The Best Beginning

10/12/2025

Inspiring Lucy Charles Barclay's story really highlights the long road of Coeliac disease and how it can be silently doing damage to the body.

Ironman world champion Lucy Charles-Barclay believes she was poisoning her body when carb-loading before she knew she was coeliac.

21/11/2025

Written by Stella Chadwick for Autumn 2020 edition of the Autism Eye Magazine It is little wonder that families touched by autism are turning their attention to the medical conditions of PANDAS and PANS. The key symptoms associated with these diseases are extreme obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)....

21/11/2025

Being a coeliac is hard....

A child diagnosed with coeliac may have a difficult experience of food from the point of weaning to diagnosis and this may be years.
Eating any food may present many difficult associations concious and unconcious. Given the complexity of coeliac symptoms for children, its impact on eating patterns and appetite it may be a consideration where ARFID symptoms present.

Coeliac children can follow a long road rebuilding trust with food again starting to heal gut and brain.
Therapy with a coeliac informed approach will aid.

In a study of coeliac patients 57% met suspected ARFID criteria*

Coeliac disease foundation (4.4.22)
Prevalence of Avoidant /Restrictive Intake Disorder in Celiac Patients
https://celiac.org/2022/04/04/prevalence-of-avoidant-restrictive-food-intake-disorder-in-celiac-patients/

Accessed 20.11.25

18/11/2025

Its not "just" a diet change.
Children with coeliac have a higher risk of anxiety, low mood, ADHD and eating disorders.*
Children with higher risk of developing mental health challenges should be prioritised for services and understood in the context of their needs.
Coeliac isnt being trendy its a complex and lifelong condition often traversing the physical and mental.
Greenblatt 2025 42 issue 2 Psychiatric Times

anxiety
children
ADHD

18/11/2025

16/11/2025

TheBest Beginning finally brings a special therapeutic service to little coeliacs, tweens and teens that have been diagnosed with coeliac disease and have had or continue to have challenges with emotions, anxiety, stress or other mental health issues.
Ailish works with children and their parents in bringing about change and relief in all areas of child mental health 0 -17 using play and creavity as well as the family system.

with coeliac

12/11/2025

Strep throat is a common childhood illness, but in a few children this bacteria infection can lead to alarming, lasting changes in behaviour.

06/11/2025

Our sense of mattering—the feeling that we are valued and have value to add to the world—is a key ingredient for lifelong well-being, and it begins in the earliest days of infancy. While it’s never too late to build a sense of mattering, when we start early, we can have an outsized positive effect on children’s health and well-being across their lifespan.

In our new paper, co-authored with Jennifer B. Wallace, learn more about the science around mattering in early childhood, including what mattering means, the powerful effects of mattering on lifelong health and well-being, and strategies for building a sense of mattering in our children.

📚 Read the paper here: https://bit.ly/43bXRaX

28/08/2025

If a relative dies when a child is very young or before they were born, they can feel confused, excluded or upset others have memories they can't share in.

For ways of helping them connect with the person and ideas on how others can help, including school, visit: childbereavementuk.org/child-doesnt-remember-someone-who-died

27/08/2025

Words Worth Holding Onto is a gentle collection of quotes, reminders and affirmations for children and young people navigating big feelings. Sometimes, the right words at the right time can make all the difference.

OUR TOPIC - Back to School Anxiety
NEW TO THE RESOURCE STORE - only £3.25 until 15 September 2025
Back-to-School Anxiety Toolkit for Parents & Educators
Instant download available at https://thecontentedchild.co.uk/product/back-to-school-anxiety-the-toolkit-for-parents-and-educators/

19/08/2025

One million neural connections every second happens in a baby’s brain during the first three years.

This is the main event. The way we show up with emotionally nourishing, supportive relationships shapes lifelong health and well-being.

Let’s treat it like it matters. Because it does.

15/08/2025

"As we celebrate exam results, let’s also pay attention to the subjects that are quietly vanishing from our schools, because when we lose music, we lose more than we realise," writes Gareth Malone

Read more: https://trib.al/nE5RMeo