How Gout Can Affect Children
If you suffer from gout you may have heard the comments about it being the disease of kings and how it is caused by to much beer and rich food. This would make you think that your children are at no risk at all from gout, as I am sure you don’t let your kids drink beer.
One of the causes of gout is the increase of uric crystals around your joints. Mostly this will start to show itself in your big toe, from here it can travel around your body causing more damage as it goes. It doesn’t matter that you could be very young and consider yourself not at risk from gout, you are not too young to feel the pain that gout attacks bring.
Over the last 20 years the average child spends a lot less time outside getting exercise and eats a lot more processed food and drinks. Most children are not satisfied with drinking plain old water any more they want sugary sodas and flavored drinks that are full of fructose.
Fructose and sodas have been shown in recent studies to increase the levels of uric acid in peoples bodies, this has led to increased incidences of gout. Gout is definitely not a disease of kings anymore, as the amount of soda and so called “health” drinks that we all consume continues to increase so will the instances of gout.
People who suffer from gout can greatly reduce the number of attacks they have by simply controlling their diet. It sounds easy, but some will not have the focus to stick to a healthier diet despite the obvious benefits. If you are in a routine then it can be hard to break it, even more if you are a little older. But it can be done and can have a very positive effect on your gout.
Have you thought about the long term effects of your child’s current diet? If you haven’t, then you need to because if you are letting them pick up bad habits in relation to their diet, you could be causing them long term damage. Therefore you should try to help them get into good eating habits so that they will see the benefits as they get older.
We are all trying to squeeze too much work or to many chores into too short a day so often the shopping trip for food for the whole family can become a very rushed affair, add to the time constraint a child who doesn’t want to be there and one shopping trip can give you enough of a headache for a week.
Your shopping trip is the very core of gout prevention for your family, if you don’t buy foods that are high in fructose and you don’t allow foods that are high in uric acid creating chemicals into your fridge then your family won’t be able to eat them and you are taking a huge step towards preventing not just gout, but most likely diabetes and any number of other illnesses that are caused or worsened by our diet.
You should know that gout is a problem which can hurt you where you are young or old. But the original problems can start from when you are a child. There are however some very good forms of gout treatment which can help you.