Juice? No, just a glass of olive oil, thank you!
Meet Adam, the boy kept alive by a VERY unusual diet...
MOST of us use it for frying, drizzling and salad dressing.
But for Scots schoolboy Adam Watson, olive oil is far more than a cooking ingredient – it is vital for keeping his brain working. The seven-year-old suffers from an extremely rare genetic condition which means he must consume large amounts of it every day. Unless he drinks a glass of olive oil with every meal, his speech starts to slur, he loses his balance and can even lose consciousness. Adam, from Arbroath in Angus, is one of only 300 people worldwide with an incurable condition named Glut1 deficiency syndrome, which means his brain can’t receive the nourishment it needs from normal food. He has to survive on a diet that minimises his intake of proteins and carbohydrates by only eating tiny amounts of meat, cheese, pasta and bread.
Instead, he must consume a massive amount of pure fat – in the form of calorie-rich olive oil.
His mother Stefanie, 35, said: ‘Adam is absolutely brilliant. He doesn’t even flinch when we make him drink the oil and he never complains.’
Civil servant Mrs Watson and her 40-year-old husband Billy, a North Sea oil firm manager, became worried about Adam’s health soon after his birth in 2004. They noticed he had difficulty with co-ordination and would frequently appear to black out. Doctors thought he might have epilepsy or cerebral palsy, but tests at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee when he was six diagnosed Glut1 deficiency syndrome. Adam drinks 120ml of olive oil a day and also takes fat supplement calogen. He can only have 10.7g of protein per meal, usually cold meat, and 10g of carbohydrates, less than a slice of bread.
Although burgers and chips are high in fat, Adam cannot eat them because they are also high in carbohydrates. Mrs Watson, said: ‘We can never give Adam any kind of sweets or take him to McDonald’s, treats most other seven-yearold boys take for granted.’ The family is now trying to raise £5,000 to travel with Adam and their six-year-old daughter Evan to a special conference on the condition in Indianapolis in July.