Hi everyone,
Sorry I couldn’t make it to the last Coffee Connection – sick kids. I am also going to miss April 3rd too – babysitting neighbor’s kids. Anyway, thought I leave some information about the bio-medical journey we are on with my son’s autism.
Gluten Free / Casein Free Diet:
First off, we are staring with a gluten free / casein free diet for at least 6 months (probably longer) to rule out any gut function issues that may be there (very common with kids with autism). We are now just finishing month 4 of the diet. We have also pretty much cut out soy, eggs and peanut too. We (my husband and I) have not seen much change in his behavior at this point. However, Ryan’s preschool teachers, bus drivers and school teachers have noticed an improvement in his behavior ( increased class participation, decreased anxiety, etc).
Lab Work:
We are now going to get some lab work done on Ryan to nail down for sure what, if any, food sensitivities he may have so that we know what direction to take the diet. We were hoping that the diet alone would give us enough confirmation without the lab work. So lab work is next on our list. We are avoiding the doctor route as much as possible (to save money and my lack of trust in most doctors) and will be getting our lab work done throughdirectlabs.com. The labs we are considering doing are the IgG Food Antibodies test that rates any delayed reactions ( act like toxins /stressors in the body) to 90 different foods, a Comprehensive Digestive Stool Analysis test that will give us a complete look at Ryan’s digestion and absorption along with any issues with yeast in his system, and finally a third test called Organic Acids. This test goes really in depth on how everything is metabolized in his system. Children on the spectrum are often too high or too low in certain areas that need to be equalized through supplementation. The results are very heavy duty so you need to either do your own research into bio-chemistry or see a doctor whospecializes in autism and supplementation to guide you through this. I am going to attempt to do as much on my own as possible.
Vitamin / Mineral Supplementation:
We have also started a new liquid multi- vitamin / mineral supplement with Ryan from BrainChild Nutritionals. It looks like it is really good stuff and I have read many success stories on it. The vitamins are tailored specifically to an autistic child’s needs and are good quality. We started the vitamins a week ago and haveseen an increase in speech (conversation skills). We are only at half dose at this point.
***If you need any information on nutritional supplementation,testing or trying a gluten free/ casein free diet please don’t hesitate to ask me. I want to help anyone I can. I have done most of my research on my own because I didn’t know anyone to ask. I have done loads of research and can save you some time and can direct you to other good contacts. I can give you tips on starting the diet, the vitamins, etc. My background is as a Chiropractic Technician and I worked deeply with nutritional needs of the patients we used to have. I believe very strongly that everyASD kid needs a unique combination of therapies and that many (probably all to some degree) of those kids need help from the ground up starting at a nutritional level. With a firm base (the child getting all there nutritional needs met and not being burdened by toxins in their systems) it makes any additional therapy(ABA,RDI, speech, OT, etc) that more effective.
Sites to consider :
brainchildnutritionals.com – great products, vitamins, minerals, fish oils, etc. Terri Mikland is a great contact at this company. She is extremely knowledgible in nutrition and has a preteen son with autism. She recommended Direct Labs.
directlabs.com – any lab you can think of is on this site, do not need a doctor’s prescription to get any of the labs done. Results sent to you. They accept some insurances (but not ours).
generationrescue.org – gives you the general idea of bio-medical intervention and gives you ideas of avenues to look into.
For a specialized diet consider these books:
The Kid-Friendly ADHD & Autism Cookbook by Pamela Compart and Dana Laake and the Special Diets for Special Kids by Lisa Lewis – both of these books dedicate the first half of the book to explaining the importance of specialized diets in these kids and how all of it works. The second half of the book is all recipes. I have tried a few and my kids love them.
Hope this information has been helpful to someone.
Karen
