Okay, so as promised some real info. I thought the best place to start was on sensory issues, as its a topic anyone can relate to and it explains a lot of some of the more bizarre autistic behaviours. A few months after Ed had been diagnosed, I spoke to the wife of one of Richards friends who just happened to work with autistic children. I can still hear her voice, 'Liz, you have to sort out his sensory issues before you can do anything.' My ignorant reply was 'I am really lucky he doesn't have any.' 'Liz, he has, you just don't know what they are!' How right she was.
So you have five senses, taste, touch, hearing, seeing, and smell. There are two other ones I had no idea existed till autism hit us, they are vestibular and propriception. Vestibular is the sense of where you are in space, all the wee bits and bobs in your ear tell you if your up or down, propriception is a little more difficult to explain, but its knowing where all of your body parts are in space. So, if you were getting in a boat from shore, you would need to know whereabouts in space you were and where all your body parts are as you negotiate getting in a wobbly boat. If this doesn't explain it fully enough tap it in google, there a books written on the stuff.
When you experience through these senses there is a kinda volume button. You have hypo-sensitive and hyper-sensitive. Hypo would be the sound all turned down, so it doesn't register, and hyper would be the sound cranked all the way up to past bearable. On this volume button, just to make things interesting, you can be anywhere between the two extremes and to make it more interesting, you can have a mix of both. For example, Ed is hypo-sensitive to cold. He needs to be getting to frost bite cold before it registers, but he is hyper-sensitive to hot. So now you have seven senses with a range of perceptions and you can start to see how it affects them. I have heard of children who have such sensitive noses that they can smell everything in the house, parents have to be careful with what they cook and throwing things out. Imagine smelling everyones body odours. I have heard of children who have such sensitive ears they can hear your heart beating. Imagine being that sensitive and being in a super-market, with the noise of the chiller cabinets, the freezers, the noise of the overhead lighting let alone the music and noise of the customers. I have heard of children who see everything in its entirety in a room. This doesn't sound to bad, but let me tell you of an experience I had during my art foundation years. We had just had an intense session on typography, on the way home all the letters on the shops and posters and car number plates were all jumping out at me, it was almost painful. I had to look at the floor to get home till my brain calmed down. Some children who are dyslexic have difficulty reading because the words literally jump around the page. Children who are so sensitive to touch that they can't bear to be touched, imagine wearing clothes when you feel like that, what would a woolly jumper feel like? Those are example of hyper-sensitivity which I think is the worst, but on the other hand you get behaviour aimed at just feeling anything - which generally verges on the dangerous. Also, if you can't feel it, how do you know its time to run to the bathroom till its to late. Its only when the pooh is actually coming out of his bum that Ed is aware of it, thankfully, those days are ending with the kefir water. So just let that all sink in. What you get from that in terms of behaviour is hand-flapping, spinning, jumping, climbing, hanging, switching things on and off, eating only crunchy food, eating only smooth food, eating spicy food, or bland food, eating only food that is green, or yellow or whatever - see where I am going, the result is weird behaviour. So you need to track down their behaviour to see why they are doing it, and then you will start to understand their sensory needs. Quite often, the sensory overload is so great that they can't cope anymore and this results in what is know as a melt-down. A melt-down is a normal childs worst behaviour - but on crack-cocaine! So its important to understand your childs sensory needs to prevent this. And so, to offset all this craziness, to feel safe, our children really like routine, something they know. So, we go this way to school, down this road, past this thing, maybe we like all our things just so, or our food laid out in a certain way or whatever. Something predictable in their unpredictable world. You see, they experience life in a totally different way to a normal person, and they each experience it in a unique way. Yes, this is true for all of us, but for them its more extreme.
Edward is hypo-sensitive to touch, so he likes to be in tight spaces. He like to get between the bed and the wall, if you sit down he puts his hand under your bum. He likes to feel the very end of his hair because its spiky, he likes to feel grout between tiles. I guess that's why he used to smear his pooh, because it was gritty. He likes to climb and hang off things, curtain poles for instance, this gives him a nice feel of his propriception faculties through his arms. See when you know why they do something, you can be understanding, and help. You may have seen children round town with great big headphones on to protect their ears, or glasses to cut down on what they see, or grown children jumping for no reason and though, that's weird. Well now you know why, and looking at just this one issue, maybe you can have a glimpse of the minefield the parents of autistic children tread everyday, one miss step and MELTDOWN! BOOM!
Thankfully, with the interventions I have put in place, ie, NAET, homoeopathy, supplements particularly zinc for this, Epsom salt baths, kefir water and coconut oil rubs, Eds sensory issues are coming under control, and at the moment, things are good - well, good for us. This is a very complex issue, hope I have made it a little clearer. xx
Monday, 19 August 2013
Sunday, 18 August 2013
2 steps forward 1 step back
Sometimes even as you say something you know you shouldn't in case you 'jinx' it. And so it was on Friday. I had just bashed out my last post before trotting off for Ed. I arrived to find him licking the mat at the very front of the school - not a good sign. He seems happy once he sees me, and I thank all the staff till next holiday (when I darken their doorstep again) and pick up his stuff. Attached to his changing bag is tied a plastic bag - again - not a good sign. We get home, happy enough, just as I am putting his kit away I hear splashing water on the floor of the utility room. I rush in to find its not water but wee, Ed is standing there peeing on the floor, as he does so he pulls the back of his pant down to reveal a great big pooh which I am too late to do anything about. As it hits the ground it breaks in two, as he steps forward to get to the toilet, he treads in half of it with his feet covered in his trousers. Bloody marvellous, at least now I have a full load.
Spent the weekend thinking about this, sometimes you really wonder why you bother. Then today he spoke two new words. Sat on the toilet waiting for another pooh (anyone envious yet!) he clearly says 'pooh' twice. And in bed, after reading him 'Freddie and the Fariy' as he was turning the pages and reading it for himself with his own funny noises - he started making monkey noises at the picture of the monkey! Yeah! it may seem a little trifle of nothing, but in our world, even just looking you in the face is something to treasure. From little acorns grow big trees, hope is still alive.
Tomorrow, he has a fun day, promise to post something informative as opposed to just what we got up to. xx
Spent the weekend thinking about this, sometimes you really wonder why you bother. Then today he spoke two new words. Sat on the toilet waiting for another pooh (anyone envious yet!) he clearly says 'pooh' twice. And in bed, after reading him 'Freddie and the Fariy' as he was turning the pages and reading it for himself with his own funny noises - he started making monkey noises at the picture of the monkey! Yeah! it may seem a little trifle of nothing, but in our world, even just looking you in the face is something to treasure. From little acorns grow big trees, hope is still alive.
Tomorrow, he has a fun day, promise to post something informative as opposed to just what we got up to. xx
Friday, 16 August 2013
the end of the pooh pant bucket?
I know I don't normally post two days in a row, but I am putting off an awful job, and that awful job is washing out all the pants in the pooh bucket of disinfectant - so who can blame me! Yeah, I know, I haven't talked about pooh for a while and your all missing it. Well, the funny thing about my pooh pant bucket is - that its not full. It just has a few pairs of pants from a while ago which have been forgotten because I haven't been putting in the 2, 3, sometimes 4 pairs of pants in a day. See, I like a full load, then I wash them with disinfectant again, and then put them on a really hot wash. And I don't have a full load yet. And the only reason I can think of is my new thing - water kefir. My medium boy has had a bit of a runny bum recently, but I think I over dosed him and myself because it tastes so nice. Ed on the other hand has about an inch in the bottom of a cup of cranberry juice, more or less every time he has a drink. The effect is that the other day he did the most perfect pooh which left his bottom clean as a whistle. (Are whistles that clean?) And that was a dear diary moment.
He has also been a lot more calm, I mentioned in my last post he has been singing. I also need to say, that yesterday though, I found him at the front door of the holiday club he goes to in the summer, only wearing his vest and pants. He was upset that he couldn't turn off the x-box the other children were playing with, so he was in a very cross state, licking the mat that everyone walks on when they come in! So if he doesn't end up with the runs, this stuff is really working. The lady who gave me the kefir grains, puts them in a cupboard to do their thing, however, I have moved mine to the window sill. I love watching them bubble and bits float up to the top and then down again, its like a living lava lamp. I think that other than the fact all people dealing with dealing with autism, say first thing is to restore the bacteria in the gut, that the magic of them is lost. I read somewhere that one of the things that our friendly bacteria do is produce B12. B12 is the energy vitamin, and the one our brains need to work. Of course it does a lot more but that is it in a nutshell. So, I kinda think in a funny way to most people - the apple doesn't fall far from the tree - I thought is that why we are suffering with dementia like we are. People start off normal, anti-biotic slowly kill all our friendly bacteria through the Dr and our hormone injected anti-bacteria treated industrially produced meat and dairy. We have anti-bacteria this and that in the home which only kills 99.9% of germ (that other .1% always bothers me, if that's the one we cant kill, what the hell is it!) and slowly slowly our internal flora dies, the weeds take over. The yeast, unfriendly bacteria, parasites etc and our B12 stops and slowly slowly we fade away. We have stopped eating food as we have done for centuries, gone is the raw milk and cheese and butter, gone are the fermented veggies we stored for over winter, gone is the sour-dough bread. I know I am starting another rant, but something deep inside tell me that our autistic children are a symptom of something that has gone awfully wrong in our modern world, and that the rise in their number is linked to the rise in all our modern day woes, cancer, dementia, diabetes, obesity, addiction, the list goes on.
I follow a lady who produces a blog about cultured foods, she was really sick and bedridden. These bacteria rich foods brought her back to health. She say that each of them have different types of bacteria in them, and to reap the real benefits you need to have kefir, cultured foods and komboucha. I have already seen the benefits form kefir, I know that's the only thing that's changed over the past weeks, we haven't had any more NAET treatments - yet. So, I think I am going to try my hand at culturing some food and hope he eats it.
Next week is the end of his holiday club, and we have a full week of NAET treatments booked. Look forward to posting something amazing at the end of it - fingers crossed xx
He has also been a lot more calm, I mentioned in my last post he has been singing. I also need to say, that yesterday though, I found him at the front door of the holiday club he goes to in the summer, only wearing his vest and pants. He was upset that he couldn't turn off the x-box the other children were playing with, so he was in a very cross state, licking the mat that everyone walks on when they come in! So if he doesn't end up with the runs, this stuff is really working. The lady who gave me the kefir grains, puts them in a cupboard to do their thing, however, I have moved mine to the window sill. I love watching them bubble and bits float up to the top and then down again, its like a living lava lamp. I think that other than the fact all people dealing with dealing with autism, say first thing is to restore the bacteria in the gut, that the magic of them is lost. I read somewhere that one of the things that our friendly bacteria do is produce B12. B12 is the energy vitamin, and the one our brains need to work. Of course it does a lot more but that is it in a nutshell. So, I kinda think in a funny way to most people - the apple doesn't fall far from the tree - I thought is that why we are suffering with dementia like we are. People start off normal, anti-biotic slowly kill all our friendly bacteria through the Dr and our hormone injected anti-bacteria treated industrially produced meat and dairy. We have anti-bacteria this and that in the home which only kills 99.9% of germ (that other .1% always bothers me, if that's the one we cant kill, what the hell is it!) and slowly slowly our internal flora dies, the weeds take over. The yeast, unfriendly bacteria, parasites etc and our B12 stops and slowly slowly we fade away. We have stopped eating food as we have done for centuries, gone is the raw milk and cheese and butter, gone are the fermented veggies we stored for over winter, gone is the sour-dough bread. I know I am starting another rant, but something deep inside tell me that our autistic children are a symptom of something that has gone awfully wrong in our modern world, and that the rise in their number is linked to the rise in all our modern day woes, cancer, dementia, diabetes, obesity, addiction, the list goes on.
I follow a lady who produces a blog about cultured foods, she was really sick and bedridden. These bacteria rich foods brought her back to health. She say that each of them have different types of bacteria in them, and to reap the real benefits you need to have kefir, cultured foods and komboucha. I have already seen the benefits form kefir, I know that's the only thing that's changed over the past weeks, we haven't had any more NAET treatments - yet. So, I think I am going to try my hand at culturing some food and hope he eats it.
Next week is the end of his holiday club, and we have a full week of NAET treatments booked. Look forward to posting something amazing at the end of it - fingers crossed xx
Thursday, 15 August 2013
for the newly diagnoised
As we are coming to the end of summer, we seem to be plauged by wasps. I just had the wasp man out about 3 weeks ago to get a nest right under Toms window, they were getting in under the lead flashing and at night when all was quiet you could hear them eating away at the ceiling. I thought it was a neighbour who had another nest, but no its us again. This time they are in the roof and back under the lead flashing. So anytime we leave the back door open in they come, big nasty things that kinda face you down. I have a technique where I summon up the godess in me ( a technique the dog whisper uses!) and shout 'out!' at them pointing to the door. Mad as this seems, it works 9 out of 10 times. Yesterday I was there in the kitchen shouting 'out!' in my most commanding voice, when a little peewee voice starts up. It's Ed, saying out and pointing at the door! He was copying me, and I really felt a connection with the little chap. Generally he suits himself, we all fit in round him as he wanders round in his own little Ed world filled with all the mad stuff he likes and does. But for that small moment we were together 'outing!' a wasp, and I felt like it was another step forward for him away from the nightmare place we started from.
One of the men that Richard works with asked him if I would mind speaking to a friend of theirs who has just had their eldest child diagnoised at two and a half, they have just had another baby. In his words they are 'devastated' and he wondered if I could help them. Of couse I said yes, though I doubt they will contact me. I spent the last weekend wondering how was the best way to go about talking to them, and remembering how it was for me, and even though its a few years ago and we are on a road to recovery, I don't mind telling you the tears flowed again. How do you tell someone to kiss the life they once pictured for their child and themselves goodbye and face down the spector of autism? How do you tell a young mother with a new baby that she is going to have to dig so deep that there will be little left of her, that she has the fight of her life on her hands - that she has to fight it and win it? How do you do that and give her hope that it can be done and it is within her to do it? Well I have been pondering that for days now and still have no answer, but these early weeks of having a diagnoisis I think are so important. Its a time of greiving for the life lost, and planning for the life given - and there is no doubt in my mind that the 'state' needs to do so much more at this time than they do at the moment.
I absolutley believe that we are all stronger than we can imagine. I always knew I was a strong person, but autism has shown me just how strong I am emotionally. Ed is fiercely strong physically, I often contemplated what made him SO strong and my conclusion is that he doesn't know he is not. Because he doesn't think like us, if he wants to move something he does it without thinking that he can't. Have you ever watched the pictures of those great big men climbing Mount Everst, and how pleased they are with themselves? Have a look behind them and you will see men half their size climbing that mountain with a mountain of gear on their backs that those great big fellas are unable to carry. How is this possible? I think it's just because they believe they can do it and those big fellas think they can't. Henry Ford had a saying "If you think you can do it, you probably can. If you think you can't do it, you probably can't." In those wise words you have a blueprint for life. Because most medics think that autism is genetic, there is nothing to be done about it. Those that do nothing, get the same back. Those that believe they can do something - and do it, get something back. Its all in your attitude and action. So, my advice for newly diaganosed is 'Educate yourselves' there is a lot you can do, but what you do needs to suit you and your family and the needs of your autistic child - which just to make things more difficult, are all different. And in your quest for knowledge, don't just believe anything, test it. Does it make sense, does it feel right, does it make a difference, and if so do it. Pray for guidance, this thing has come to you and you can find a way through. You know this week has not only seen Ed "out!" a wasp, but he has started singing, the noises are the same that you'd expect from a baby, or maybe a zombie movie, but there is no doubt that he is singing. Can't wait to hear what he has to say. x
PS Spell check isn't working so sorry for the mistakes x
One of the men that Richard works with asked him if I would mind speaking to a friend of theirs who has just had their eldest child diagnoised at two and a half, they have just had another baby. In his words they are 'devastated' and he wondered if I could help them. Of couse I said yes, though I doubt they will contact me. I spent the last weekend wondering how was the best way to go about talking to them, and remembering how it was for me, and even though its a few years ago and we are on a road to recovery, I don't mind telling you the tears flowed again. How do you tell someone to kiss the life they once pictured for their child and themselves goodbye and face down the spector of autism? How do you tell a young mother with a new baby that she is going to have to dig so deep that there will be little left of her, that she has the fight of her life on her hands - that she has to fight it and win it? How do you do that and give her hope that it can be done and it is within her to do it? Well I have been pondering that for days now and still have no answer, but these early weeks of having a diagnoisis I think are so important. Its a time of greiving for the life lost, and planning for the life given - and there is no doubt in my mind that the 'state' needs to do so much more at this time than they do at the moment.
I absolutley believe that we are all stronger than we can imagine. I always knew I was a strong person, but autism has shown me just how strong I am emotionally. Ed is fiercely strong physically, I often contemplated what made him SO strong and my conclusion is that he doesn't know he is not. Because he doesn't think like us, if he wants to move something he does it without thinking that he can't. Have you ever watched the pictures of those great big men climbing Mount Everst, and how pleased they are with themselves? Have a look behind them and you will see men half their size climbing that mountain with a mountain of gear on their backs that those great big fellas are unable to carry. How is this possible? I think it's just because they believe they can do it and those big fellas think they can't. Henry Ford had a saying "If you think you can do it, you probably can. If you think you can't do it, you probably can't." In those wise words you have a blueprint for life. Because most medics think that autism is genetic, there is nothing to be done about it. Those that do nothing, get the same back. Those that believe they can do something - and do it, get something back. Its all in your attitude and action. So, my advice for newly diaganosed is 'Educate yourselves' there is a lot you can do, but what you do needs to suit you and your family and the needs of your autistic child - which just to make things more difficult, are all different. And in your quest for knowledge, don't just believe anything, test it. Does it make sense, does it feel right, does it make a difference, and if so do it. Pray for guidance, this thing has come to you and you can find a way through. You know this week has not only seen Ed "out!" a wasp, but he has started singing, the noises are the same that you'd expect from a baby, or maybe a zombie movie, but there is no doubt that he is singing. Can't wait to hear what he has to say. x
PS Spell check isn't working so sorry for the mistakes x
Friday, 9 August 2013
this little piggy went to ...
Well, I apologise for my rant in the last post (though I'm right!) but just to finish up, what about the brainiac who put a nuclear reactor on a well known fault line, just above sea level in a tsunami area? How could I forget that one?
But hats off to the inventor of Velcro, the washing machine, hoovers, fridges, and decent sanitary ware for women.
Apologise also for my poor grammar. Even my 14 year old has complained about it! Well, I am a child of the '60's and we were just taught to write, which is exactly what I do, I sit down, type, spell check, post, job done.
So, whats new in our world. Ed has had a series of unfortunate events. On Sunday, whilst washing out the latest offering of poohy pants, he came out of the living room like a bat out of hell, screaming. He ran around all the house upstairs and downstairs screaming in obvious pain. I had no idea what had happened and being non-verbal he couldn't tell me. Eventually I managed to get his thumb under a cold tap, it wasn't cut but he held it tightly in his hand then wrapped it in his top. He calmed down eventually, but, don't touch my thumb! As the day drew on, I thought maybe he had broken it? what should I do? Well, I slept on it, and it seemed a bit better in the morning, and I think that he probably got stung on the thumb by a wasp. On the following day, I had the most wonderful time. We dropped Ed off at his holiday club, and I spent the day basking in the glory that is my sister. We pottered about town till it was time to get the lad. Thankfully we were early, because there he was crying at the front door. What a disaster, he had bitten a member of staff, pulled some children's hair, and then spent the rest of the time crying by the front door. The sweet lady who runs it said she knew I was having a nice time with my sister so she wasn't going to call me. So we had to pick up Ed, who wouldn't walk or put his shoes on. When we got home, I noticed he was walking funny, trying not to put weight on his big toe. So my darling sister held him down while I had a look and it just didn't look right, it was swollen with a big blister above it. Thankfully I have a wonderful Dr, who gave me an emergency appointment, and told me to my surprise that his toe was infected and the blister was pus. He gave me anti-biotic and off we went, now the infection was out, Ed was much happier, but still not walking on his toe. Well, that explained his bad behaviour which made me a little happier, though there was no way on this earth he was going to take his medicine. The next day was with children in action who had a fun day at Thames valley adventure park. This place is just heaven for Ed, its a fantastic playground just for special needs children and what they don't have isn't worth having. I knew he would have a great day, so I just warned them about his toe and off I went. Latter that day, when I went to pick him up I was puzzled to find him sat in a buggy. The sweet girl who was looking after him had apparently been pushing him around for an hour or so. As I looked at him, I asked, "what happened to his toe?' Well, he had scrapped all the skin of his little toe just above the nail on the same foot as his bad toe. Poor little chap, three things in three days. Thankfully, I had been back to the DR and picked up some anti-biotic cream for his toe! Now, my rant on my last post was spurred on by the pain in my toe. I had been pushing the shopping out to the car when I kicked the back wheel of the trolley. God it hurt. I thought no more about it, till it felt wet in my sandal. Looking down I had really hurt myself, the nail on my little toe is no more, hence when I sat down to post something, with 40mins till the boy came home from his last day off school, things didn't come out quite as they would have under more favourable circumstance.
On the whole, our summer holiday is working out OK, minus the odd toe and finger x
But hats off to the inventor of Velcro, the washing machine, hoovers, fridges, and decent sanitary ware for women.
Apologise also for my poor grammar. Even my 14 year old has complained about it! Well, I am a child of the '60's and we were just taught to write, which is exactly what I do, I sit down, type, spell check, post, job done.
So, whats new in our world. Ed has had a series of unfortunate events. On Sunday, whilst washing out the latest offering of poohy pants, he came out of the living room like a bat out of hell, screaming. He ran around all the house upstairs and downstairs screaming in obvious pain. I had no idea what had happened and being non-verbal he couldn't tell me. Eventually I managed to get his thumb under a cold tap, it wasn't cut but he held it tightly in his hand then wrapped it in his top. He calmed down eventually, but, don't touch my thumb! As the day drew on, I thought maybe he had broken it? what should I do? Well, I slept on it, and it seemed a bit better in the morning, and I think that he probably got stung on the thumb by a wasp. On the following day, I had the most wonderful time. We dropped Ed off at his holiday club, and I spent the day basking in the glory that is my sister. We pottered about town till it was time to get the lad. Thankfully we were early, because there he was crying at the front door. What a disaster, he had bitten a member of staff, pulled some children's hair, and then spent the rest of the time crying by the front door. The sweet lady who runs it said she knew I was having a nice time with my sister so she wasn't going to call me. So we had to pick up Ed, who wouldn't walk or put his shoes on. When we got home, I noticed he was walking funny, trying not to put weight on his big toe. So my darling sister held him down while I had a look and it just didn't look right, it was swollen with a big blister above it. Thankfully I have a wonderful Dr, who gave me an emergency appointment, and told me to my surprise that his toe was infected and the blister was pus. He gave me anti-biotic and off we went, now the infection was out, Ed was much happier, but still not walking on his toe. Well, that explained his bad behaviour which made me a little happier, though there was no way on this earth he was going to take his medicine. The next day was with children in action who had a fun day at Thames valley adventure park. This place is just heaven for Ed, its a fantastic playground just for special needs children and what they don't have isn't worth having. I knew he would have a great day, so I just warned them about his toe and off I went. Latter that day, when I went to pick him up I was puzzled to find him sat in a buggy. The sweet girl who was looking after him had apparently been pushing him around for an hour or so. As I looked at him, I asked, "what happened to his toe?' Well, he had scrapped all the skin of his little toe just above the nail on the same foot as his bad toe. Poor little chap, three things in three days. Thankfully, I had been back to the DR and picked up some anti-biotic cream for his toe! Now, my rant on my last post was spurred on by the pain in my toe. I had been pushing the shopping out to the car when I kicked the back wheel of the trolley. God it hurt. I thought no more about it, till it felt wet in my sandal. Looking down I had really hurt myself, the nail on my little toe is no more, hence when I sat down to post something, with 40mins till the boy came home from his last day off school, things didn't come out quite as they would have under more favourable circumstance.
On the whole, our summer holiday is working out OK, minus the odd toe and finger x
Wednesday, 31 July 2013
are most scientists arseholes?
When I first had the diagnosis of autism and had cleared my head to looking forward, the obvious starting point was diet. Everything and everyone was talking about the gluten, casein free diet. I dipped my toe in and tried some of the overpriced gluten free replacements. They were so yuck that the yuck combined with a nagging voice was enough for me to try something different. Now my nagging voice was 'bread is the staff of life' and 'the land of milk and honey' WHAT? you might think. Well, my point is for centuries, we have eaten the stuff and be fine - so what has changed? Well, science is the answer. Perhaps science payed by big money is a better one.
Years ago, bread would take 2 days to make, now you can shove in flour and a load of yeast (which is mostly genetically modified) and you can eat it in 2 hours. Milk used to come from cows fed on grass and hay, and straight in a jug for consumption. Now, cows are fed corn (lots of it from the states where its mostly genetically modified) and the stuff is pasteurised (which kills most of the beneficial elements) and then stripped of its fats and then homogenised. The reason they do this is profit. And the scientist say its fine. Well friends, scientist will say anything if you pay them, and its big business with the money. Lets face it, who has the most money to spend and the most to lose, a small family run raw milk dairy farm, or big business milk with all the spin off business and products? So anyway, back to why is this stuff so bad for our kids. I remember asking one of the mums at an early bird session, and she gave me the line about leaky gut and molecules going into the bloodstream causing an opiate reaction etc, the standard response which I already knew. I looked at her and said 'I know all that, but why?' and she couldn't answer, or maybe didn't understand my question. My problem with this diet is no-one seems to look beyond it. My sister is allergic to cats, she appears fine as long as she keeps away from them, but she is still allergic to them. So when I read that (I think its called) bt corn, which is genetically modified, is actually listed as an insecticide, things made a little more sense. You see, they have actually put in the corn itself, a bacteria which kills the insects eating it, by destroyed their digestive system, it makes holes in them and then they die. Sound familiar? Our lovely men in white coats say this is safe for us to eat. But only the white men in coats who are paid by big business, some of the men in white coats disagree, but as they end up un-employed, they are brave souls to speak out.
So, take a minute to digest this. This corn which kills its enemies by destroying their insides is then fed to cows who are not designed to eat it. This gives them upset tummies, which leads to them having routine anti-biotics, it all ends up in their tissue, and then we eat it. The men in the white coats say this is fine, but they also thought it was a good idea to feed dead mashed up sheep to cows, and that didn't have a happy outcome either.
My problem isn't with all scientist, my problem is with the arrogance. I live in wonder with all that we don't know, they seem to think what we don't know isn't importance. They have no idea what most of our genes do, so they call it junk DNA. I kind of go back to when they thought the world was flat, and work from there. The other day I read a really interesting article which just proved this point. If you ask most people what the point of your appendix is, they will say it has no point at all. This is because they had no idea what its purpose was, so rather than saying this, they said it was useless. Well, this article argued that the point of your appendix was as a 'repository for beneficial bacteria' and that far from it being a wee thing in us that evolution was slowly getting rid of, was also found to be in more than 50 mammal species. This has really sparked me up, since starting Ed on kefir water, his pooh has been so much better. I am still taking it easy with him, but the results from just 2-3 teaspoons a day are looking really good. I read another article which said that to really reap the benefits you need to include cultured veggies and kombucha (another bacteria tea) because they all had different types of bacteria, so once I have mastered the art of kefir water, veggies, here we come! These are all ancient foods, foods that truly nourish us, not some highly manufactured crap that makes a few very wealthy.
So lets bash the scientist just a bit more for fun. Apparently they are only just pondering about what there was before the big bang - that was my first thought! How about all the money spent looking for life outside of this planet, which focused on water and sunlight, because that's what they thought was needed to support life. Then, they went deep to the bottom of the ocean and found a whole eco-system in complete darkness, flourishing in water that is super heated. Wheres that leave the search for life? well, they are only looking for life as they know it. Perhaps its my attitude, when I was a teenager my dentist told me I needed 8 fillings. I thanked him and walked out. About 3 years latter I went back and this time he told me I needed 6 fillings. This was great, at this rate, in my 30's I wouldn't need any, and that is absolutely what happened. I went back to another dentist in my 30's and all I needed were some replacements for some of the old ones. Just because you have a white coat on doesn't mean I will believe you.
So, back to my replacement fillings. Who thought it was a good idea to put mercury in your teeth? did you know that heat and friction will release small quantities of mercury gas from them. So what do you think a sandwich and a cup of tea will do? Back then, I wasn't quite as switched on as I am now. I never let any of my children's teeth be filled with amalgam, I had read that orange juice helped with iron absorption. After the first filling, I learnt about the dangers of fruit acid! but only now am I thinking of how my own could have affected them. (Did you know that they also put small quantities of mercury in vaccines, along with thing like formaldehyde?) I have a big double filling at the back which needed replacing. My dentist did a lousy job and I ended up with food getting stuck between them, I swapped dentist, and had them replaced again. He did another lousy job which needed fixing. During all these procedures I rinsed with that weird pink drink, loads of bits of filling. Looking back, this is where Eds problems started. The symptoms of mercury poisoning are like a mirror for the symptoms of autism. If you have these fillings removed properly they have to cover up your mouth with plastic to stop the bits getting in your system and special ventilation so you don't breath in the gas. I had none of that. As I was older, and thought all my babies where behind me, I just thought it was me in the firing line. Poor Ed. Science likes to point out that your more likely to have an autistic child the older you are, that its something to do with your old eggs. I think another way of looking at it is, as you are older you have had longer to absorb all the crappy chemicals they have released in the environment, and your body is more likely to be depleted of vital nutrients from all the crappy processed foods that our modern day diet is made up of.
Years ago, bread would take 2 days to make, now you can shove in flour and a load of yeast (which is mostly genetically modified) and you can eat it in 2 hours. Milk used to come from cows fed on grass and hay, and straight in a jug for consumption. Now, cows are fed corn (lots of it from the states where its mostly genetically modified) and the stuff is pasteurised (which kills most of the beneficial elements) and then stripped of its fats and then homogenised. The reason they do this is profit. And the scientist say its fine. Well friends, scientist will say anything if you pay them, and its big business with the money. Lets face it, who has the most money to spend and the most to lose, a small family run raw milk dairy farm, or big business milk with all the spin off business and products? So anyway, back to why is this stuff so bad for our kids. I remember asking one of the mums at an early bird session, and she gave me the line about leaky gut and molecules going into the bloodstream causing an opiate reaction etc, the standard response which I already knew. I looked at her and said 'I know all that, but why?' and she couldn't answer, or maybe didn't understand my question. My problem with this diet is no-one seems to look beyond it. My sister is allergic to cats, she appears fine as long as she keeps away from them, but she is still allergic to them. So when I read that (I think its called) bt corn, which is genetically modified, is actually listed as an insecticide, things made a little more sense. You see, they have actually put in the corn itself, a bacteria which kills the insects eating it, by destroyed their digestive system, it makes holes in them and then they die. Sound familiar? Our lovely men in white coats say this is safe for us to eat. But only the white men in coats who are paid by big business, some of the men in white coats disagree, but as they end up un-employed, they are brave souls to speak out.
So, take a minute to digest this. This corn which kills its enemies by destroying their insides is then fed to cows who are not designed to eat it. This gives them upset tummies, which leads to them having routine anti-biotics, it all ends up in their tissue, and then we eat it. The men in the white coats say this is fine, but they also thought it was a good idea to feed dead mashed up sheep to cows, and that didn't have a happy outcome either.
My problem isn't with all scientist, my problem is with the arrogance. I live in wonder with all that we don't know, they seem to think what we don't know isn't importance. They have no idea what most of our genes do, so they call it junk DNA. I kind of go back to when they thought the world was flat, and work from there. The other day I read a really interesting article which just proved this point. If you ask most people what the point of your appendix is, they will say it has no point at all. This is because they had no idea what its purpose was, so rather than saying this, they said it was useless. Well, this article argued that the point of your appendix was as a 'repository for beneficial bacteria' and that far from it being a wee thing in us that evolution was slowly getting rid of, was also found to be in more than 50 mammal species. This has really sparked me up, since starting Ed on kefir water, his pooh has been so much better. I am still taking it easy with him, but the results from just 2-3 teaspoons a day are looking really good. I read another article which said that to really reap the benefits you need to include cultured veggies and kombucha (another bacteria tea) because they all had different types of bacteria, so once I have mastered the art of kefir water, veggies, here we come! These are all ancient foods, foods that truly nourish us, not some highly manufactured crap that makes a few very wealthy.
So lets bash the scientist just a bit more for fun. Apparently they are only just pondering about what there was before the big bang - that was my first thought! How about all the money spent looking for life outside of this planet, which focused on water and sunlight, because that's what they thought was needed to support life. Then, they went deep to the bottom of the ocean and found a whole eco-system in complete darkness, flourishing in water that is super heated. Wheres that leave the search for life? well, they are only looking for life as they know it. Perhaps its my attitude, when I was a teenager my dentist told me I needed 8 fillings. I thanked him and walked out. About 3 years latter I went back and this time he told me I needed 6 fillings. This was great, at this rate, in my 30's I wouldn't need any, and that is absolutely what happened. I went back to another dentist in my 30's and all I needed were some replacements for some of the old ones. Just because you have a white coat on doesn't mean I will believe you.
So, back to my replacement fillings. Who thought it was a good idea to put mercury in your teeth? did you know that heat and friction will release small quantities of mercury gas from them. So what do you think a sandwich and a cup of tea will do? Back then, I wasn't quite as switched on as I am now. I never let any of my children's teeth be filled with amalgam, I had read that orange juice helped with iron absorption. After the first filling, I learnt about the dangers of fruit acid! but only now am I thinking of how my own could have affected them. (Did you know that they also put small quantities of mercury in vaccines, along with thing like formaldehyde?) I have a big double filling at the back which needed replacing. My dentist did a lousy job and I ended up with food getting stuck between them, I swapped dentist, and had them replaced again. He did another lousy job which needed fixing. During all these procedures I rinsed with that weird pink drink, loads of bits of filling. Looking back, this is where Eds problems started. The symptoms of mercury poisoning are like a mirror for the symptoms of autism. If you have these fillings removed properly they have to cover up your mouth with plastic to stop the bits getting in your system and special ventilation so you don't breath in the gas. I had none of that. As I was older, and thought all my babies where behind me, I just thought it was me in the firing line. Poor Ed. Science likes to point out that your more likely to have an autistic child the older you are, that its something to do with your old eggs. I think another way of looking at it is, as you are older you have had longer to absorb all the crappy chemicals they have released in the environment, and your body is more likely to be depleted of vital nutrients from all the crappy processed foods that our modern day diet is made up of.
Monday, 29 July 2013
ginger ninja
Do you have any memories that made you think about the way you think? I remember years ago coming back from a walk with my Dad, at the bottom of our close there was a rickety old fence with all brambles growing over it. It looked more like a gate than a fence and I mentioned it to Dad and he laughed and told me to look over it, there was an old car on the other side. So, I looked over and sure enough, there was a car completely covered in brambles, just a small patch was clear on the bonnet. As I turned away, I thought hang on a minute, what was on that car! I played the scene over in my head as I looked back over the fence, and sure enough, was just in time to see the tail of a fox disappear. My point is, my subconscious mind had seen the fox, but my conscious mind which was expecting to see the car - hadn't. I had seen a fox all curled up snoozing in the sun but it didn't register immediately.
In my quest to understand my autistic son, I have gone down all sorts of interesting avenues. And it appears, that most of the time we just run on autopilot. This is apparently a survival tactic, which allows our brains to work on more important stuff than 'have I flushed the toilet?', which is why all of us do things on auto, which leaves you sometimes wondering, 'did I shut the front door, is the gas still on etc.' Well, when you deal with autism, auto pilot isn't really an option, because nothing is ever really routine.
Last week, the children broke up from school. I went and visited my mum and dad on Thursday. As we waved goodbye and drove down the bottom of the close I saw something on the other side of the road that took me a moment to figure out. There was a trolley from my mum and dads garden, I knew instantly what had happened. We had a lovely time playing in the garden, Edward kept climbing up the back gate to undo the catch in a bid for freedom and we kept stopping him. As I was mashing the potatoes at the end of the day, I heard the gate bang. I shouted to my sister to see if Ed had got out. She had a look and said, 'no, he must be inside.' Well, I knew he wasn't, so I ran out and shouted his name, and a few minutes latter he came round the corner all smiles. Margaret said to me, 'he must have been in someones drive because I looked down there and couldn't see him.' Ah, the pieces of the jigsaw all fitted together. He hadn't been in anyones drive, he had run down the close with the trolley, crossed the road and left it on the grass verge, crossed the road and come back! As I played this out in my mind, I worked out all the scenarios with cars and no cars (thankfully it wasn't a busy road) and I thought to myself, my God, he could have been killed! So I played that out in my head, and I thought, well, I would be upset and very sad, but I wouldn't spend my life with the could have, should have poison. The truth is, I do my very best with him, I can look anyone in the eye and say I do my best. Sure, I could do more, but I need to have enough energy to get up and do it again and again, not just for a day. He keeps running out of our front door as well, to pick up things he has thrown out of the window. My friends have suggested a small latch at the top of the door, that apparently keeps their kids at bay. Would it be an issue for Ed, fat chance. He climbed up the back fence and undid it, he would pull up a chair and undo whatever latch I put on, he climbs up the handles of the fridge to get at the goodies in the cupboard above! I could lock the front door, but that's a fire hazard, anyway, he gets the keys and undoes it so whats the point. We all have to live there, not just Ed. Last night late I picked up my eldest from the airport and told him what had happened whilst he had been away. I told him the story of the runaway trolley and he said, 'Ed is like a ginger ninja' and I couldn't think of a better description for him.
Maybe the fact that autistic children don't spend time on auto-pilot adds to their sensory overload. They are constantly aware all the time. Perhaps that is part of the puzzle when they melt down. When we say melt down, you need to imagine your child having the worst temper tantrum, upset, that you have ever witnessed, and then imagine what it would look like if they were on steroids or crack cocaine! Thankfully, those have calmed down - touch wood - and whilst they are still a regular feature, they don't last all day and are bearable. Maybe as he grows older, that auto pilot bit is beginning to happen.
PS apologise for the last post, I understand that auto spell corrected google to goggle! I thought I had managed to change them all. x
In my quest to understand my autistic son, I have gone down all sorts of interesting avenues. And it appears, that most of the time we just run on autopilot. This is apparently a survival tactic, which allows our brains to work on more important stuff than 'have I flushed the toilet?', which is why all of us do things on auto, which leaves you sometimes wondering, 'did I shut the front door, is the gas still on etc.' Well, when you deal with autism, auto pilot isn't really an option, because nothing is ever really routine.
Last week, the children broke up from school. I went and visited my mum and dad on Thursday. As we waved goodbye and drove down the bottom of the close I saw something on the other side of the road that took me a moment to figure out. There was a trolley from my mum and dads garden, I knew instantly what had happened. We had a lovely time playing in the garden, Edward kept climbing up the back gate to undo the catch in a bid for freedom and we kept stopping him. As I was mashing the potatoes at the end of the day, I heard the gate bang. I shouted to my sister to see if Ed had got out. She had a look and said, 'no, he must be inside.' Well, I knew he wasn't, so I ran out and shouted his name, and a few minutes latter he came round the corner all smiles. Margaret said to me, 'he must have been in someones drive because I looked down there and couldn't see him.' Ah, the pieces of the jigsaw all fitted together. He hadn't been in anyones drive, he had run down the close with the trolley, crossed the road and left it on the grass verge, crossed the road and come back! As I played this out in my mind, I worked out all the scenarios with cars and no cars (thankfully it wasn't a busy road) and I thought to myself, my God, he could have been killed! So I played that out in my head, and I thought, well, I would be upset and very sad, but I wouldn't spend my life with the could have, should have poison. The truth is, I do my very best with him, I can look anyone in the eye and say I do my best. Sure, I could do more, but I need to have enough energy to get up and do it again and again, not just for a day. He keeps running out of our front door as well, to pick up things he has thrown out of the window. My friends have suggested a small latch at the top of the door, that apparently keeps their kids at bay. Would it be an issue for Ed, fat chance. He climbed up the back fence and undid it, he would pull up a chair and undo whatever latch I put on, he climbs up the handles of the fridge to get at the goodies in the cupboard above! I could lock the front door, but that's a fire hazard, anyway, he gets the keys and undoes it so whats the point. We all have to live there, not just Ed. Last night late I picked up my eldest from the airport and told him what had happened whilst he had been away. I told him the story of the runaway trolley and he said, 'Ed is like a ginger ninja' and I couldn't think of a better description for him.
Maybe the fact that autistic children don't spend time on auto-pilot adds to their sensory overload. They are constantly aware all the time. Perhaps that is part of the puzzle when they melt down. When we say melt down, you need to imagine your child having the worst temper tantrum, upset, that you have ever witnessed, and then imagine what it would look like if they were on steroids or crack cocaine! Thankfully, those have calmed down - touch wood - and whilst they are still a regular feature, they don't last all day and are bearable. Maybe as he grows older, that auto pilot bit is beginning to happen.
PS apologise for the last post, I understand that auto spell corrected google to goggle! I thought I had managed to change them all. x
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