Flu Season Hits!

Well, we just made it through this year's flu. Glad to feel alive again! I have to tell you that I discovered the most amazing thing about homeopathy through this flu! Nothing was touching the body aches, headache, queasy feeling.....not motrin, not icyhot, nothing. That is until I happened to remember that I bought this homeopathic remedy on clearance last time I went grocery shopping. It said it was safe and effective to either prevent the flu or fight the flu. Thus, I decided to put it to the test, and hope for the best. I read the ingredients and was pleasantly surprised that it was just the influenzinum nosode. Anyhow.....I took it, and gave it to Caleb and my other young son who all felt rotten. Lo and behold, within a 1/2 hour, we all were up and around. Caleb was no longer so flushed, and he was up playing and talking! I gave us another dose a few hours later, and we again continued to feel better. Every few hours and another dose of the remedy, and a day later we're all feeling normal! Hooray :) Caleb went to school and I'm eating again & doing the things I normally do. I feel like myself once again! Again, in case you've all forgotten.....I LOVE homeopathy!

Safe TOY links

Trying to think of a great birthday gift for Caleb as his 6th b-day is coming quickly...Feb. 26th. I want it to be educational, fun, and SAFE! Here's some lead-safe toys sites that I've found:

www.bluedominos.com
http://www.fatbraintoys.com
http://toysamerican.com
http://www.coolmompicks.com/safertoy07/
http://safetoyinfo.blogspot.com/

A few sites also contain American Made toys. I'm thinking of getting something different to build and construct with since Caleb loves to build houses, and is VERY good at it. We say that someday he's going to be an architect! If anyone has any additional websites to add to this list....let me know :)

Chiropractor/Muscle Testing

We had a chiropractic appointment for Caleb the other day, and it was very interesting. Basically, I just take Caleb there for help with supplements, and for muscle testing for deficiencies. I'm always amazed at how our chiropractor puts physiology of the body into plain, understandable language. He was talking about how important oils are for the body, especially in winter. Not only are the fat-soluble vitamins low (like vitamin D), omega 6 and 3s are very low as well. He taught me to examine elbows, the hairline, and especially the lips to look for dry patches, indicating being low in oils. Since oils are the "food for the brain" as he put it, it's SO necessary to maintain healthy oils in the body, especially when you have autism as my son does. He also taught me to check for ketones in first morning urine (with a simple strip you can get from the pharmacy) to see that Caleb is spilling at least some ketones into his urine. This lets you know that his body is using fats for brain fuel and not just simple sugars (which can leave you with a quick fix, but also a crash later). Thus I have Caleb now on a tsp of olive oil with meals, a supplement to help digest and utilize oils, and also omega 3s (DHA). So far, Caleb just seems much happier, and has the "softer" look to his eyes that I love to see ;)

Just to keep updated with the glutathione.....I'm giving it twice a day now, and will probably increase to 3 times a dy next week. Speech is better again, but still not up to where I'd like it to be. I do think it's working though!

Speech Issues and the Glutathione Component

I've been wondering about my son's glutathione levels lately. We had run out of glutathione cream, and hadn't reordered it to try to see if it actually did anything positive for Caleb. He was off it for about 3 weeks, and his speech progressively got worse, less defined, less spontaneous. Finally, I had some old Kirkman's glutathione, and I put some on my son to see if we could find something to improve his speech. Truly, within 20 minutes, his speech was much clearer and spontaneous. I then decided I needed to up the glutathione to twice a day if it is helping that much. That's where we're at now. I'm upping it to twice daily to see if improvements are noted.

You know, if it ends up helping, what's to prevent me from putting it on 3 times, then 4 times a day, etc. It got me thinking about how to raise glutathione. I know that vitamin C and N-A-C (n-acetyl-cysteine) both are supposed to be precursers to glutathione. But, since Caleb does NOT do well on vitamin C, I'll have to try the NAC. Also, I know that a new study came out (I'll have to see if I can find it for the website) about how chelation with DMSA raises glutathione for weeks by just one round. So.....until I start the NAC, I'm doing another round of chelation for which Caleb already seems happier at least. Is it the glutathione from the DMSA or something else??? I also know about the glutathione IV's, but it just isn't practical for us since the nearest DAN is over 3 hours away.

As I sit here researching glutathione, I see that whey in milk is a precurser. Now that is not possible with most autistics, since a strict GFCF is key. However, my son is actually on milk products, just not straight milk, and not a lot per day. Wheat has always been his major "no-no", not so much milk. One day last summer during a post-tball celebration, after allowing my son to have an icecream cone, he acted so normal and was playing tag with the other t-ball kids. I wondered what could this be. I now wonder if it didn't have something to do with glutathione. Not quite sure I want to increase his milk intake, but I'll have to think some more about it. Now if I could get my hands on that raw milk.....!

For now it will be glut. cream, try NAC, and more regular chelation. Hopefully, it will improve speech!

Raw Milk Debate

I've been doing a lot of thinking about raw milk recently. Anybody have any thoughts on it? I just read an article about the link between pasteurization and colitis/Chron's disease. I've always known that the hormones and antibiotics fed to the cows gets through to the milk, just as a mother would give these things to her breast-feeding child if she took them. However, I never realized all that pasteurization did to the milk. Even homoginization apparently isn't too good either. Please read these sites:

http://www.mountvernonnews.com/local/06/07/08/raw.milk.html

www.realmilk.com

www.rawmilk.org

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2008/1/1/does-tainted-milk-cause-crohn-s-disease.aspx
http://www.suegregg.com/about/The%20Wonder%20of%20Raw%20Milk.pdf

I'm seriously thinking about buying a share of a cow and getting the raw milk. I'm sure my husband and my kids will truly believe I've gone off the deep end! Maybe I have :)

How I love homeopathy! It should be called hopeopathy :) Caleb's anxiety was again getting out of control. The only thing that seemed to help was the supplement GABA, 1000mg at a time (twice daily). I'm glad it helps, but must we rely on this everyday now? Low and behold, Caleb's constitutional remedy lycopodium finally helped a bit (only now in a larger dose of 200c). It made his return to school after the holidays somewhat bearable. No one sent me notes about his behavior....so that's a positive thing :)
The reason I knew to try GABA was because GABA often balances excitotoxins in the brain from excess glutamates. Some glutamate sources are calcium and folic acid, many foods like wheat and milk, and I'm sure others. For Caleb, we had been trying Calcium for a while, and it had seemed to help at first. Then we hit the wall..... Instead it raised his glutamates (or so I supposed) and made GABA necessary. He's extremely good on GABA, but just quiet & not as fiesty (which I like him to defend himself and have opinions...just in smaller doses). Caleb has needed folic acid before for clearer speech, but it also often ends up fluctuating his body to excitotoxin mode. For him, we see "screaminess" over every little thing, and weeping over nothing. He also gets a bit OCD. Anyhow.....lycopodium has helped for these past few days. Thank you Lord for that!

My Beginning Blog

Welcome to my blog! I'm excited to start. I'm hoping to be helpful to some who are beginning their autism journey, yet I'm also hoping to gain better insight from those who are in the thick of it all. My son is 5.5 and can be both a joy and a stress on everyone he meets. He looks normal, and has many normal actions. However, it's the abnormal that make people take a step back. Many people assume he should be capable of all things normal (because he looks normal), and it must just be our parenting. I can read it in their eyes, and it grinds me! I can tell that they're thinking, "If that were my kid, I'd......" Believe me...if I could wave the magic wand I would have long ago!! Thankfully, his kindergarten teacher is very open-minded and refreshing, and we have a very supportive family. Biomedical (DAN protocol and more) as well as homeopathy have given us much normalcy back, and it's such a blessing! We have a long way to go, but we're in it for the long haul. Anyhow....I'm excited to begin!