Unraveling the Mystery of Autism and Pervasive Developmental Disorder [Hardcover]

Our son now 4 1/2 was diagnosed with PDD NOS within days of turning 3. We saw some familiarities with the medical issues in this book and thought it worth looking into. (relux, ear infections, persistently loose stools, Milk obsession, food intolerances affecting behaviour in a cousin, bad reaction to vaccin in a normal sibling).

Wanting to be more scientific than 'try it and see' we had a number of tests done over the following 6 months. Sure enough the results were consistent with the theories: food sensitivities, enormous yeast& bacteria overgrowth, vitamin and mineral deficiencies, amino acid imbalances. I cried for a week when I realised the 'lifestyle change' the diet would mean (just coping with life seemed such hard work). But I can honestly say that it doesn't seem that onerous now and it wasn't nearly as difficult as I first feared.

We made the changes progressively - Dietary eliminations. Vitamin & mineral supplementation. Probiotics, antifungals.We saw improvements in 'behaviour'and what convinced us that these were real and not just wishful thinking was that they were accompanied by other changes:
*At 3 1/4 you could have called our son's name from 2 ft away, all day and unless you were touching him or in his face he didn't know it. After 3 days CFGF he suddenly responded to his name from 20 ft away from then on he would look up/around when his name was called. Having woken up 5 times a night EVERY night for months beforehand our son slept through and in the last 18 months he has woken up in the night on only 3 separate occaisions (wet bed/ fell out). I don't need to tell anyone going through this kind of sleep deprivation themselves what a difference that made.
*When we treated the yeasts and bacteria we saw a change in attention span, eye contact and a spontaneous desire to talk to US. This coincided with his first(that I could remember) "beautifully" formed poops. I can't imagine how we'd have managed potty training without this change). Post treatment tests showed great improvement in results. We have had recently had confirmation of this when our suspicions of a problem this summer (poor attention span, weak eye contact, less complex speech) led us to test again and following alarming results we treated the yeasts again and Wow, what a difference.
We think we have seen improvements from supplementation changes but the more gradual changes are possibly due to other reasons. We are great fans also of his wonderful ABA and AVB therapy he has received in the last year. We are still making changes but it certainly seems that the more normal his body chemistry is the more normal he seems. We believe the changes we've made have helped him be able learn from his excellent teachers.

Our son is catching up fast. His communication skills are now only about 6 months behind (from being 'in the bottom 1 percent of children' at age 2 1/2) and people who don't know autistic spectrum disorders don't guess he's any other than a little behind in speech. He will be attending a normal kindergarten next year (no aide expected to be necessary) but continuing speech therapy probably.

It hasn't just saved our son. It's saved our sanity. Bringing up a son who had almost no ability to understand what was being said to him and was clearly so frustrated that he couldn't make his needs understood was like living on Mars. Between 2 1/2 and 3 1/2 the tantrums were explosive and could last hours despite all the very good advice we did get from the state early intervention program. The need for routines was all encompassing. This book enabled us to open a window in our son's mind that we and his teachers could pull him through. I worried if doing all this biomedical stuff would change his "personality". Didn't I love him as he was??. It's difficult to explain but he is still quite definitely the same person and fixing the problems feels a bit like putting on my glasses in the morning. I can seem 'him' clearly now.

When I first told friends and family about what we were doing they smiled sweetly but obviously thought I was nuts. Now the change in our son has been such that I can't count the number of times I've been told "you should write a book about this". I tell them I would......but there already IS one.

If so, get this book. It deserves a place right next to Catherine Maurice's groundbreaking book on intervention through educational methods, LET ME HEAR YOUR VOICE. Actually, it deserves a place of honor right on your kitchen table, where you can refer to it everyday, easily. What Catherine Maurice did for education vis vis autistic children, this book does for dietary intervention.

Karyn Seroussi has written a practical, clear, acessible book about how your child's diet can affect his/her whole way of living in our world. She posits that the health (particularly, a damaged immune system) of your child is one of the major reasons your child diplays autistic behaviors. She has incorporated her own child, Miles, and her own family, in a most compassionate and perceptive way to demonstrate this. I found that, in and of itself, a comfort. We are all in this together, aren't we? We need to help each other. This book is all about helping OUR CHILDREN get better.

Parents of autistic children have it hard enough without having to sift through the incredible, time consuming theories and treatments that come our way daily. Karyn covers all of these and makes them understandable. She explains things. Then she gives you step by step directions to follow to actually improve the health of your own autistic child (or in my case, autistic children: I have two!) This book makes so much sense and is so exciting to read, I wrote this review as soon as I finished it. Even if my own children do not experience the same remarkable recovery that Karyn's son Miles did (she caught his autism really early), I know, from my other reading, that this book ultimately makes total sense... and that my sons will be immeasurably improved. For that, I am incredibly grateful. Thank you, Karyn Seroussi.