They are calling it the “new anorexia”, avoiding all processed foods, fats, animal fats, preservatives, milk, and egg products, This doesn’t actually sounds like a bad diet to most, and for the most part it’s not. The problem is when you get to the point of obsession. If you obsess you start to cut out vital macronutrients, antinutrients, and could become orthorexic. Children are developing higher levels of orthorexia due to health obsessed parents according to a New York Times article. Officially they are often called “health food junkies”, but it is not actually an officially defined disease. It would probably be defined more as obsessive compulsive disorder in some cases, but not actually anorexia nervosa or some similar disease defined in the DSM.
There are multiple children now suffering through this type of undefined disorder due to some would say eccentric parents. They do not choose this lifestyle, they grow up with it. After a while they develop their own eccentricities and worries apparently not normal to a 5, 6, 7, 13, or so on year old child. They worry about foods that may harm them, preservatives, fillers, and things we all should worry about, but not to the extreme degree of this.
One such example is Greye Dunn who worries mostly about sodium. Without question, obtaining the right vitamins is a worry, and some supplement with great multivitamins for this purpose. However, with high levels of sodium, your heart rate and blood pressure can increase, whereas with extremely low levels of sodium, your blood pressure can actually drop below the normal levels of health. Greye comes from a mother who actually heads a multimedia company dedicated to organic foods, and has been teaching Greye how to read labels on foods from an early age.
No one would fault a parent for trying to care for their children, trying to teach their children healthy eating habits, especially in a time of rising obesity rates in adults and children. The problem is that with these over-exuberant parents, anxiety levels, stress levels, and therefore certain risk factors as well as malnourishment is on the rise. These kids go to regular functions like birthday parties, and if there is not a specialized cake such as granola cake, they feel the need to avoid it, the inability to eat it. Not only are their parents micromanaging their diets, and they know it, they begin to officially micromanage their own diets.
At this point, there are no official studies, and apparently it is not as widely spread as one might worry. There is only an official 15% rise in these kinds of practices. Many patients actually reduce refined sugar and high fat foods, but not many restrict their diets to only organic foods to avoid pesticides, and not so many children are becoming terrified of their foods. One could say, every good thing in moderation, or else even the best of intentions can easily be misled.
1. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/26/health/nutrition/26food.html?_r=3&ref=style