Our Son’s Autism–The Best Therapy of All
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Autism can turn a person’s life and their family’s lives upside down. Thankfully, there are some autism therapies that can help smooth things out so that life can be more manageable.
Following are some things that have helped us, including the best autism support of all.
Our oldest son has Asperger’s Syndrome, a form of autism, and we have been on the road of supporting him using therapies, diet changes, and more for some 5 years now. We’ve put him on a gluten-free diet, a candida diet, we use only non-toxic personal care products and we drink only filtered water.
In short, we’ve tried a lot of things to get him healthier, and while we’ve seen progress, it’s been a long road.
A long “are we getting anywhere yet?” road.
The start of the road was a fast and furious one. Well–actually, I take that back.
It actually seemed like more of a major road block.
Our family physician recommended an appointment with the Dept. Head of Psychology at our local children’s hospital and a mental nervous drug prescription. I had already started down the “alternative medicine” path prior to the autism diagnosis, but at this point I found myself moving quickly into a brand new world.
The following months are a blur now, consisting mainly of mom being up until midnight (or later), scouring the internet for therapies that might help, reading accounts of things others had tried, wondering if what other parents had helped children —might.just.help.mine.
I do not want to insinuate that what we have done might work for your child – and thus set up for you expectations that might not become a reality. However, at the same time, I feel that not sharing the things that have helped us would be a true disservice to others who are looking for help.
So here is a brief history of our path with autism. Some successes. Some “failures”. What we have done and what we are doing now. And what I think is perhaps the best supportive technique of all.
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Natural Supports for Autism
1. Occupational Therapy
We did quite a bit of OT at the beginning of our journey with autism–both in-house and in various clinics. Sensory Integration, massage, touch, and brushing were all part of what we worked on. It was time consuming to keep going to clinics, so eventually we pulled most of it in-house and did various therapies with balls, etc.
I have to say that we enjoyed it and I think our son did improve with this therapy.
One of the books that we found to be helpful that touches on Occupational Therapy is The Out-of-Sync Child.
2. Genetic testing & Nutritional Supplementation
This was overall a flop. While the testing was interesting, the supplement regimen was completely overwhelming both mentally and financially. We could not afford the expert-directed evaluations and I was unable to handle the intense trial-and-error approach to supplement management. We spent quite a bit of money upfront and quickly moved on.
Luckily, I still had all my hair :-).
Update 4/17: After trying out several different practitioners, we are going back to this and moving much more slowly. It’s based on MTHFR and other genetic testing. I’ve seen some improvement and am thinking we’ll be checking this out more.
3. Dietary Intervention
Gluten-Free and Casein-Free
There is a lot of information available in books and on the web about gluten and casein (a protein found in cow’s milk) and the roles that they are thought to have in aggravating autism.
I won’t go into all of this here, but suffice it to say that I think that removing these proteins from your child’s diet is imperative. There is data showing that the real effects can sometimes take quite awhile to show up, though there are plenty of stories about children showing marked improvement almost instantaneously.
While I follow more of a whole foods approach than the author, the book Special Diets for Special Kids contains a wealth of information on this topic.
To see how manageable (and tasty :-)) a gluten-free and dairy-free diet can be, take a look at my Recipes page. There, you’ll find healthy, whole food ideas for some of our family’s favorites like:
- Chocolate Almond Chip Coconut Milk Ice Cream
- Dairy-Free Bean Fudge
- Dairy-Free Berry Mousse
- Focaccia Flax Bread
Whole Foods
This means whole grains, and few to no processed foods. Basically, no “junk.” This is crucial. It sounds overwhelming, but basically, kids with autism have broken bodies and we need to do everything we can to support them having healthier guts and overall health.
Putting “junk” food into a broken body will just continue to muck up the mechanisms and create all kinds of problems and prevent many health gains from happening.
The Candida Diet
Our son, like many persons with autism, struggles with candida overgrowth. Candida basically is a candida albicans, a fungus that is present in all people’s bodies, but, when one’s digestive flora is out of balance, grows out of control and starts to cause systemic issues.
I love baking and, well, my son loves to eat. For a good part of his childhood, I was baking whole grain goodies regularly, and he ate them–well, too regularly. At one point, things really got out of hand and his trunk was covered with a rash and he was lifting up his shirt in public to scratch himself.
Suspecting that the rash might be caused by candida, we took him off of all sugars, including dried fruit and fruit, and limited his grain intake. The rash cleared up within two days, following one night of worsening, which is typical when the candida is starved of its food (sugars).
We kept him on a pretty strict diet for a while, and his skin is perfectly clear now. Simply gorgeous, in fact. He now has fruit and dried fruit occasionally, and we are not limiting his starches as much. But refined flours and sugars are out of his diet almost 100%, and I suspect that that will continue for his entire life.
And while it can be tough to keep your child (or yourself) on a special diet, here are some tips to help you do just that.
4. Nutritional Balancing / Hair Analysis
For awhile, we tried this approach, but frankly, we didn’t see much benefit. I know that a lot of people think that Hair Mineral Analysis is great, I don’t personally know how much weight should be put on it. So many things can skew it, and the relationship between what is in one’s hair and what is in one’s body seems complicated to me at best.
We spent a lot of money on the evaluations and supplements with very little improvement.
5. Essential Oils
As I mentioned in my post on Natural Sleeping Tips, I have begun gradually experimenting with essential oils. One way that I have been using these with our son is when his anxiety gets out of control.
Every night my son asks me to use lavender oil to prevent bad dreams. Seems to work :). Sometimes younger brother asks for it too. (You can read Which Essential Oils Company is Best for more information on how I chose which essential oils company to go with.)
The oils really seem to help him better manage his mood swings and get the sleep that his body so greatly needs. In fact, while I put the finishing touches on this post, my son had a panic attack and asked that I would please rub some lavender oil on his feet.
Within two minutes, the panic had subsided.
6. Perhaps the Best Therapy of All – “Low and Slow”
There are, in my opinion, a number of causes of autism. My theory is basically that it is a “whole person” affliction, affecting the nervous system, brain, digestive system, and endocrine system. The more I learn about adrenal health, the more I see how it’s crucial to whole wellness.
Basically, the more stressed out one is, the fewer toxins are filtered out of the body, digestion worsens and everything goes downhill from there.
So while it is my tendency to try to find new ways to help my son and to work tirelessly at them, I find that really, one of the best ways to help him is to do whatever I do–calmly.
A dear friend told me of another mother of a child with Asperger’s who called being calm with her son, “Low and Slow.”
How appropriate.
Just simply loving our son as he is, speaking softly and sweetly, and having a sense of peace has an almost magical effect on him. Literally, any day that I can slow down and live at a more restful pace is a day when I can really “see” him blossoming.
It isn’t easy, but it is cheap! And keeping my own self-calm truly is the most effective healing technique that we have tried (though it is likely the most difficult).
Have you had any natural supports help your child?
Saw this…the oil cured my H Pylori…so i thought i would share…U probably already know about this…but here it is https://coconutoil.com/aspergers-disorder-success-with-coconut-oil-and-diet/ may God continue to bless u & ur family
Lo and Slow! That is brilliant and so true. Something I struggle with. As my anxiety levels go up, so do my sons. Then he acts out more and I get more frustrated. Still working on this but thanks for the reminder.
We are gluten free/cassin free, about to start OT, speech etc.
Me too. Need to read this every minute of every day.
My third ds does some things now and then that remind me of autism. Some people really see it, others not so much. When he took swimming lessons, the instructor told me to have him tested for sure. (He had been-and was not diagnosed)But the sensory stimulation of water sent him into such a “zone” that was almost in another world. Music has been interesting, too. Classical calms, while a recent trip to a mini-golf park completely overwhelmed him. He was racing around and unable to concentrate at all.
We do work with a alternative practitioner and he takes some supplements like probiotics and EFA’s, essential oils, etc. Those things have helped. She had us do GF/CF for a while and he hated it so much. I was relieved to be done, but I wonder if it was long enough. I’ve considered doing GAPS for a while.
He did not have any vax at all-was born at home-no meds. But I did have an emergency appendectomy during my first trimester-lots of morphine, some Lortab(which I cannot handle at all) an epidural for the surgery and an amnesiac when that didn’t work. So, a true mess!
I intend to look up this Nutritional Balancing idea!
Thanks for your website!
My 8 year old son has been on the GAPS protocol for 18 months and it has saved our lives. He stopped stimming. He stopped crying constantly. His body language relaxed. He became able to talk about something other than his special interest. He acquired friends. He was able to start school again. He began sleeping through the night. His insomnia disappeared. His meltdowns have gone from 3 or 4 a week to maybe one per month. He looks me in the eye. He is no longer constipated. He talks about his feelings. He no longer feels pain and tingling on his head and hands. He no longer has full on panic attacks (though he is still struggling with some situational anxiety). But very very best of all, he started giggling and smiling once again.
I BESEECH YOU TO INVESTIGATE THE GAPS PROTOCOL. IF YOU OR YOUR CHILDREN ARE ILL. The earlier you start the better the outcome. GAPS is a challenge to master but still much easier than the stress of watching your child disintegrate or live in distress.
Every human should be taught in school what your intestines do for your body. It’s insane but medical doctors have no nutritional training or any schooling on gut mechanics (unless it’s their specialty). Your guts aren’t just important to your health, they ARE your health. They generate your immune response, cull out toxins, viruses and heavy metals. They are intimately tied to your mental health (they generate most of the serotonin our brain needs for example), they host a living foreign genetically independent ecology that doesn’t just aid in digestion but is responsible for breaking down and assimilating most of what you absorb from food. You would die without what is growing and living in your guts. The complicated majesty of your gut ecology is staggering. When it breaks down, YOU break down (psychiatric diseases, vitamin deficiencies, food intolerances, auto-immune diseases, allergies, eczema, autism etc etc etc etc).
Systemic chronic yeast infections, constipation and chronic illness (treated with longterm back to back antibiotics for years on end) in my own life left me with an out of balance gut ecology. Our babies have sterile guts at birth and the intestines are seeded with the mother’s gut flora. We pass on the healthy or unhealthy gut flora to our children – then the modern world continues to assault their internal ecology. I believe autism is nearly always the result of a systemic collapse of gut functionality.
What kind is good, thanks!
Did you find my post? Try searching for probiotics in the search bar. :). If you would like more info on the one that I am using now I would be happy to correspond via email – wholenewmom at gmail dot com.
Hi! I would love for you to do a post on probiotics. We use klaire ther biotic complete for my son and my daughter. My daughter (4) is somewhere along the lines of aspergers. My son (2) has terrible eczema that is currently being healed through a version of GAPS. He cannot tolerate nuts or eggs along with a ton of other foods, but rotating the foods he can tolerate has done wonders! We are all on an elimination rotation diet at present. I must say it is exhausting. My son eats mostly the cabbage family at present while my daughter is IgG sensitive to the cabbage family. And I’m sensitive to every spice!!
We are fortunate these sensitivities are not life threatening, but I am curious if you have done the elimination and rotation bit. If so, what did you think and how did it help/not help? I started holistic healing with my children just over a year ago. I am exhausted from the constant research and food preparation. We have so many sensitivities I don’t know how we can focus on candida. We’ve been GFCFSF for a year, whole foods and almost no processed foods. We are currently grain free along with countless foods at present. I will say once I removed coconut from my daughter’s diet her tantrums were way better.
I love your blog and am ecstatic that you are sharing your journey with all of us! Please know we are all Cheering you on and supporting you while we move along with similar health issues. I am so thankful for the Internet and the ability to communicate with other smart moms that are continually healing their kids.
All the best and God bless!
Hi there! I have done a post on probiotics but I haven’t heard of yours – the one that you mentioned. I am experimenting w/ a new kind. Were you looking for info on how they work or info on what kind is good?
Wow….very informative. Most of the information I knew but came across some regarding the adrenal system that I need to take a look into. Also the candida we battled, so this could be manifesting itself again into the issues we are having. I cant stress anymore than what you did Adrienne about the Low and Slow. With all kids, not just autistic children.
Yes, I need to remember that myself always.
Oh I have been so blessed to have found your site..I think you are doing an awesome job… My nephew they believe has Asperger’s I have been able to see the candida problem and when he was little he had food allergies which he has ate normal since he got older but I think the candida causes the allergies and he still has problems that make me think the food and yeast stuff is not gone.. I am curious if your son had vaccines? there is a high connection with the vaccine rates and autism. just curious if you had looked into that.. there are homeopathic detoxes out there for vaccines. I haven’t looked in to them much but I have seen them.. And for the supplement stuff I don’t know if you have heard of it but you can do muscle testing to see if the product is good for you or not.. if you were interested in it I could email you to tell you what I know about it.. It has a proper name that I don’t remember my house just calls it muscle testing..
Hi there. Yes, I have heard of muscle testing but I don’t know what to think about it. If you have something good go ahead and send it. Thanks.
Have you looked into Dr. Klinghardts protocols and information regarding autism? I highly recommend his approach! He is big into EMF’s and creating an EMF free bedroom. Just a thought for your son and you. If you google Klinghardt Academy you can access lots of his writings. (Or go to betterhealthguy website). Peace.
Another reader mentioned this. we don’t have that much in the way of EMF’s but thank you. I am convinced it is getting harder and harder to eliminate them w/ the towers everywhere. Sigh.
Aww I’m very sorry that it did not help significantly for you :(….
Hey Adrienne I just have one little question for you. Please do not take this in any negative way. I am just really curious. If you would prefer to keep it private, I will understand justt fine.
I just want to know if your pregnancy with your first son was a pleasant one? (Would you say you ate healthily for the entire pregnancy? Had low stress levels? No complications whatsoever?)
I promise I am not trying to be condescending. I would really like to know.:) thank you so much for your time! I am truly greatful!
Hi Marie. I don’t see how I could take that condescendingly at all. I was not eating as healthy with my first pregnancy but it went fairly well. In fact, my horrible spring allergies were gone. I had fairly high stress since I was working and am a Type A personality and have always been pretty intense. I had no complications at all except the delivery was horrible. I had him at home and probably will share the story at some point. My second pregnancy was horrible. I think it is b/c I was copper toxic. I was horribly nauseous for all 9 months. I am eating healthier now than ever. But I THOUGHT I was eating healthy then. I had no idea how bad sugar was at the time. And refined flour. I was almost completely vegetarian. I was basically just beginning another step into learning about how to really eat. Bless you.
Here’s the article URL
https://www.facebook.com/notes/viviendo-philippines-inc/autism-and-virgin-coconut-oil/230106433699353
Very interesting. I had one practitioner tell me not to give my son coconut at all but I didn’t listen. Though now his anxiety is awful and I don’t know what to do. Sigh.
Hi Adrienne!
Thank you so much for posting your Autism blog! I found it incredibly useful! I have an 8 month old baby. I worry that she may have AS because I was really malnourished in the first trimester and lost about 20 lbs. maybe malnourishment affected her? However, by the grace of God she was born! She smiles back when smiled at. She barley let’s an unfamiliar face hold her. She is fine with her dad, grandparents, and my siblings carrying her. However, whenever she sees me, she always reaches out to me to hold her. Every times she sees a baby or child under 4 feet, she gets really excited and wants to touch their face.
She has received the first few immunization shot (about 7). I’ve decided to postpone it until she starts talking and behaving like her “normal” peers.
I have a question for you. I am curious about your 2nd son. Have you consented him to have any immunization shots? If he has received any would you mind sharing which ones?
I wanted to share this article I found about a lady who found a “cure” for her son’s AS condition. I hope you find it useful as well! God bless you!
Hi! I have a 20-year old with Aspergers. He drives, works part-time and goes to the community college part-time. We have found that “juicing” has been really beneficial. Our son eats organic foods & snacks (expect for pizza). It would be great to connect with someone in the Austin area. Thanks!
Diane! Please tell me more on the juicing! Exactly what fruits and veggies are/were you juicing?
Thank you, Adrienne, for your speedy reply! We do eat sardines, but should probably eat more. Our son drinks rice milk, which is supposed to have some calcium…but who knows what else it has in it? Then, there are almonds, but we haven’t been soaking and drying them so I don’t know if they count as helpful. Everyone keeps telling me about kale, but that seems hard to come by in France, where we live (and where the approach to autism is incidentally supposed to be more Dark Ages than anyplace else in the Western World.) That’s lucky that your son willingly eats his leafy greens. And now we’re going to try your ice cream recipes. Thanks again!
Julie,
Try looking at other leafies to see if you can get them. You could plant kale – can you have a garden? It grows super easy and your son might like my Kale Chips. If you are into saving money, you could just make your own rice milk (I have a recipe for that as well) and you can add your own calcium as need be. It is much cheaper that way. Sesame is a good source, by so far my son is allergic. Blessings!
So many families and so many stories. Thanks for this blog, which makes me feel less alone. Our son, aged 4, has just been diagnosed as having Asperger’s. He’s had a year and a half of occupational therapy and speech therapy; we’ve been advised to do more of this. We’ve been off gluten, dairy & eggs, after blood tests showed that these were the baddies, 8 months ago. He had vitamin therapy but as the (pricey)bottles ran out, we didn’t ever replace them, except for a multivitamin and vitamin D. He’s also taken homeopathic meds. Which of these explain that he’s doing slightly better? (Fewer melt-downs, and shorter ones. Progress in the language department.) Could you tell us how you’re getting enough calcium into your son? I’m a little bit worried about this part.
Hi Julie.
I get concerned abt calcium but there are different theories on that. With Nutritional Balancing he is taking a supp that has Ca in it. He eats a good amount of leafies usually. Sardines are great too. Does that help? You can purchase inexpensive Ca supps but you need to do research on balancing w/ Mg and D3.
Thanks for your kind words….by the way :). I’m going to start speech w/ my son soon.
My son is 18 now, and had at autism diagnosis at age 3. He has made a complete recovery, recently graduated from high school, and has joined the Army – he’ll be leaving for boot camp on Sunday.
The things that made the main difference in his life were speech and Occupational therapy, which I engaged in as training, and used 24/7 the rest of the time, starting at about 18 months.
At three, he was still profoundly affected, and I was introduced to Touch Pressure/Joint Compression therapy as a way to help him with sensory issues. This was a life changing practice for my son and when I asked his therapists why they didn’t tell me about this earlier (he was still waking up four or five times a night at age three, which was corrected within a week of starting the therapy), they said it was because most parent’s won’t do it, because of the time committment. I was kind of outraged but too busy catching up on three years of sleep to do anything about it. Within one week of starting the therapy he began sleeping through the night, and within two weeks he began putting together three-word sentences for the first time. Things progressed rapidly from there.
We weren’t really doing any real food, but my son made known to me that he wanted some dietary changes. As it turns out, his body prefers meat and real fats over vegetables and carbohydrates. Once, when I tried to make him eat a vegetable (green beans, which he still hates) he hollered, “YOU CAN ONLY FEED ME COOKIES, CANDY AND MEAT!” Meat it was.
As he got older, we switched to whole milk from 2%, to butter from margarine (!), from using modern fats to traditional ones, and eventually from whole milk to raw milk. Regarding allergies, I’d like to say that allergies can vary from person to person. If casein and gluten worked for your son, that’s awesome, but they are pretty individual, so it’s important to find out what your child’s particular sensitivities are and work on those. I would also like to say that cholesterol is a healing food.
At the age of 9, my son told his first lie (you parents of autistic children will understand what a triumph this is), and soon thereafter made his first genuine, unprompted apology. In 5th grade, he asked to stop receiving services at school, because it made him feel as though he were different from the other kids. In 9th grade, he was removed from the special education program altogether. When I asked the staff how often this happens, they said, “never”.
Today, my son is an awesome young man. He is slightly socially immature, which is fine, and he is one of my favorite people on all the earth. Frankly, if everyone could be more like him, we’d have a much better planet. He has a great sense of humor, several good friends, a relationship – a real one, with God, and is a very caring son. He wants to get married and have children, and not wait too long to do it. Though he’ll need to meet a girl, first. I guess I worry that he won’t be able to meet her emotional needs. I think she’ll need to be the type of person who asks for what she wants, which can be a rare quality in the under 30 female of our species, who always seem to want men to read their minds. But if he treats her half as well as he treats me (and he’d better), all she need do is ask, and he’ll treat her like a queen. And no, I’m not giving out his number. 😀
:-). Thanks for sharing!!
Thanks so much!!! I will check those things out!! Thanks for your honesty and compassion!!!
Hi Adrienne,
I just found your blog through the healthy home economist. I love your approach to healing your son!!! We have a ten year old daughter with PDD. We have tried many things with her. Right now we are working with Dr. James Neubrander. He recommends the GFCF diet and supplements and meds to get rid of the yeast. She is also on daily M-B12 shots. He also had us try the hyperbaric chamber. He is very scientifically based and orders tests along the way to see how the treatments are working. I haven’t seen a huge change in my daughter since we started this two years ago. My husband is convinced that he sees changes in her. I’m concerned because her stimming is off the charts right now. We also tried the GFCF diet twice with her. Once for a year and once for nine months. I didn’t see any change in her. Also, now that she is older, it is extremely difficult to keep her form getting restricted foods. She also has terrible constipation! Even massive doses of pro and prebiotics haven’t helped! Any advice you can offer would be greatly appreciated!!! Thanks and keep up the good fight! You are doing a wonderful job with your son!! God bless you!!!!
Hi there. I personally avoided the candida meds. Supps are much safer, in my opinion. Did you try sugar free? About the constipation, there is a probiotic that I LOVE. But it might be being discontinued. Check out the link to Strata Flora on my Store page. It really helps. I have another bathroom help that I hope to share w/ readers soon. If you don’t see it soon, email me and I can send you more info.
Ummm..otherwise, if it were me, I’d for sure top all sugar and all refined grains and even fruit. I am very happy w/ our practitioner. I of course can’t tell you what to do but you might want to check out my post on adrenal fatigue and look up Theresa Vernon. Her info is there.
Blessings!!!!
Even for those not on the spectrum, going GF helps a lot with that sort of behavior. Blessings to you on your journey!
Thanks, Annie. We have gone GF. I am thinking we may need to go grain free next.
What a beautiful post.
I just found your website, as I’m always looking for wholesome recipes for my family, and was touched to read about your efforts to heal your son. I, too, have been working for the past three years to heal my now-9-year-old son with autism. We have been *amazingly* fortunate in our journey, which included many of the approaches you listed- GFCF, whole foods, occupational therapy (not much help with us), and a calm environment. We also tried homeopathy which gave our son’s healing an added boost.
It took some time, but our son was able to move from high-functioning autism, to mild ADHD in 18 months, and we are beyond thrilled with his progress. Just in the past few months, we were even able to re-introduce gluten and casein into his diet with no reactions. Like you, we feel very blessed, and are grateful to the other parents who have shared their stories about what worked (and didn’t work) for their child. If you’re ever interested in reading about our son’s story, I’d be happy to send you the link.
All the best to you and your beautiful family. 🙂
I’d love to hear about your son. Thanks for taking the time to write. We are having a lot of anxiety issues w/ him right now so it’s a particularly rough time. Thanks for your kind wishes.