RE: Suppliments/diet/and hand flapping?

April 26, 2001

My son who remains undiagnosed at this time is 5.5 years old. He is very

verbal and had just speech between 3 and 4. He had several sensory issues

and still does to some extent. Also very small and has digestive problems.

Due to all of this I put him on gfcf with his younger diagnosed ASD brother.

I also just started SNT and probiotics 3 days ago. The last 2 days I have

noticed his raising his arm slightly and flicking his wrist a couple of times

then stops. He can't tell me why he is doing it and I am not sure he is

fully aware when he is doing it. Does this sound familiar to any of you? My

younger ASD son doesn't have any arm flapping issues so I am not sure what

this is in my older son. Can the diet and suppliments bring out some inner

or hidden behavoirs beneath the surface? Will this behavoir go away once my

older son's body adjusts to the suppliments and diet. He tells me he feels

so much better now and he is no longer constipated....we have been GFCF since

Easter. Before that we were for 4 days but on antibotics that we probably

not GFCF.

Debbie

April 26, 2001

Debbie,

Our son did the same thing on SNT. The Mega dose of B6 can cause numbness

in the hands and feet. Our son is almost non verbal so he was unable to

tell us anything. He would grab his wrist or lower arm and " wave " his hand

while looking at it. This is much different than the classic hand

" flapping " that he does. We took him off of the SNT and the waving stopped.

We think we finally figured out that it was numbness in his hand that was

the cause. Following is a quote from a paper Bernard Rimland, Ph.D. wrote

in 1996 titled " Vitamin B6 in autism: the safety issue " :

" Tens of thousand of people, including thousands of autistic children and

adults, took large doses throughout the '60s, '70s, and beginning '80s with

no reported signs of any adverse effects. However, in 1983, a paper by

Schaumburg et al. reported significant, though not permanent nor

life-threatening side effects in 7 patients who had been taking 2,000 mg to

6,000 mg per day of B6. The side effects, peripheral neuropathy, were

numbness and tingling in the hands and feet-the sensation one gets when

one's hand or foot " falls asleep. " The foot numbness in some cases

interfered with walking. These patients were not taking magnesium, the other

B vitamins, nor any of the other nutrients that should be taken if one is

taking large amounts of B6. It is at least possible that the adverse

reactions were due not to B6 " toxicity " but to deficiencies of magnesium and

the other B vitamins induced by taking large amounts of B6. "

The entire paper can be read at