Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Exercise, food and other supports
If fish oil gives you those horrible repeats all afternoon, that is a fixable problem rather than a reason to stop. Keep the capsules in the freezer, ask about an enteric coated version, or try a flavoured liquid.
Sticking with something usually fails for small unglamorous reasons like this. Someone with a sensitive palate will not last four weeks with an aftertaste that keeps coming back, and often they will not say why they quietly stopped. Coated capsules cost more and freezing costs nothing, so try the free fix first.
Qur’an and Sunnah
Follow the ways made easy for you by your Lord (Quran 16:69). Taking the easier route around a practical obstacle is allowed, and often it is the only way the thing gets done at all.
ثُمَّ كُلِي مِن كُلِّ ٱلثَّمَرَٰتِ فَٱسۡلُكِي سُبُلَ رَبِّكِ ذُلُلࣰ اۚ يَخۡرُجُ مِنۢ بُطُونِهَا شَرَابࣱ مُّخۡتَلِفٌ أَلۡوَٰنُهُۥ فِيهِ شِفَآءࣱ لِّلنَّاسِۚ إِنَّ فِي ذَٰلِكَ لَأٓيَةࣰ لِّقَوۡمࣲ يَتَفَكَّرُونَ
Then feed on all kinds of fruit and follow the ways made easy for you by your Lord.’ From their bellies comes a drink of different colours in which there is healing for people. There truly is a sign in this for those who think
Qur’an 16:69read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
A review of marine omega-3 notes that most people take in far less long chain omega-3 than is thought good for brain function, and that the trial evidence in behaviour and mood is genuinely mixed. Since what you are trying to notice in yourself is modest and uncertain at best, the trial has to actually run to tell you anything. That makes the aftertaste a real obstacle rather than a fussy one.
DiNicolantonio JJ, O'Keefe JH. (2020). The Importance of Marine Omega-3s for Brain Development and the Prevention and Treatment of Behavior, Mood, and Other Brain Disorders.. Nutrients doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
A supplement you cannot stand taking is one you will not take long enough to learn anything from.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
One senior researcher in this field is approached by ADHD app startups roughly once a month and no longer takes part, on the view that the companies are not seriously trying to build something that works.
Cutting sugar does not improve ADHD, and nor does stripping out additives. Both have been tested repeatedly, including under conditions where nobody knew which child had eaten what.
When you read that a treatment worked, look for who judged the improvement and whether they knew what the child had been given. In much of this literature, they knew.