omega 3/6 oils and sleep

[sphil]

After reading on MN that Equazen fish oil had made some children's hyperactivity worse, I cut it out of DS2's diet three weeks ago. We then had two weeks of almost unbroken sleep. When we went to BIBIC they suggested flaxseed oil. Started this on Sat and he's been awake for 4 hours in the middle of the three nights since. It also seemed to make the eczema round his mouth worse, though this could be a coincidence. I'm going to e-mail BIBIC but does anyone have any advice about anything else I could try? DS2 has quite a few food allergies.

Glad you posted this as it's something we've found too. Eye-Q caused DS to wake up at night with nightmares. I read somewhere that evening primrose oil could cause insomnia so decided to try flaxseed oil but it had the same effect. Suppose of the omega-3s are altering brain functioning it could cause the brain to be more active a tnight as a side effect. Frustrating as I think DS would benefit in terms of his concentration.

We were discussing this at Earlybird last week and two other mums had found the same with fish oils. One of the mums got a preparation from a health food shop that she says is just omega 3 nothing else. Haven't investigated the shop yet to find out what she got. Otherwise you may have to look at food sources rich in omega 3s. Pumpkin seeds is a good one apparentlyI think some supermarkets do milk fortified with omega-3 oils, Sainsburys are starting to do orange juice with it in too apparently

HTH

Liz x

Thanks Liz - the problem is he's allergic to milk and citrus fruits and we've been advised not to give him seeds yet! Eggs too, so can't give him the Omega eggs. This is the difficulty really - his diet is so restricted (because of allergies and fussiness) that it's hard to get the right stuff into him. He does eat salmon in fish cakes about 4 times a week, which is better than nothing I know.

I'm glad other people have had the same experience iyswim - I prefer it if there's a solvable reason for his sleep problems! I'll let you know what the dietician at BIBIC says.

BIBIC nutritionist suggested trying hemp seed oil. Anyone else tried this? Alternatively she suggested crushing seeds into his food, but to start with a small amount and leave a few days to see if there are any side effects.

Hiya

We do the seed thing, but what I do is keep ahuge tub of mixed seeds next to a breadmake then bung in a large handful when I make bread- so it's delivered easily iyswim.

I forgot to run that by the BIBIC nutritionist though, but seeing her this month

That's a good idea - we make our own bread so could do that. Would have to crush them though so DS's eagle eye couldn't spot them...