Will a litre of blackberry-and-apple squash per day add to behaviour problems? Raisingkids.co.uk's paediatric dietitian, David Swain, offers some advice.

Raisingkids member's query
I manage a full day-care nursery and one child (aged 36 months) is giving us real trouble with approx 6 temper tantrums a day. His sleep pattern is very irregular too, keeping his parents awake and finally falling asleep in the parents' bed with his father or in his own bed with Mum.

We are all qualified staff and I have 6 years experience but I've never encountered anything like it. We' ve tried all our usual, tested methods such as distraction, praise rather than punishment, one-to-one attention and honestly nothing helps. We've also gone on behaviour management courses. This has been going on 11 months now and his parents are desperate.

He's been tested for coeliacs disease but was found to not have it. He also drinks approx 1 litre of blackberry-and-apple squash per day. Any suggestions would be helpful.

David's advice
From a dietary point of view, I believe it would be helpful to reduce the amount of squash that this child consumes. A litre is too much for a 3 yr-old as it will fill him up and blunt his appetite. Squash also often contains large amounts of additives that could be to blame for hyperactivity - see my answer to another member's query about food and behaviour for more information.

Although the question of diet and hyperactivity is controversial, I feel it would be sensible to stop giving squash for a trial period (a month) and see if this helps with his behaviour. In the meantime, he can have water or milk to drink instead.

Finally, I would recommend that you also contact our parenting expert Dr Spungin with the behavioural side of this dilemma, as it's unlikely to be improved by diet alone.

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