April is Autism Awareness Month. With autism rates jumping from 1 in 10,000 in the 1970s to 1 in 36 in the USA at present, autism has become a “hot button” topic. Much of the heat stems from fierce debates about causes, diagnostic criteria and nomenclature. The debate is fiercest among those who believe vaccines are a major contributor to autism and those who deny any harm from vaccines. However, none of this makes things any easier for parents already living with an autistic child.
The recent, well-meaning, politically correct trend to “mainstream” autism as merely a variation of “normal” has not helped parents, either. “Neurodiversity” sounds more respectable than “autism spectrum disorder”, yes, but it is secretly disempowering. Autism is an official medical diagnosis, not a social preference. Either it is a disease or it isn’t. You cannot have it both ways. Calling the autistic brain “neurodiverse” is a bit like referring to a house on fire as “thermally altered.” Would you call the fire brigade to attend to a “thermally altered” house?
At core, and leaving aside all debates about origins and diagnostic criteria, the autistic brain is on fire (and not in the nice way of using that expression). Brain inflammation is the fire that leads to most of the socially debilitating symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Getting on top of the inflammation pathways results in a massive reduction in the more distressing symptoms. Don’t worry, your child will always be “neurodiverse” if that’s your thing, but when the flames have been put out, that diversity has a much better potential to flourish and bring joy to many.
Below is a (slightly modified) letter Doc Frank sent to the parents of an autistic boy, aged 7. Bear in mind that it was written with a specific child in mind, but maybe there are little nuggets in there for other parents, too, and not just for autistic children. Please note that this is a letter for information purposes only, it does not constitute medical advice.
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Here are some basic guidelines to get you started. As these routines become fixtures in your household, we can add more where needed.
1. OVERVIEW
Your child has much joy to give. Currently, the psychiatric meds are holding back his development. These need to be de-prescribed responsibly by a doctor. The meds are designed to suppress brain activity (read: hyperactivity and socially disruptive behaviour), which means that little to no learning can take place, relative to a child not on meds, If we can clear the aluminium from his brain, inflammation will reduce and new neurons will grow faster..
Don’t let him think he is “different”. To him you are “different”. Treat him as you would any neurotypical child, but with extra dollops of compassion and kindness stirred in. Compassion does not mean “no boundaries and no discipline”. It means different boundaries and creative discipline.
2. ANGER MANAGEMENT
His anger outbursts can mostly be traced back to nutrient deficiencies in the brain. Chief among these are a lack of lithium and Vitamin B1. These deficiencies likely predate the prescription of medication, but the meds made matters worse, especially as regards Vitamin B1. In order to have their effect on the brain, they deplete Vitamin B1.
Other than de-prescribing the meds, the deficits have to be replenished through supplementation. I suggest high-dose Vitamin B1 (3 x 100 mg) for 3 – 6 months. I also suggest our Re-Mind Plus x 1 capsule daily for 2 months. The B1 tablets can be crushed and mixed with some fruit juice. The lithium orotate in Re-Mind Plus has no taste and can be mixed in with food or water. Note that standard Re-Mind also contains fulvic acid, which is not easy to mask into food or drink, thus the Re-Mind Plus is the better option for children. It’s only for 2 months, so no danger of overdosing.
You can start with these while he is still on meds, no interactions are expected.
Don’t be disturbed by his angry behaviour. It’s not who he really is. Right now it’s hard for you as parents to cope with, because it feels like he needs to be disciplined for his bad behaviour. The thing is, discipline won’t change his behaviour while his brain is still under siege from meds and inflammation. Be firm with him, but never show anger. Responding to his anger with anger merely triggers a never-ending cycle of tit for tat. This symptom will hopefully soon be a thing of the past; it may take less than a week to see results.
3. HOME SCHOOLING
Think hard about home schooling him. No one loves him more than you do. School is a hotbed of “us vs them” activity which will permanently impact on his ability to socialise. Once school kids have taught him that he does not belong, he will stop trying to belong. Special needs schools can be useful, but they are usually very expensive and the most important element (love) is missing.
There are many South African home school forums on social media where you can ask questions. We chose to “unschool” our kids, which was considered radical at the time. We did very little formal schooling and let them learn from life, with us as their resource of last resort. They amazed us by teaching themselves to read and write, and so on. My wife read them great stories every day, so they developed the ability to listen carefully and remember detail. The kitchen became the science lab (“Watch what happens when I add lemon juice to baking soda”) and also the maths class (“Double that recipe please”).
Our home school goals have four parts — what I call the “Four Rs“:
Religion
Children need a framework in which to fit their experiences and make sense of them. This is what society calls “religion”. Every religion has a ton of stories. Tell your children the stories of your faith, including the stories of your own faith journeys and those of family and friends. To figure out why people behave in a certain way, they need to understand what people believe. You cannot tell your child, “Don’t hit Jonny,” when the child has grown up on violent cartoons. Faith stories mould character and behaviour. It takes years to see results, but that is the more reason to start early.
Relationships
Your child needs to socialise across age barriers. Ideally, he should have at least one friend over the age of 70 or 80, whom he visits at least once a week. Not for that person to baby-sit him but for the two of them to engage in mutual multi-stage projects, like baking cookies, knitting a jersey, building puzzles or such fun things that keep his attention focused for hours at a time. School only teaches kids to relate to same-age peers – that’s not healthy and it’s not how real life works. Home schooling affords your child the chance to socialise vertically instead of horizontally. Be intentional in doing just that.
The other major part of Relationships is conflict resolution. Showing / Teaching your child how to resolve conflict in a win-win way is crucial for success in every sphere of life. Nowhere is this more important than in marriage, where conflict resolution is a key skill to overcome rough patches. School, almost by definition, teaches competition and adversarial habits of dealing with conflict. This will cause your child’s self-confidence much harm.
Residence
Being able to run a household is an almost forgotten skill set. Let your child take part in running your home with you. “Parallel play” is the secret phrase here. Doing the same or similar things side by side allows for bonding and learning at the same time. Children are able to work alongside Mum and Dad from a young age, much younger than we give them credit for. School kids are kept so busy nowadays; they never have time to get involved in domestic work. University is even worse. When the young adults marry, neither party has a clue how to run the shared household. This leads to much needless conflict. And we’re not even talking about caring for a pet, balance a budget or raise a child of their own.
Retail
Every child should grow up being encouraged to think like an entrepreneur. Buying and selling should become part of how he thinks. Yes, few people think like this by nature, but you need to polish this skill as much as you can. One of your biggest fears as the parents of an autistic child is that he won’t be able to fend for himself one day. Don’t let fear paralyse you. Of course, this advice is not unique to autistic children. We started baking cookies with our kids at age 4 and helped them sell them door to door. Some bought, other slammed the door shut or did not answer. It was real life. They also sold their goods at many markets. The main goal is not to make money (though a little cash is always a nice reward) – it’s to let them fail in a safe, loving space. Business in South Africa is tough. Failure is almost guaranteed. Failure hurts so much that we don’t want to do it more than once in life. Kids need to learn to fall, get up, fall, get up – over and over. As long as you keep loving them, they won’t lose heart. From about 14-15, you may try to help your child focus on one business that can hopefully support him into adulthood.
Imagine you’re an employer. Who would you rather employ: An 18 year old matric graduate or an 18 year old autistic child with several years of business experience? Entrepreneurship is a rare skill set that can easily be applied to any work situation or employment.
And, oh yes, university degrees are overrated. A quarter of all Bachelor graduates in South Africa are unemployed. Imagine wasting three or more of the best years of your life to get into massive debt and still remaining unemployed (and likely unemployable, since universities are completely out of sync with the job market). What’s wrong with a trade? What’s wrong with an apprenticeship? People who can work with their hands and think on their feet will be in great demand in the years ahead. AI kan gaan speel in die mielies.
4. PETS AND HORSES
Most autistic kids love animals, or at least some animals. If there’s a chance for him to learn to ride a horse, go for it. Horse riding develops almost every aspect of an autistic child’s challenges in a non-confrontational way. Texture sensitivity, midline crossing, obsessive cleanliness, etc., etc. It really is worth the investment. Kids on the autism spectrum often have an almost telepathic bond with horses and other animals. If riding isn’t an option, find other animals he can be around. Herbivore pets like rabbits or guinea pigs are especially good, since they are minimally demanding and carry beneficial microbes that will help your child’s development. You don’t have to own them, either. He just needs to work with animals fairly often.
5. OUTDOOR ACTIVITY
Horse riding or working with animals also brings another benefit: it takes you outdoors. Being in nature has a unique property. I call it “similar but not identical”. The leaves on a tree are all similar in appearance, but each leaf is also entirely different from the others in the way it is seen (partially obscured or with different light and shadow falling on it or partially eaten by an insect, etc.). Children who spend time in nature become incredibly observant to these subtle, almost imperceptible differences. Combined with an exposure to an adult who reads them stories, they develop what we call “attention”. Your boy, like any other child, was not born with his attention span fully developed, any more than he was born with speaking a language. Attention span is a skill that needs to be developed just as much as language needs to be developed. Reading aloud and being outside in nature are your best friends in this task.
Every time your child moves in nature, the scenery changes significantly. Perspectives shift, light shifts, objects become visible. The brain rewards this movement with a tiny shot of dopamine. The more your boy moves around, the more dopamine his brain gives him. This is how nature keeps children moving.
Outdoor activity is crucial for developing all aspects of being human. Low muscle tone is best addressed by horse riding and being outdoors. For the most part, it is free to engage in outdoor activities. Being outside with someone who loves him (I’m looking at you parents) makes it doubly as exciting and rewarding.
6. SCREEN TIME
This is a touchy subject. Screen time is deadly for the autistic brain. They really struggle to discern between what’s on the screen and what’s real. I advise almost no exposure to TV or smartphones. None. It’s very tempting to use a screen to calm your child down – but screen time causes permanent brain changes that can never be undone, no matter what you do later. If you love your child, throw out the TV and keep smart screens away from him.
Screens do the opposite of exposure to nature. The scenes on a screen keep changing, leading to a shot of dopamine rewarding the brain. Thus the child learns that sitting still in front of a screen is rewarding. Most children’s programmes on TV have scene changes every three seconds or less. Real life requires a lot longer to give a similar amount of dopamine. When the screen is turned off, the child’s brain goes into withdrawal mode almost instantly, trying to recapture the blissful dopamine bath that accompanied screen time. To do this, your boy has to run around the house, climb on top of things, crawl underneath tables and generally behave in a “wild” manner. He is not being naughty. He is simply obeying his brain. Try to stop this and the anger of a junky comes into play.
If he’s already used to screens, cut them back step by step, but as fast as you can without him noticing. Try starting a board or card game with him about 10 minutes before his favourite TV show. He’ll enjoy the game so much he won’t even notice he missed his programme. Rinse and repeat until the habit is broken. It’s hard work, but you’re doing this for the long haul.
An MP3 player loaded with great audiobooks is one way of training attention when you don’t have time to read aloud. Please don’t opt for “children’s audio books”. Choose “meaty” books, the classics from a century or more ago.
You may consider buying a projector so you can watch films and documentaries together as a family. It should be about the specialness of the event and being together.
7. DIET
My most important dietary advice does not relate to food: Eat at a table. Every meal must be an event, with as many family members as possible eating together while seated. Fifty years ago, this was standard practice. Now it is the exception. Your child needs the routine to feel safe.
The autistic brain is extremely sensitive to sugar, sweeteners and colourants. Slowly shift him away from processed foods towards natural ones (“whole food diet”). It’s easy to make your own yoghurt, which is much healthier than shop yoghurt. Use biltong and droëwors as treats and rewards instead of sweets. A little chocolate now and then is acceptable, but only occasionally. Rather opt for dried fruit, like raisins or cranberries. His palate must not get used to the excessive sweetness of modern treats.
Virtually every autistic child has a history of antibiotic use. This often leads to Candida taking hold in the gut. Candida, in turn, urges the brain to crave sweet things (since Candida digests simple sugars as its main food). Moving away from sweet treats will thus not be an easy journey. You are fighting an enemy within your child. This dysbiosis (disturbed gut flora) must be repaired to help remove your child’s sweet tooth.
Add more (saturated) animal products to his diet – meat, eggs, bacon, sausage, butter, cheese, fermented full fat dairy. If he’s dairy sensitive, it’s usually due to pasteurisation. Cold-pasteurised milk products may not affect him as badly.
Animal proteins are complete in the sense that they supply all the amino acids the body and brain need to grow. They are also well digested and absorbed. Plant proteins lack a number of essential amino acids and are poorly absorbed. Also, animal fats are much better brain fuel than processed (unsaturated) seed oils or “vegetable fats”. These only increase brain inflammation.
As far as possible, make sure his fruit and veg are free of toxins, especially RoundUp. Seeds and nuts are healthy too, but many autistic children struggle with their texture. Test and see what works for your boy.
Drinks
Give him water, rooibos tea or milk as much as possible. If he’s used to other drinks, try diluting them gradually. He must NEVER drink soft drinks. Kombucha is a wonderful drink with many health benefits in autism.
8. SUPPLEMENTS
FIRE Drops (Vitamin D3)
Give 1 drop for every 10 kg body weight daily. In other words, for a 35 kg child, give 4 drops daily. Mix it in his food. This is Vitamin D, which his brain needs to develop fully. Vitamin D supplementation is a lifelong requirement.
Brain-Mag
One capsule a day. It has no taste and can be mixed into water or yoghurt. This form of magnesium goes straight to the brain, where it lifts mood, brings calm and helps with deeper sleep.
Vitamin B1
Already mentioned.
Give 300 – 500 mg (3-5 x 100 mg tablets) a day. Crush the tablets between two spoons and dissolve in drinking water. It’s a little bitter-sour, so a splash of orange juice or kombucha can hide the taste. Vitamin B1 is a game changer when it comes to ASD.
Re-Mind Plus (lithium orotate)
Already mentioned.
Take the contents of 1 capsule once daily, with food or water x 2 months to stabilise mood and stimulate brain development. Lithium orotate is the other game changer in ASD. You will hardly believe it is the same child after two months.
ULDN (Ultra Low Dose Naltrexone)
ULDN triggers endorphin production, which helps lift mood, boost immunity and boost neuronal growth. Give 1 spray in the mouth in the morning. You can take a spray yourself, too, to show him it’s not dangerous. It’s totally safe for everyone. Do this for 3 – 6 months, or even longer.
Algae Oil
Algae oil is derived from spirulina and is rich in the omega-3 fatty acids DHA and EPA. Both have great anti-inflammatory properties. Unlike fish oil, algae oil has no fishy taste. The contents of the gel capsules can be squeezed into food for easy ingestion. A daily dose of 1,000 mg / 10 kg of body weight is recommended, with a maximum of 4,000 mg / day.
Gut IQ (probiotic)
As I said above, virtually all children on the spectrum have a gut dysbiosis. This means their good gut microbes are seriously disturbed while bad ones are flourishing. Our Gut IQ provides the correct microbes needed for a healthy brain. Take 5 ml daily, diluted in water or kombucha. Initially, there will be a small war as the bad gut microbes rebel, but keep persisting until the newcomers are settled in. This takes at least 3 months.
9. MICROCURRENT THERAPY
Microcurrent therapy takes many forms nowadays. I prefer CES (Cranial Electrotherapy Stimulation) also known as tACS (transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation). This non-invasive treatment delivers tiny, imperceptible electric impulses to the brain, triggering the production of ATP in the brain. ATP is the “energy currency” of the body. The more ATP your brain has, the faster it can heal itself. It has no serious side effects. In fact, it barely has any side effects at all (a few users report mild headache or drowsiness).
We sell the Elexoma Medic device, a Swiss-designed product with 8 pre-set programmes. In autism, the Elexoma Medic improves sleep, increases attention span, reduces anger outbursts and boosts rapid language development.
A great benefit of the Elexoma Medic is that one device can be used for the whole household. This saves a lot on supplements. We have a lease-to-own option (R370 / m for 24 months), which is soft on the budget.
To your (joyful) health!
The Team at Integrow Health
