question: autistic child develops catatonia at age 12: anyone else hear of this?

[Guest guest]

I have a question to the group. I know many of you are incredibly informed on

the medical side of autism.

So my question is this: Have any of you come across any information on a child

who has regressive autism, has limited language, develops physically typical

despite this, and suddenly develops catatonia that progresses to the point where

the child is no longer able to walk unassisted, limited language is completely

gone, unable to eat, no longer having the ability to chew because he is frozen

if you would, and stays frozen in?rigid body movements.

A friends child is going through this. After onset, the doctors fearing

seratonin syndrome because he was taking conservative amounts of an ssri

(celexa) and wellbutrin, completely removed him from these meds. I guess they

know best, but despite removing him from the ssri and dopamine drugs, his

catatonia has gotten incredibly worse. He is now 14, and honestly, it does not

look good.

My friend has been going to the medical university in our state for help. They

have been great about bringing in experts in catatonia, but no one has been able

to figure out what is causing this.

Have any of you come across any information of a child that has experienced

this? Thank you for any information you can share.