Let’s bring hope to a heavy topic.
As you’ve been following our lead poisoning series, inspired by the lead poisoning of my triplets in 2024, you’ve learned that exposure to this neurotoxin is wildly prevalent, incredibly dangerous, and can happen to any child.
Even for children in brand-new homes, the Washtenaw County health department sees lead exposure happen from construction season (which stirs up lead-contaminated dust) and toys (there are recalls every year from toys dangerously high in lead).
In old homes, children can be lead-poisoned even if all the paint is intact — from faucets, bathtubs, backyards, art supplies, cooking pots and toys.
RELATED: Lead Poisoning: It’s Not as Simple as ‘Don’t Lick the Paint’
Even microscopic exposure risks a host of longterm health effects. Some data indicates that more than half of America’s children have detectable lead in their blood: at or greater than 1.0 µg/dL. Considering there is “no safe level of lead exposure,” this is rightly so worrisome for parents.
In Michigan, 78% of tested children had measurable lead in their blood. Approximately 2.5% of children have blood lead levels at or above 3.5 μg/dL, a number that warrants immediate action and monitoring by the Washtenaw Health Department.
Children are far more affected by lead, absorbing over 50% of lead in their intestinal tract, compared to 15% in adults.
If our kids are 50% likely to be exposed to a life-altering neurotoxin that has seemingly unavoidably permeated our environment, homes and foods, where’s the hope? If lead poisoning permanently alters our babies’ bodies, minds and moods, how can we be anything but depressed when our beloved babies test positive for exposure?
But there is hope for lead poisoned children. There is.
Let’s explore a Johns Hopkins neurons study; the crunchy-mum power of garlic and blueberries; the comorbidity of anemia and the power of iron; and specific types of nurture and environmental changes that counteract lead damage.
Johns Hopkins: neuron damage reversal.
The prognosis for lead-poisoned children is often very grim. Once I started researching it, my findings were full of findings like “permanent brain damage” and “lifelong learning difficulties” and “seven times more likely to be incarcerated”. Over 3,500 genes in the hippocampus, a part of the brain involved in learning and memory, are damaged by lead poisoning.
But finding a Johns Hopkins study that showed neuron damage from lead poisoning being literally reversed was such a hopeful light.
The scientists, in observing lead-poisoned rats, found that when the rats were placed in an enriched environment (multiple opportunities for different types of exercise, challenging toys, and social opportunities), the changes in their cognition function were notably observable at the molecular level. The lead-damaged parts of their brain (in the protein subunit levels) had returned to normal — and there was even increased growth.
Lead is particularly detrimental for children because it provably affects how they are able to learn and remember by altering the hippocampus. But this study shows that the genes that are vital for memory and for learning can be impacted and even entirely reversed by a stimulating social and educational environment.
Rather than seeing brain damage as permanent, this study says that neurons in the brain can be increased, even after damage.
The study’s lead scientist, Tomás R. Guilarte, says, “Previously, we knew that lead impaired cognitive function, but we didn’t know exactly how. Now that we know that lead decreases neurogenesis in the hippocampus and alters the ability of these new neurons to communicate, in future studies we hope to determine if environmental enrichment can reverse these detrimental effects of lead.”
The power of garlic and blueberries.
I mean, it’s no surprise to many of us that blueberries and garlic are good; but why specifically blueberries and garlic for helping the child’s body heal from lead?
Garlic, particularly fresh garlic, not only lowers lead in the blood, but also lowers lead levels in the kidney and liver. Some studies indicate it may even be neuroprotective against some lead-induced brain damage.
This may be because garlic contains sulfur-based compounds that help synthesize amino acids and antioxidants. One study indicates that garlic can actually pull lead out of not only the intestines, but also the tissues of the body, containing its own form of chelation therapy that helps eliminate lead.
Garlic has also been shown to help with some of lead’s common side effects in children, including lessening irritability and headaches.
Even if garlic isn’t quite the magical cure-all some of these studies seem to tout, it won’t hurt — and it might help! For many people, there is no harm in eating garlic.
Fresh berries
Blueberries have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects, support healthy gastrointestinal microflora, protect brain neurons and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease (lead poisoning increases this risk). Lead induces oxidative stress in our body’s cells, and antioxidants help remove oxidization. Fresh blueberries (wild ones in particular) are one of the most powerful antioxidant foods.
Blueberries are powerful at modulating proinflammatory molecular pathways and oxidative stress. Although studies on blueberries and lead poisoning are limited, it’s reasonable to assume that anything that helps directly counter the damage that lead is known to cause (e.g. oxidative stress, organ stress) can be helpful in supporting the body to heal from lead poisoning.
Bonus foods: Jane Nickert, director of nursing at the Washtenaw Health Department, said foods containing calcium, zinc, vitamin c and iron are some of the best ways to help lower lead levels. (Calcium can interfere with the absorption of iron, so consider eating these foods separately if possible.) Some foods, like cilantro, have also been indicated in research to help remove lead from the body.
These vitamins can help decrease the amount of lead stored in the bones, reduce brain and organ toxicity (caused by lead leeching from the bones), and help excrete the neurotoxin.
Another bonus: A full stomach! “Keeping a full belly helps them absorb less lead,” said Nickert. Empty tummies absorb more lead. Making sure your kiddo has lots of access to healthy foods throughout the day, since their bellies empty quicker than adults’ bellies do, will help prevent them absorbing lead.
Anemia and Lead
Lead and iron seem very similar to the body. Low iron levels are directly associated with elevated lead levels.
Iron levels and lead levels work together (and against each other) in a vicious cycle:
- Lead exposure heightens risk of low iron or anemia. Lead interferes with iron absorption, damages heme synthesis, and raises the destruction of red blood cells.
- Anemia and low iron causes greater susceptibility to lead poisoning. A child with low iron will absorb more lead. Iron deficiency (a cause of anemia) can cause the body to absorb even more lead, especially in the child’s intestinal tract. Two of my babies, Arden and Conall, tested at 8 months for severe iron deficiency anemia when they were hospitalized for norovirus. But even though it’s well-known that anemia is often a warning sign of lead poisoning and Michigan’s children are more at risk for lead, no doctor thought to run a lead blood test for them until their mandatory 12 month lead test. Had we been able to catch it earlier, we would have been able to reduce the exposure, preventing some of the damage and longterm health consequences.
If your young child tests positive for low iron, absolutely get a lead blood test!
A novel environment can reverse damage
Another study indicates that, although lead exposure derails typical brain and body development, the effects can be mitigated and even reversed by a specific kind of environment: specifically, an environment that the child finds stimulating and novel.
As a Montessori teacher, I am more of the mindset that allowing children a lengthy amount of time to explore just a few toys, creating space for independent play and a little bit of healthy boredom (which often sparks creative usage of toys) is best.
But every child is different, and for lead-poisoned children, providing novelty in their environment is particularly important.
In the Johns Hopkins study, the rats’ brain functions were stimulated to increase new neurons and form new connections by frequent changes in their environment: they were given new toys every week. This helped improve their impaired function, to the point that some of the rats’ brains fully returned to normal.
Nickert said, “Lead has a real affinity for the brain.” Anything that supports brain development is helpful to heal lead damage.
Novelty needs among children with ADHD is well-studied, and lead exposure both mimics ADHD in the brain (e.g., the neurodivergent brain and the lead-exposed brain can be very similar in some neural areas), and lead exposure in childhood vastly increases the risk for an ADHD diagnosis later in life.
So interventions that help children with ADHD help lead-poisoned children in the same way.
These children experience a higher drive for novel, different experiences. Stimulating new experiences better challenge their brain, spark curiosity and creativity, and help with longterm memory consolidation — all things needed to help heal and create new neural pathways for lead-poisoned children.
For many children, stimulating novel environments look like frequently rotating toys, spending lots of time outside at different parks, checking out new museums and playspaces and scheduling playdates with a variety of friends.
Nickert said, “Typically we won’t see the effects of lead poisoning right away, developmentally. We often see big impacts at 1st grade when a child is learning to read, then 4th grade when they’re reading to learn, and then again at 7th grade when they’re doing executive-level type of work and longer projects.”
The Nurture Revolution
“The Nurture Revolution,” written by neuroscientist Dr. Greer Kirshenbaum, put a name to a concept that parents throughout centuries have known (and scientists, with lifesaving studies on kangaroo care and more, are verifying) — that keeping your baby close to your skin with lots of tender nurturing care is the healthiest way to care for them.
A nurturing environment includes frequent holding, responsive soothing and engaged interactions. Think lots of eye contact, skin to skin and taking joy in your child.
But nurture fosters and creates millions of neural pathways in the child’s neuroplastic brain. Nurture is the most powerful tool for brain development in a child’s first 3 years. Even small increases in skin to skin produced measurable differences in the babies’ brain matter: only 20 minutes more a day raised a child’s score by 10 points on a neurodevelopment scale system.
Since we know that one of lead exposure’s greatest concern is its impact on a child’s brain, leading to potentially lifelong learning difficulties and mental disorders, anything that helps heal and build neural pathways can be lifechanging.
Nickert says, “The majority of kids with an elevated lead level will do just fine. They just might learn differently. When a child has been lead poisoned, it’s important for parents to share that when they start school. They might need a quiet room, or other adjustments. Maybe a lead poisoned child needs to get up and move, or if a subject is difficult they are allowed to sit in a quiet room to do their work. It’s not that they don’t learn. We just have to give them the tools to make sure they’re successful.”
When I asked Nickert if she felt there is hope for children to heal from lead poisoning, she said confidently, “Absolutely, there is hope.”
This feels like a lot. I know. But I hope you find comfort that it’s also simple.
It’s going to parks, meeting for a playdate at the nature center and throwing some garlic in your kid’s pasta sauce for dinner.
It’s getting in some skin-to-skin cuddles during story time, giving a gentle massage before bed, and making sure their multivitamin contains iron (double check with your pediatrician on your particular child’s needs).
As scary as lead exposure in our children is, I hope this gives you hope — that even if the worse case scenario happens, there are still things we can do to help our children heal.
