is just click bait.

My two children have had the same diet from being babies (mostly...unless sensory avoidance in my DS). My DS has ASD, ADHD and dyspraxia. My DD doesn't.
I have noticed some behaviour changes in my children when they were younger with certain foods (mostly sugar related). I don't think that had any impact on neurodiversity.
If anything my 8 year old DS eats more healthier than my teenage DD. 🙄

I was diagnosed with adhd last week. By some bloke with a medical degree and a string of post grad specialisms, rather than some prick who’s written a couple of books.

I don’t eat junk food, I’m gluten free so most junk food is unavailable to me anyway and I prefer to avoid gluten free substitutes

I eat takeaways probably once or twice a year

still got adhd. Apparently exercise is the best way of controlling adhd, next week
im running London marathon. How much fucking exercise do I need to do before it’s controlled???

he’s a prick who’s jumped on the “adhd is in the news” bandwagon to get his name some current visibility.

fwiw, I was always firmly of the belief that adhd is bollocks and down to poor parenting. Then got two boys with adhd so that view bit
me right on the arse 🤣

Oh, in that case I have jumped the shark
Lately though I have been a bit pissed off at influencers giving health advice.

Would you mind posting links to tonnes of these studies, even a single meta study, that demonstrate poor diet contributes to high rates of ADHD?

Except that's not really what he said is it?

It's quite the jump from 'I wonder if nutrition plays a part?' to 'Junk food causes ADHD'. Asking a question, not making a statement.

Typical tabloid froth and any anger is best directed towards the Mail rather than Wicks himself.

DS1 now 24 has (mostly) good control over himself now but my god after a few vodka’s his ADHD goes into overdrive!

He’s got a brass neck given how much shite he eats when he’s on a binge

Yeah this he's not the brightest button and just opens his mouth I mean he's just feeding into fears of some people he's a bit culty! Oh and he's an app to promote.

I agree

It is a MASSIVE thing to put a child on amphetamine, yet the number of parents who 'just do it' is horrifying to me.

Watch yourself if you feed them any aspartame as they go from bouncy fun boys into fucking little terrors 😜
The wretched stuff is in so many things.
They took the sugar out and put that in instead.

Doctors do about 1 hour of training on nutrition btw, and I would be quite sure that someone like JW has studied nutrition much more than any standard GP.

When you see your DC struggle with ADHD you will try anything for them to have a “normal” life. We tried meds with both of ours but took them off them due to the terrible side effects. So while I don’t blame parents for trying the meds I would advise doing a lot of researching before starting down that path.
DS1 has ADHD and Tourette’s. DS2 has ADHD and was prescribed meds which caused tics. Doing my own reading I discovered that meds were advised against if anyone in the family had Tourette‘s!

Firstly, the medical profession doesn’t know much about ADHD, especially in adults, or females of any age (as evidenced by the huge delay in diagnosis and treatment in the UK right now).
Secondly, if you give some kids Ultra Processed food, or non-diet cola, they definitely go a bit “hyper”. I’ve witnessed this many times - and also seen some nasty reactions to those drinks that don’t have sugar, but are sweetened with aspartame and other artificial sweeteners.
Thirdly, Joe Wicks does have a degree in Sports Science. Quite a lot of a Sports Science degree is study of the effect of various foods on the body, so I don’t agree with the PP’s who have suggested (snarkily) that he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

With recent studies on UPF’s showing that it’s more harmful than previously believed, he’s probably on the right track on this point.

Not a medical person but I also genuinely believe that there is a big link between our gut biome and our mental health/cognative function.

He's almost right. It's a high carb diet. It doesn't matter whether it's potatoes, bread or pasta ... metabolically it's all glucose.

This.
I have ADHD (not caused by bad diet) but if I eat loads of shite it impacts my mental health and I am much more twitchy and buzzy. DS1 is the same and DSS (both have ADHD). Watch yourself if you feed them any aspartame as they go from bouncy fun boys into fucking little terrors 😜

This.
From my skim reading, the impression I got was that the junk food made the symptoms worse.

It is really curious that people on this thread are outraged that you may be able to improve ADHD with diet, but likely have absolutely no issue in giving children amphetamine to fix it.

I genuinely think the world is upsidedown at the moment.

I bet the medical big minds are so grateful to JW for his in depth study into the matter.... fuckwit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jumping_the_shark

The idiom "jumping the shark" or "jump the shark" is a term that is used to argue that a creative work or entity has reached a point in which it has exhausted its core intent and is introducing new ideas that are discordant with, or an extreme exaggeration of, its original purpose.

He may be a numpty but there's plenty of actual medical studies which point to some link.

Gosh, I didn't realise he is a doctor ;-)

Cool. What are his credentials…. Oh wait.

It's horribly ableist to suggest that people with ADHD can be "avoided" or "fixed" by a change in diet.

@Kijuity ,Jumping the shark - Wikipedia

Of course it’s bullshit- I’m not a scientist but can see that if that were true then whole sibling sets would have ADHD or not.

Food affects mood and behaviour as well as health but most people know this through experience and don’t need a fucking influencer to tell them that.

JW’s “influence” should have disappeared once schools reopened and they didn’t need an online PE teacher. Hopefully he won’t need one of his children to have ADHD to realise that he should think before he speaks.