[NurseNature]

Anyone see Jenny Mcarthy on 20/20 last night? She claims the cure to autism is simply diet modification. It appeared to work wonders for her little boy. I believe it was the dairy and gluten free diet or something along those lines. There is currently a study on it at a university that I cannot think of atm either. Worth keeping an eye on.

[ann945n]

I saw the show too and thought it was interesting. It will be exciting to see if anything comes out of the study. Wouldnt that be wonderful if it was that easy?

[NurseNature]

I have a question about the mercury-free vaccines offered. What is replacing it and has it been thoroughly studied?

[Indy]

You know what, I really don't believe 99% of the male bovine feces perpetuated out there with regards to this disorder. Let's see, there's coffee, ritalin, adderal, prozac, gluten free diet, secretin, chelation therapy, etc.

The ortho I used to work for offered to prescribe and give secretin injections to my little girl based on having seen it on television. He had no experience with the drug whatsoever. I politely declined. I told my mother in law where to stick her coffee. I decided that my family couldn't afford to deal with specialty diets because if one person had to have all the odd food, we'd have to restructure the rest of the family's diet to be fair. We saw a psych doc for two years of adderall and prozac. I don't know what it did other than put a big drain on my pocketbook; I've weaned her off and she's actually happy now.

Granted, she's half retarded (I can say that, I'm her mom, besides, it's true), still a bit obsessive and still in need of structured behavior modification in her education and her home, but happy. I've been in the shoes of thinking my 3 year old could be "normal" or "recover" by oh, age ten or so... and at age ten I was hoping for recovery by adulthood... now I'm just thrilled to see her enjoy life. Our society just can't accept weird people, we have to focus on curing them for some reason. There is not a cure for Down's syndrome and people accept that they are sweet, lovable people. For pity's sake, people who know what autism is like should just focus on trying to help the families get through the everyday business of life.

We make all kinds of progress, and then some famous lady has to come along and claim that the cure to an entire cluster of symptom-related disorders is to take away their peanut butter samwich. Jenny McCarthy can bite my a$$.

[NurseNature]

I really have not done any research on autism and I have only been around one autistic child regularly. It is just strange to see how wide the spectrum of behavior can vary from one person to another with the same diagnosis. Structure is obviously needed, as is with all children. I am happy to hear that your child is happy. I think that is all anyone's goal should be for their children no matter what developmental level they are in their life; however, it seems that a lot of autistic people are not happy for whatever reason. The fact that many seem unhappy and exhibit 'self-abuse', are the only two aspects of autism that are upsetting and that I feel warrant researching solutions for. Of course, finding a cause is very important also, IMO. If there is a cause which can prevented, why not find it and prevent it? If the cause is found to be unpreventable... cool, now we know and again/still the focus should be on keeping the child happy and controlling any harmful symptoms.

[Spidey's mom]

I saw it too . . . . I'm still a bit confused as his first symptom was a seizure and then at the end of the show she mentioned the worst part and she mentioned seizures.

Are seizures part of autism? Maybe his first seizure caused brain hypoxia . . . I have a friend whose daughter was deprived of O2 at a very difficult delivery and she is brain damaged - difficult impulse control is the most obvious symptom.

This diet would be something I would probably try - seems easy enough with no negative side effects. We've all gone off dairy products when my #1 son was young - he was diagnosed as allergic and so we switched to soy. Of course, he is 24 and drinks a gallon of cow milk a day with no problems.

Medicine is frustratingly hard . . . . who really knows?

steph

[Spidey's mom]

Originally Posted by Indy

We make all kinds of progress, and then some famous lady has to come along and claim that the cure to an entire cluster of symptom-related disorders is to take away their peanut butter samwich. Jenny McCarthy can bite my a$$.

steph

[TNMommy]

I saw the show also. I cannot say for sure if he really had or has autism, but I saw a show on DHC called Mystery Diagnosis about a little boy from infancy to toddlerhood that continued to decline in reaching his milestones when he was supposed to. By the time he became a toddler, he started having theses episodes where he was zoning out and having odd behavior. The mother video taped him and gave the doctor the tape. Come to find out he was having seizures and that it was from Celiac Disease. The mother had Celiac Disease but didn't put two and two together because he wasn't showing normal signs of the disease. Once he was put on a glutin free diet, he progressed dramatically and is now a normal pre-teen with no evidence of a delay.

I wondered after watching 20/20 if maybe that was all Jennie's son had. Granted I don't have all the facts, but it sounded so similiar.

[indigo girl]

Originally Posted by FutureNurseLori

I have a question about the mercury-free vaccines offered. What is replacing it and has it been thoroughly studied?

It is not a question of what is replacing it.

The mercury compound, thimerosal is used as a preservative in multi dose vials
and not every vaccine needs a preservative. There is no need for it to be in single dose vials.

[woody62]

It seems that every once in a while, blame is placed on either vaccinations or diet. I am surprised that people, would fall for such poorly researched evidence. No scientific evidence as ever demonstrated that vaccinations had anything to do with autism. In fact some very valid scientific research has demonstrated that vaccinations don't play a role in autism.[/b]

Woody