Lochlan ate strawberries!
So..... as many of you ASD parents know feeding is hardly enjoyable. The constant prompting, pleading, persuading, encouraging and praying is exhausting!!! Like many we have fought this battle since nearly the begining and with slow progress and frequent regression its easy to get discouraged. BUT... for those of you who are at your breaking point. HANG ON! Your hard work will pay off and when you have that success no matter how big or small somehow it will give you enough hope and power to carry on. One year ago, Sully was limited to (all casein-free) grilled cheese, chicken nuggets, fries, applesauce, juice and rice milk. Lochlan was primarily on baby food (number 2 only) with the occasional chicken nugget, potato chip or french fry.
Sully did feeding therapy for a while with a pediatric behavioral psychologist and an Occupational Therapist with very little progress. Cody and I spent hours with him at the table promising him a chip for every bite he would take just to keep a feeding tube out. This bite for bite technique worked but it was very labor intensive and time consuming. So we started promising him 2 chips for every 2 bites then 3 until he was eating the majority of his plate and then getting a handful of chips at the end. This took lots of time and we reserved chips only for mealtime and if he ate what was requested. This is crucial as if he had access to them any other time they wouldn't have been enough of a reinforcer for him to eat. Once he was eating decent we started putting one piece of non-perferred food on his plate ex. one green bean or one strawberry slice. It is important to first have success with bite for bite before you add any non-perferred foods (at least for us it was) as before he would shut down totally if anything nonperfered was on his plate. The requirement would be to first taste the nonperferred food before chips would be given. Once successfull with a taste then we would require him to bite, chew and swallow before the chips were given. Once he was successful with this technique we changed to 2 bites of non-perferred the next time and so on. (Only move to 2 bites of nonperferred when they are eating one bite independently before reinforcer.)
Hint: do only one-two non perferred foods per week and then switch. But keep re-introducing them until they will eat them independently.
This technique has given us huge success with both boys. Feeding is still an issue sometimes and our issues have changed too, but it is much better and we have much more variety. Now if I can actually get them to stop arguing at the dinner table!
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Supplement Updates
Just wanted to update our supplements as we have gone back to Super Nu Thera. Lochlan wasn't tolerating the ASD plex and it was upsetting his stomach. So far the boys continue to do well and Sully really seems to be more mellow and able to cope with stressors better.
AM
500mg Inositol (twinlabs)
250mg Inositol/250mg Choline (twinlabs)
Lunch
1/2 tsp Super Nu Thera w/ P5P
4 cod liver oil soft gels (nordic naturals children's)
1 oz Aloe Vera Juice (akins brand)
1 pro-defense chewable wafer probiotic (kirkman labs)
1 AFP chewable enzyme (houston) / or 1 enzyme-complete w/ isogest (kirkmans)
1/2 cap very berry blend multi-mega antioxidant (solaray)
1 tsp calcium/ magnesium citrate
1/2 tsp Amino acid support (kirkmans)
1/2 scoop Intra-cell Gen 2 (ourkidsasd)
500mg Inositol
250mg Inositol/250 Choline
Supper
1/2 tsp Super Nu Thera w/ p5p
1 oz Aloe vera juice
1 pro-defense chewable wafer
1 AFP chewable enzyme / or 1 cap enzyme complete with isogest
500mg Inositol
250mg Inositol/250mg Choline
1 zinc lozenge (30mg) w/ slippery elm (kirkmans)-before bed
AM
500mg Inositol (twinlabs)
250mg Inositol/250mg Choline (twinlabs)
Lunch
1/2 tsp Super Nu Thera w/ P5P
4 cod liver oil soft gels (nordic naturals children's)
1 oz Aloe Vera Juice (akins brand)
1 pro-defense chewable wafer probiotic (kirkman labs)
1 AFP chewable enzyme (houston) / or 1 enzyme-complete w/ isogest (kirkmans)
1/2 cap very berry blend multi-mega antioxidant (solaray)
1 tsp calcium/ magnesium citrate
1/2 tsp Amino acid support (kirkmans)
1/2 scoop Intra-cell Gen 2 (ourkidsasd)
500mg Inositol
250mg Inositol/250 Choline
Supper
1/2 tsp Super Nu Thera w/ p5p
1 oz Aloe vera juice
1 pro-defense chewable wafer
1 AFP chewable enzyme / or 1 cap enzyme complete with isogest
500mg Inositol
250mg Inositol/250mg Choline
1 zinc lozenge (30mg) w/ slippery elm (kirkmans)-before bed
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Vaccines- We are poisoning our children!
Here is a link to the generation rescue site (Jenny McCarthy's site) that has info regarding vaccines and autism. My goal is to help educate so each mother/father can make their own decision-one that considers all the information-not just what the govt wants you to know.
Please check it out.
http://www.generationrescue.org/evidence-science/05a-autism-and-vaccines.htm
Please check it out.
http://www.generationrescue.org/evidence-science/05a-autism-and-vaccines.htm
Monday, March 2, 2009
A Starting Place
First of all I just want to say that over the past year we have been greatly blessed by God with great workers, friends, family and professionals. A few years ago I had no idea what autism was and now I can't remember life without it. All the children and their families we have met along the way touched us and we are so proud to be where we are today. Now some people wonder where we started. Let me tell you:
(Just as a side note- we did not do any chiropractic treatment until February 2009. I would encourage people to evaluate the structure of the spine first as it is crucial to helping the body heal itself. I am thankful that we have met a great chiropractor here in Des Moines that is passionate to heal children with autism and I wonder where we would be today if we had started out in the beginging with having the body completely aligned and working properly. So really the first thing I would tell people to do is see a good chiropractor who believes in treating autism biomedically and make sure that the body is properly aligned so it can work most efficiently. However...)
The first decision I made was to improve the boys' diet. I did lots of research and it just seemed to me like the easiest thing to start with. No possible side effects and we'd all be eating better.
Also the body will not absorb properly unless it is healed! So how do you heal it? Our children (especially those more suseptable to damage-premies, other birth complications, GI issues the list goes on and on), their bodies have been fighting from the beginging. Environmental toxins, vaccine toxins, drug toxins (either passed from mother or prescripton drugs given to baby) these all tax the body and when the body is busy fighting off toxins and virus' it has a hard time doing the job it was made to do-grow and learn. So first step is to clean up diet- if there are GI issues (diarrehea or constipation, ear infection, skin rash or lack of eye contact) my first suggestion is to go completely off dairy (casein). It takes about 48 hours to really get it out of their system but you should results at least within 3-4 days. If there are no significant results then it becomes a personal choice to either stay off and see what happens as more time goes by or add it back in and watch for negative symptoms. Either way no harm done. I will warn you- my kids too had a very limited diet and it was scary as they would only eat things with dairy in it. So when we went off dairy they had to eat totally new foods. Amazingly they did and they learned to like new things, unfortunatly they still have somewhat limited diets but at least there is no dairy and their diets are improving. Next eliminate all food dyes, high fructose corn syrup, enriched foods and any genetically engineered foods. This will help with mood and sensory issues. Finally limit sugars and any other processed foods and keep a food diary so you can figure out what foods are problem areas. Also keep in mind that if a food is craved obsessively than it is probably not good for their bodies and is acting more like a drug.
Second of all you have to remove other toxins that could be damaging or occupying the bodies energy such as prescription drugs, chemicals in lotions, soaps, and so on. This can be tricky and its nearly impossible to rid your environment of all but making a conciencous effort really helps and doing it little by little. I started by changing laundry and bath soaps then moved on to shampoos and lotions and then look at what you cook with and what you use in the microwave. Keep in mind that traditional medicine has a place in the world just be aware that everytime antibiotics are given #1 the good bacteria is also killed off and #2 Yeast thrive. So if antibiotics are necessary make sure you take precautionary measures and increase probiotics.
Third- add in vitamins and supplements. I know every kid is different and what worked for us may not work for you. Sooo, here is a starting place.
1. Probiotics- EVERYONE needs probiotics. Good bacteria is necessary to keep the balance.
2. Enzymes- Help with digestion. I know that I feel much better when I take enzymes-my body doesn't need to work so hard. Our bodies today for some reason just do not have all the enzymes needed or get enough enzymes from food for digesition and adding in enzymes is very helpful. (just make sure that you start with a broad spectrum enzyme-for children- as some are very strong (enzymedica- Digest Gold) was too strong for my small son and was just too much. You can tell by their stools too.
3. Cod liver oil- this too everyone can benefit from and our kiddos especially need help with focus, attending and brian function.
4. Multi-vitamin- Kirkman's has a great multi-vitamin/wafer for kids
5. Antioxidants- these we no longer get from our food and are necessary to minimize free radical damage to the brain. We use Soloray mutli-mega antioxidant with very berry.
6. Aloe vera juice- very healing to gut and also normalizes Ph in stomach and aids in absorbtion.
7. Inositol -very effective for OCD symptoms and anxiety.
Lastly- Chiropractic care, Occupational therapy, speech therapy and ABA are also important. We found that no matter what the therapy the best chance of success is if the body is healthy so that is where we started. The body needs to function properly in order to develop.
(We also consult a DAN! Dr. and had some labs run as well but these supplements above are completely natural and things that all people would benefit from. There are links throughout my blog with research and data on most of the suppelments we give. If you can afford a DAN! dr. they are great but I found that most things are trial and error anyway and so we do minimal consulting. We choose to do nothing that can further damage the boys so we do only no risk supplements so worst case scenario we are wasting our money. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. )
(Just as a side note- we did not do any chiropractic treatment until February 2009. I would encourage people to evaluate the structure of the spine first as it is crucial to helping the body heal itself. I am thankful that we have met a great chiropractor here in Des Moines that is passionate to heal children with autism and I wonder where we would be today if we had started out in the beginging with having the body completely aligned and working properly. So really the first thing I would tell people to do is see a good chiropractor who believes in treating autism biomedically and make sure that the body is properly aligned so it can work most efficiently. However...)
The first decision I made was to improve the boys' diet. I did lots of research and it just seemed to me like the easiest thing to start with. No possible side effects and we'd all be eating better.
Also the body will not absorb properly unless it is healed! So how do you heal it? Our children (especially those more suseptable to damage-premies, other birth complications, GI issues the list goes on and on), their bodies have been fighting from the beginging. Environmental toxins, vaccine toxins, drug toxins (either passed from mother or prescripton drugs given to baby) these all tax the body and when the body is busy fighting off toxins and virus' it has a hard time doing the job it was made to do-grow and learn. So first step is to clean up diet- if there are GI issues (diarrehea or constipation, ear infection, skin rash or lack of eye contact) my first suggestion is to go completely off dairy (casein). It takes about 48 hours to really get it out of their system but you should results at least within 3-4 days. If there are no significant results then it becomes a personal choice to either stay off and see what happens as more time goes by or add it back in and watch for negative symptoms. Either way no harm done. I will warn you- my kids too had a very limited diet and it was scary as they would only eat things with dairy in it. So when we went off dairy they had to eat totally new foods. Amazingly they did and they learned to like new things, unfortunatly they still have somewhat limited diets but at least there is no dairy and their diets are improving. Next eliminate all food dyes, high fructose corn syrup, enriched foods and any genetically engineered foods. This will help with mood and sensory issues. Finally limit sugars and any other processed foods and keep a food diary so you can figure out what foods are problem areas. Also keep in mind that if a food is craved obsessively than it is probably not good for their bodies and is acting more like a drug.
Second of all you have to remove other toxins that could be damaging or occupying the bodies energy such as prescription drugs, chemicals in lotions, soaps, and so on. This can be tricky and its nearly impossible to rid your environment of all but making a conciencous effort really helps and doing it little by little. I started by changing laundry and bath soaps then moved on to shampoos and lotions and then look at what you cook with and what you use in the microwave. Keep in mind that traditional medicine has a place in the world just be aware that everytime antibiotics are given #1 the good bacteria is also killed off and #2 Yeast thrive. So if antibiotics are necessary make sure you take precautionary measures and increase probiotics.
Third- add in vitamins and supplements. I know every kid is different and what worked for us may not work for you. Sooo, here is a starting place.
1. Probiotics- EVERYONE needs probiotics. Good bacteria is necessary to keep the balance.
2. Enzymes- Help with digestion. I know that I feel much better when I take enzymes-my body doesn't need to work so hard. Our bodies today for some reason just do not have all the enzymes needed or get enough enzymes from food for digesition and adding in enzymes is very helpful. (just make sure that you start with a broad spectrum enzyme-for children- as some are very strong (enzymedica- Digest Gold) was too strong for my small son and was just too much. You can tell by their stools too.
3. Cod liver oil- this too everyone can benefit from and our kiddos especially need help with focus, attending and brian function.
4. Multi-vitamin- Kirkman's has a great multi-vitamin/wafer for kids
5. Antioxidants- these we no longer get from our food and are necessary to minimize free radical damage to the brain. We use Soloray mutli-mega antioxidant with very berry.
6. Aloe vera juice- very healing to gut and also normalizes Ph in stomach and aids in absorbtion.
7. Inositol -very effective for OCD symptoms and anxiety.
Lastly- Chiropractic care, Occupational therapy, speech therapy and ABA are also important. We found that no matter what the therapy the best chance of success is if the body is healthy so that is where we started. The body needs to function properly in order to develop.
(We also consult a DAN! Dr. and had some labs run as well but these supplements above are completely natural and things that all people would benefit from. There are links throughout my blog with research and data on most of the suppelments we give. If you can afford a DAN! dr. they are great but I found that most things are trial and error anyway and so we do minimal consulting. We choose to do nothing that can further damage the boys so we do only no risk supplements so worst case scenario we are wasting our money. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. )
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Supplements and Progress
This year 2009 has been incredibly awesome! We finally jumped through enough hoops with the state and both boys are recieving waiver benefits and we are finally able to afford therapy, clinics and the visits to the psychologist for both boys! A huge weight has been lifted off our shoulders and it feels so good to be able to get all the help for them that they need without having all the financial burden or weighing which one is more important at this time.
Also this year Lochlan continues to make tremendous gains with ABA and Speech therapy. He is a totally different kid and to see him emerge more and more each day is breathtaking. I never knew if we would ever get ahead of the autism or damage done to his body (immune, neurological and gastrointestinal systems) but I feel like we are head to head with it now. Lochlan's speech therapist told me that she had started an evaluation and that in some areas he was scoring WITHIN HIS AGE RANGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Taking into consideration that less than 9 months ago they could not even evaluate him because he had barely any language skills and now he is in his age range in some areas. What a miracle!!! I truly believe that God is at work here and that this is a testament that He can do anything! For Lochlan to gain that much development in only 9 months is impossible by human standards. And what is so amazing is that everyday we can see him gaining more and more ground.
Sully is also making huge strides. He amazes us as his intelligence surpasses mine daily! He is getting taller and is begining to learn how to deal with his sensory issues. One of our more recent issues is that he had started pulling up and at his pants obsessively all day. It became such a problem that it impaired his daily function and just walking down the hall was an ordeal. I kept thinking that this has to be sensory. Of course sensory is the most difficult kind of problem to figure out. We had also been dealing with him stomping around the house. For 35 pounds he sounded like a 3 ton elephant!!! No matter how many reminders, it was as if he couldn't help himself. I keep racking my brain for possible culprits... diet, supplements, sensory overloads. The only thing that made any sense was that my hypersensitive son was have trouble feeling his pants on his waist or his feet on the ground. So I pulled out some old undies(training pants that I made for him while we were potty training) and we gave them a shot. At first he complained that they were too tight. I kept telling him that we have to be scientists and give it a few days to collect data. He was more receptive to the idea as long as we were only doing a trial. The first day I can count on one hand how many times I saw him pulling on his pants!!! It was amazing. He no longer fights me about them and the problem is currently non existent! To handle his stomping we discovered that about 10 minutes on the trampoline would help the heavy footedness for about an hour or two. (one of our respite workers who is also a family friend suggested this)
As for supplements:
Our current supplement schedule is as follows.
Lunch: (I mix the following in a banana puree with a bit of apple/orange juice and then administer with a syringe)
1 scoop of ASD plex (millinium nutritionals)
1 cap EnZym-Complete/DPP-IV II with Isogest (kirkmans)
1 cap mega-mulit antioxidant w/ very Berry (Solaray)
1/2 500mg cap Insotiol (solaray)
1/2 tsp Nordic Naturals Cod liver oil for kids
1 cap bio-defense probriotic (kirkmans)
2mls Aloe Vera Juice (Akins Brand)-for absorbtion
Supper:
The same as above without the ASD plex.
Also this year Lochlan continues to make tremendous gains with ABA and Speech therapy. He is a totally different kid and to see him emerge more and more each day is breathtaking. I never knew if we would ever get ahead of the autism or damage done to his body (immune, neurological and gastrointestinal systems) but I feel like we are head to head with it now. Lochlan's speech therapist told me that she had started an evaluation and that in some areas he was scoring WITHIN HIS AGE RANGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Taking into consideration that less than 9 months ago they could not even evaluate him because he had barely any language skills and now he is in his age range in some areas. What a miracle!!! I truly believe that God is at work here and that this is a testament that He can do anything! For Lochlan to gain that much development in only 9 months is impossible by human standards. And what is so amazing is that everyday we can see him gaining more and more ground.
Sully is also making huge strides. He amazes us as his intelligence surpasses mine daily! He is getting taller and is begining to learn how to deal with his sensory issues. One of our more recent issues is that he had started pulling up and at his pants obsessively all day. It became such a problem that it impaired his daily function and just walking down the hall was an ordeal. I kept thinking that this has to be sensory. Of course sensory is the most difficult kind of problem to figure out. We had also been dealing with him stomping around the house. For 35 pounds he sounded like a 3 ton elephant!!! No matter how many reminders, it was as if he couldn't help himself. I keep racking my brain for possible culprits... diet, supplements, sensory overloads. The only thing that made any sense was that my hypersensitive son was have trouble feeling his pants on his waist or his feet on the ground. So I pulled out some old undies(training pants that I made for him while we were potty training) and we gave them a shot. At first he complained that they were too tight. I kept telling him that we have to be scientists and give it a few days to collect data. He was more receptive to the idea as long as we were only doing a trial. The first day I can count on one hand how many times I saw him pulling on his pants!!! It was amazing. He no longer fights me about them and the problem is currently non existent! To handle his stomping we discovered that about 10 minutes on the trampoline would help the heavy footedness for about an hour or two. (one of our respite workers who is also a family friend suggested this)
As for supplements:
Our current supplement schedule is as follows.
Lunch: (I mix the following in a banana puree with a bit of apple/orange juice and then administer with a syringe)
1 scoop of ASD plex (millinium nutritionals)
1 cap EnZym-Complete/DPP-IV II with Isogest (kirkmans)
1 cap mega-mulit antioxidant w/ very Berry (Solaray)
1/2 500mg cap Insotiol (solaray)
1/2 tsp Nordic Naturals Cod liver oil for kids
1 cap bio-defense probriotic (kirkmans)
2mls Aloe Vera Juice (Akins Brand)-for absorbtion
Supper:
The same as above without the ASD plex.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Inositol and Autism
Recently our psychologist who is also every bit of a DAN! dr. as our actual DAN! dr recommended that we try using Inositol for Sully's anxiety and OCD. She printed out a paper on some research that was done and when I got home from our appointment I did some further research on google. There have been a couple different papers written about the use of the B vitamin Inositol and how it could be used to treat OCD symptoms, anxiety, depression and many others. One particular paper concluded that there were no significant results on 9 autistic test subjects but that more testing is warrented. This appealed to me as there is no risk in trying this particular B (3) vitamin. I scanned quite a few different blog sites of parents of autistic children and the burden of proof was overwhelming. So many children were responding to Inositol and the results were amazing. We have come so far and made so much gain-much more than I could have ever dreamed of-with the use of supplements that it was worth a shot. My philosophy is: its worth a try as long as there is no risk. I picked up some 500mg capsules from our local health food store and started BOTH boys on 250mg 2 times a day. Within a week we were starting to see that Sully was much more calm and wasn't so high strung throughout the day. He was following directions more easily and actually would stay in time out without shouting. I also had decided to give it to Lochlan as well for mood regulation and just to see if it would have any calming effects on him. Lochlan too has been more managable and seems to be more easily redirected. I know it is still early to be so conclusive but I am hopeful as we continue that this supplement will continue to work for them. Below are some links to some of the research I came across on this vitamin. Some of the papers describe how Inositol can also be very helpful for hair pulling and skin picking!
http://westsuffolkpsych.homestead.com/Inositol.html
http://www.oralchelation.com/ingred/inositos.htm
http://www.curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=49840
http://autism.com/ari/newsletter/112/page2.pdf
http://westsuffolkpsych.homestead.com/Inositol.html
http://www.oralchelation.com/ingred/inositos.htm
http://www.curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=49840
http://autism.com/ari/newsletter/112/page2.pdf
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Terbutaline and Autism
I have recently run across some information regarding terbutaline and autism. This comes as quite a shock to me as I was given this drug (FDA approved to treat asthma-not preterm labor!) during both pregnancies for pre-term labor. My doctor never disclosed to me that it was not FDA approved and had I known the risks I would have never taken it. This goes to show that you really have to investigate every pharmacuetical and over the counter drug before you take it-regardless of what your physician says. What really upsets me is there has been research done that suggests a correlation but physicians continue to prescribe it. The link to Dr. Kaplan's Interview is below:
http://www.usautism.org/terbutlaline_interview_autism_one_radio_082305.htm
http://www.usautism.org/terbutlaline_interview_autism_one_radio_082305.htm
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