Help For a 'New' Mom on the Autism Journey

Since announcing on the radio that Aleks has autism, I have had the privlege of helping along a few moms who are in the beginning of their own autism journey. One of my new moms just received her son's food sensitivity testing results back and is feeling so overwhlemed. Here is part of the email I sent her. Hopefully the information will be helpful to you too. I've taken out some of the personal information, but felt the rest was okay to leave in.

Faith, Hope & Healing~
Melissa

***************************************

Hi! You are not alone. I really feel for you. I totally understand how overwhelming it is when you first get the test results back. I cried all the way home from Whole Foods. What exactly is your child sensitive to? Give me all the foods and let me see what suggestions I can come up with for you. If not chicken or turkey nuggets, I've also made homemade fish sticks for Aleks out of tilapia. It's easy and yummy for her. By the way, Aleks was a super picky eater before the diet. She was down to just a few foods, but after removing all her sensitive foods it got better. All of a sudden she started eating her veggies again! She also was more willing to try new foods! Most of the foods she was eating were the ones that she was sensitive to. Hence her body being addicted to them.

It sounds like your child is still in the 'food fog' that so many of our kids are. When we took out the chicken, corn, rice, soy in addition to gluten and casein is when Aleks had her severe withdrawals. For 3 weeks she was up crying at night and just plain miserable. Then it stopped and it has gradually gotten better. Is your child in Speech Therapy? If not that has been huge for Aleks. We love our ST if you need the name of someone. She has experience with autism and really supports the GFCF diet. Before the diet, Aleks attention span was seconds to a few minutes max. 3 weeks after the starting the diet she was up to 20 minutes for being able to sit still and concentrate. The speech has come along from there. She has never been non-verbal, but has always struggled with just a few words. Now, six months later she is talking in short sentences. The other key element in her healing has been supplementation. I buy many of
mine from Kirkman Labs. I know Dr. Spore will soon start carrying them. Their Super Nu Thera was developed for autistic children and is a high dose of Vit. Bs and magnesium. We also found that Nordic Naturals 'Children's DHA' really has helped. During the beginning of the diet she did 1 t. 2x day. We mixed it in with her apple juice, along with the Super Nu Thera and a few others. The DHA helps calm the brain down. They're finding that so many of our kids have swollen brains. I have Aleks on a strict supplement schedule. I got it from Dr. McCandless's book recommendations and Dr. Spore.

As far as your child's speech, a ST will most likely be able to help you figure out what is going on. We learned that besides it being a speech problem that Aleks wasn't able to comprehend what we were saying. Her cognitive just wasn't there. ST has helped. Susan, our ST, also really helped by giving us tips on how to talk to her which helped. It is so cool to see once things come together. One of the things we learned is to talk as slowly and simply as possible. Fewer words, simple commands and use as many visuals as possible. It won't always be that way, but it will help his brain catch up.

I hope some of this helps. You've been on my mind a lot lately. Rough couple of days with Aleks being sick. It is amazing how the autism stims always get worse during illness.

You're in my thoughts & prayers. Hang in there and know you're not alone.

Blessings-

Melissa