completely new and need help! (long)

[Guest guest]

Hi everybody,

This is my first post-- I am completely new to the whole SCD and have only

begun reading BTVC last night. Here is a bit of background:

My son (who just turned 5 in Dec) has a dx of high functioning autism.

We are GFCF and seeing a DAN doc and is taking ASD-plex vitamins as

well as some other vitamins and supplements. We started the GFCF diet about

a year ago and after 3 weeks on the diet and supplements, began

speaking in full sentences and actually having real conversations with us.

It was miraculous. In addition to the dietary interventions, has 30

hrs/week of ABA, 2 hrs/week of speech (he has resolving apraxia also) and an

hour each of OT & PT. He attends a typical preschool with a shadow and will

be taking an extra year of early intervention next year before entering

kindergarten. (We are hoping for mainstream kindergarten at our regular

public school.)

is an amazing, funny, sweet beautiful boy and-- I know I am very lucky

about this-- he is also a great eater! He will eat basically whatever we

serve and feed to him. Although I dreaded the thought of going GFCF, I

found that it was not too hard to adapt some of our favorite recipes so

we've been doing pretty well with it.

After our first round of testing with the DAN doc (stool, urine, hair, blood

analyses) we discovered that has " leaky gut " and that he was sensitive

to not only wheat, but also egg, rice, peanut, beet, soy, sesame, corn, and

coconut. We stayed off all those foods for about 4 months (as per the

doctor's advice) but have since added rice back in and egg in baked

goods/recipes. does not eat regular corn, but he has had some foods

which contain corn, beet or soy products. Once we added rice back in (which

we did because of horrible diarrhea and family stress over being *so* food

limited), began having regular-looking poops and he finally potty

trained. (Interestingly enough, showed no allergies to dairy but we

kept it out because we didn't want to complicate things at that stage.)

Just over the last few months, has been having some more serious

behavior problems-- head banging, much more stimmy, lashing out and beating

on us and his teachers-- than we had noticed in a long time. Our DAN doc

suspects yeast and clostridia and has prescribed Nystatin and Culturelle

Lactobacillus-- which should arrive next week. We tried Diflucan for 2

weeks in Dec, which reacted well to. but a couple weeks after we

stopped, the behaviors reappeared. also has a minor ear infection--

which may explain some of the lashing out, which is his general reaction to

pain-- so we're treating first with garlic oil drops instead of with

antibiotics this time. (We'll see the ENT next week just in case.)

I have always felt that " something is attacking from the inside " and

have at times felt like we try to do everything right, but we just don't

have all the pieces put together. I read one of your success stories where

the mom says she just didn't know what was going to happen after each meal

because her son seemed to react so strongly to foods and vitamins-- that's

us. Some days we " get it right " and is focused and with us and feeling

good. And then some days it's all wrong and he disappears. (Some days we

try to get it right, but then he doesn't eat all his breakfast or has an

extra snack or something, and then it's all wrong again-- or sometimes

amazingly good-- we just don't know what all the factors are!)

Anyhow, I am very hopeful about this diet and my questions are simple:

1. How do we start?

2. Where's the quick list of " legal foods " or recipes? (I'm a decent cook,

but I need a roadmap!)

3. How does all this fit with GFCF and the supplements? Do we have to stop

GFCF or stop vitamins, etc? Or should we keep what we're doing now and then

add in SCD? (And how exactly does that work in keeping a balanced diet?

He's a great eater, but I'm afraid to cut out too much-- can he be healthy

on only 1 or 2 foods?)

4. What's the minimum time you would suggest trying SCD in order to see

results? It helps me to have a timeline so I know that we've given a

treatment our best effort before we change something.

I have never looked for a " miraculous " recovery from autism-- I want most to

see my little guy be the wonderful kid he is, complete with quirks,

focusing, interacting and enjoying life. I want him to be healthy and happy

and I know he's not when he's banging his head on the wall.

Sorry for such a long post but thanks so much for any advice and guidance

you can give! I'm scared about starting, but crying tears of joy that maybe

this will really help!

Cathy