Team-BHP - The Autism Thread

my son is autistic. 4 years old. am based in Chennai.

we have been following a combination of DAN protocol ( a diet/supplement based therapy mode ), GFCFSF diet ( gluten, caesin, sugar free ) and ABA based therapy

of course, we follow the above to the best possible/available resources in India ( which I would say is at maybe 40-50% of what is available in the west -especially the US )

BUT with this, we saw very good improvement over the last 1 year when my son has been subjected to the same.

autism is clearly taking the shape of an epidemic

I just casually came to this section today wondering whether TBHP might have a thread on autism and i find it in the FIRST PAGE.

THAT SAYS A LOT ABOUT THE PREVALENCE OF AUTISM

any parents new to the world of autism, feel free to reach out for any info, queries or any assistance in Chennai. happy to help

Samurai
DAN does not include homeopathy
please refer this site for lot of resources on DAN - www.autism.com

Gluten free means avoiding wheat maida etc. the main thing that kids like is biscuits. it was difficult initially. but now its better. off late we see some revival in my sons interest in biscuits !

there are alternatives available. you get gluten free atta from sunira foods. pls check their website for online ordering. a bit expensive but gives some variety for the kids. you also get gluten free cookies.

if you have some people in US - ask them to carry GFCFSF foods when they come here.

you are right, for some kids the result may not show. i did some reading on the gluten peptide effect and have been convinced by that logic

frankly, on a practical basis, its very very difficult to observe and check what the impact of removing gluten is. for e.g some say, it takes 3-6 weeks for existing gluten in the sytem to be purged.
for some kids, gluten alone may not give that dramatic results but in association with other supplements, it may prove useful

so i am going purely by the logic of gluten's harmful effect. i have not verified its effect in isolation but have seen an overall improvement

sugar free - now this is more to do with removing the very food that the harmful yeast feeds on. many autistic kids have yeast infections in their gut. this leads/promotes the leaky gut condition. removing sugar ( processed sugar ) is a way to starve the yeast

alternatives is to use honey, jaggery ( again only in moderation )

come to think of it GFCFSF diet is as such one of the MOST healthiest diet. so putting our kids on this diet would only help them. of course administration is difficult but worth the effort

Quote:

Originally Posted by wildon (Post 1837642)

A Special Educator who is working with my wife suggested this academy. A B Academy - HRBR Layout.

Dr.Smita Awasthi.

As per her getting admission is very difficult.

Contact Person name: Rumno Mukherjee : 9945562005
Website: Behavior Momentum (I) Pvt Limited

My wife works as a ABA therapist in this academy.
She says that there is a long waiting list for admission. And still there are parents approaching them for registering.
It seems this is the only centre in India which practises ABA-only-not-any-other-therapy.

Quote:

Relatives and friends often treat us with long faces and unhealthy amount of tch tch thrown our way. It is strange to find ourselves more cheerful than them. We are not drowning ourselves in sorrow, we just wish others don't try to drown us either.

I just do not have words to type. But, I Know you two are wonderful parents :thumbs up. The ones with the most difficult problems can laugh more at life! What does'nt kill, you makes you stronger! :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samurai (Post 1842761)

My son is on B-Complex, vitamin C, probiotiocs and cod liver oil supplements. I’ve also been advised to go on GFCF diet (gluten free, casein free). Removing casein was easy, my son never liked any dairy products to start with. Gluten however is a nightmare, it means no wheat, no sooji, no oats, no corn and no to even more stuff ( www.gfcfdiet.com ). Until now I’ve only reduced gluten.

The biggest problem is taking cakes and biscuits away from kids. I’ve heard there is a place in Bangalore selling GFCF snacks, don’t have the details. But there is an online store Sunira Foods and they deliver anywhere in India. As my son’s doc is pushing for it, I have to give it a try. :Frustrati

I don't think any of the double blind studies done on autism & GFCD diet have shown that a GFCD diet helps. However, going GFCD very rarely harms. A lot of Gastro-Instestinal problems are solved by GFCD.

Quote:

Originally Posted by narayan (Post 1891948)

autism is clearly taking the shape of an epidemic

There is a conspiracy theory in the US saying that vaccination is a cause of the autism epidemic. However, there is no scientific basis behind this.

I would avoid Ayurvedic treatment for autism. There is another unproven theory going around that heavy metals are a cause of autism & a lot of Ayurvedic medicines contain heavy metals.
I have made a post earlier about some side-effects of Ayurvedic medicines because of their heavy metal content - http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/shifti...ml#post1492293

Another thing about Autism is that a decent percentage of autistic people have extraordinary ability in some other area. i.e. what god taketh in the social behaviour area, he giveth in some other area - Savant syndrome - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The guy who invented Bit Torrents suffers from Aspergers. There are a lot of such geniuses who are autistic.

Carboy, can you kindly refrain from making sensational statements like that doesn't work, this doesn't work, etc. We are all capable of doing Google research here and can find counter statements for the same. And trust me, parents of Autistic kids would have done lot more than googling. They would have talked to numerous doctors, therapists, parents of other autistic kids undergoing various treatments, etc.

This is a thread for people who have near and dear ones having autism condition. Autism is a such a condition that even modern medicine is pretty much clueless about a definite cure. And it is well known in autism circles that same treatment doesn't show similar results across all autistic kids. So we throw stones in every direction hoping something will eventually hit the target.

Frankly we don't care if double blind studies are done or not. If another parent says GFCF worked for their kids, we are inclined to try it for a while. If it doesn't work for us, we'll look at something else.

If you know something that worked, let us know. With so little treatment options available to us, we don't want to hear what doesn't work, especially when it is based on Google research.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mpower (Post 1921839)

Some disturbing statistics I saw on TV.

80% of couples with an Autistic child in America end up in divorce. Much higher than the normal rate. As if the kid doesn't have enough to go through already.

My wife's comments on that in italics.

It's the stress. Agreed it's hard for the kid, but what our kids put us through is something else. We too crack up sometime or the other. My son's institute often has counselling for parents for this very reason.

Here atleast we can hire maids to cook and clean and concentrate on the child. I can imagine it being so much harder in US with no help and very little family support.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samurai (Post 1924749)

My wife's comments on that in italics.

It's the stress. Agreed it's hard for the kid, but what our kids put us through is something else. We too crack up sometime or the other. My son's institute often has counselling for parents for this very reason.

Here atleast we can hire maids to cook and clean and concentrate on the child. I can imagine it being so much harder in US with no help and very little family support.

Hi,

I completely agree with your wife.Parents play a vital role here, they need to keep thier cool.
My friend had to leave her job to concentrate on her daughter, fortunately she could take services of a very good therapist and that has worked wonders.

Samurai, i didnt go through this thread earlier, and must say it was a great idea to put your experiences and learnings here for the benefit of others. I got to know about your son's special needs only when we met.

As rightly mentioned, denial is what stops parents from seeking treatment for the little one. A relative's daughter has a special condition which demanded attention from an early age. However, the parents lived in denial all along, and when they finally ralized something was amiss, a lot of time had passed. It was when the younger one (who was just a year younger) started responding much differently that reality struck. The little one is now undergoing theraphy at AIISH in Mysore, with both parents having to live seperately to balance their lives, very much as Samurai had mentioned in this post of his : http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/1853666-post27.html

Not sure if the child is autistic, but i make sure i always show greater affection towards her over the normal child whenever i meet her so she never feels different.