Diet taboos for children with precocious puberty

There is no need to blindly avoid foods such as long-term excessive amounts of high-sugar and high-fat deep-processed foods, supplements with unknown ingredients claiming to increase height/benefit/replenish the body, adult hormone drugs/skin care products mistakenly taken, soy milk, off-season vegetables, strawberries, and fried chicken that are spread online, as long as they are produced in compliance with regulations and consumed in normal amounts.

I just received a 7-and-a-half-year-old patient last week. Her breasts are obviously indurated, and her bone age is one and a half years older than other children of the same age. As soon as her mother entered the clinic, she cried with red eyes, wondering if the soy milk she gave her every day was bad. After careful investigation, I found out that my grandma was afraid that her child would have weak immunity, so she fed her a spoonful of royal jelly every day, and asked someone to buy imported "Children's Brain Pills" to eat every day. Finally, it was found that the child had peripheral precocious puberty caused by excessive intake of exogenous sex hormones. She stopped taking supplements for three months and then re-examined, and the developmental signs subsided.

Speaking of soy milk, it is indeed the "controversial food" that parents ask about most. Many popular sciences have mentioned that soy isoflavones in soybeans are estrogen-like and may induce precocious puberty. This statement is not completely wrong, but talking about toxicity without dosage is just a hooligan. The current consensus in the domestic and foreign nutrition circles is that the estrogenic activity of soy isoflavones is only 1/1 of the human body’s endogenous estrogen. 10000~1/1000. Under normal circumstances, children drink 200~300ml of soy milk every day. The soy isoflavones they consume are not even 10 mg, which cannot reach the threshold that affects hormone levels. Unless you drink soy milk as water and drink two or three liters of it a day, then there may be problems. Of course, there are also a few schools of traditional Chinese medicine that believe that children with weak spleen and stomach have weak transportation and transformation abilities. Eating too much soybeans will easily cause stagnation, which will disturb their own yang energy and affect hormone regulation. You can also refer to this. If a child drinks soy milk and has flatulence and diarrhea, there is nothing wrong with drinking less soybeans, so there is no need to argue.

There are also rumors about out-of-season fruits and vegetables. Many parents get nervous when they see strawberries in winter and watermelons in spring, saying that they are treated with ripening agents and will ripen prematurely if they are eaten. Let me emphasize it again: Ripening agents used in plants, such as ethephon, only act on plants. The human body has no corresponding receptors at all. Just like pollen does not make people pregnant, plant hormones cannot cause premature puberty in humans. Unless the fruits and vegetables you buy have pesticide residues that seriously exceed the standard, that is a food safety issue and has nothing to do with the ripening agent. Regardless of whether it is out of season or not, you cannot eat those with pesticide residues that exceed the standard.

High-risk diets are something that really need to be taken seriously, but many parents don’t take them seriously. Let’s talk about supplements first. I have met at least 20 children who suffered from precocious puberty due to taking supplements: some took oral liquids that claim to “grow 5 centimeters in height in 2 months”, some elderly people at home fed cordyceps and deer fetus ointment to replenish their bodies, and some parents relied on folk prescriptions to feed their children Ziheche (human placenta). These things either contain animal sex hormones themselves, or are secretly added hormones in Sanwu products. Parents spent a lot of money, but harmed their children. You must also put away medicines and skin care products at home. I once took care of a 4-year-old girl who treated her mother's birth control pill as jelly beans and ate half of the bottle. Within half a month, vaginal bleeding occurred. Fortunately, she was sent to the doctor in time and no major problems were left. ； There are also breast enhancement creams and topical ointments containing glucocorticoids for adults. Do not let children touch them. It is possible to absorb excessive amounts of hormones through transdermal absorption.

Another easily overlooked factor is obesity caused by a long-term high-sugar and high-fat diet. This is one of the most common causes of precocious puberty among urban children. Fat cells secrete leptin. Children who have been overweight for a long time have consistently high leptin levels, which will start the development of the gonadal axis in advance. Many parents say that my child has precocious puberty because he has not taken any supplements. When asked, he weighs 20 pounds more than his peers and eats fried chicken, milk tea, and cakes every day. In this case, it is useless to just avoid certain foods. The key is to control the weight first.

Finally, I would like to mention that don’t rely on diet for all precocious puberty. About 30% of central precocious puberty is related to hypothalamic pituitary lesions, tumors and other factors, and some are idiopathic with no clear cause. If you are really diagnosed with precocious puberty, you should first follow the doctor's advice to investigate the cause and intervene when it's time. Don't delay the best intervention time just by relying on taboos.

To be honest, you don’t need to be too elaborate when raising children. You should eat home-cooked meals, with a balanced mix of meat, eggs, milk, vegetables and fruits. Don’t buy those fancy “children’s only” supplements and snacks. Controlling your weight within a normal range is better than anything else. Don’t dare to eat this and that every day. In the end, the child will be malnourished and will not grow taller, which is not worth the gain.