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.


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

Wednesday 24 July 2013

beware of flies, and things that fly! and google google google!

The recent nice weather has meant that our wee boy has spent a lot of time outside swinging in the tree hammock. Dressed mainly in just a pair of under pants, covered in coconut oil, he can play for hours. The other day, I had trouble calling him in for a bath, so I went out to get him. As I passed an empty 'urn' which is  waiting for me to put something in it, I noticed that it was attracting a load of flies (always a bad sign), as I looked in, guess what? It had a big pooh in the bottom. There was a wasp in there as well, so I thought I would just leave it till all the guests had left. Yes, the boy had wanted a pooh, hovered over my pot, job done! As I took him inside, I showed it to him and told him that was naughty, pooh went in the toilet. Gosh, I must be a comedian, because he laughed all the way indoors.

Again, due to the recent nice weather, the windows have been open wide in the late afternoon. There's quite a list of things I have found on the drive, thankfully nothing breakable. You hear footstep, wild laughter, and splashing in the bath. That means, look outside! I can't tell you how funny that is to him, or how important it is to keep anything breakable away from the windows! When you bring it back, well, you're the worlds funniest comedian again.

I must apologise for my constant reference to what comes out of my boy, but to understand anything about autism, you have to look at the gut. Most of our autistic children will have gut issues, and to start to address their issues, this is where to start.

Did you know that in the gut there are neurons similar to that found in the brain?
Did you know that there is a gut brain connection?
Did you know that you have more bacteria in your body than cells?
Did you know that most of these are found in you gut?
Did you know that you have good bacteria and bad bacteria, and that any anti-biotics will kill your good bacteria and leave the bad to flourish?
Did you know that most of the good bacteria you supplement via pro-biotic, yogurts etc don't survive the acid in your stomach?
Did you know that these good bacteria are the first line in your immune system defence?
Did you also know that they think that these good bacteria are responsible for lots of the complicated enzymes we produce that make us such amazing biological creatures, compared to say a mouse or a worm, which only has a few less genes than us?

Well, I could 'did you know?' a lot more, this one subject is so interesting, trust me, put it in goggle and you have several weeks of amazing revelation if you could be bothered to research it, or just take my word for it. This has been a thorn in my side for a long time. What falls out of Ed varies from the pretty normal to a bubbling, foul smelling, yeasty liquid. How to address this in my boy, who will not take supplements. Well, thankfully there are lots of different types of pro-biotic, some are soil based - ever heard of the saying everyone needs to eat a pinch of dirt before they die? Well, they may not have realised it, but they meant the pro-biotic in soil which have been described as the Chuck Norris  of pro-biotic! I think these are the type you find in traditional fermented foods like sauerkraut. But there are others and these are really interesting to me as a mother of a fussy eater, and those are Kefir. You  may or may not remember, but a while ago, a very sweet lady at a Treating Autism Support Coffee morning, was handing bags out of the stuff with instructions. It was an answer to a prayer, because who wants to buy something like that of e-bay? Well, I have been making it, making everyone take it, and slipping it in Eds drink. I haven't been able to afford any NAET treatments lately, so all I have been doing with him, is letting him get plenty of Vit D in the sun (remember coconut oil, not suncream) fresh air, Vit C and a teaspoon ( just till we get used to it ) of Kefir water. He has been really good considering and recently has been really trying to babble, reading books with different voices. On the second day of taking Kefir water, he did 4 solid big poohs, which is a sign his gut is beginning to normalise. There is a lot more to do, I need to introduce proper homemade bone broth, to help heal his gut further, make my own sourdough bread ( need to make the starter first ) and get hold of some cholesterol, what? Yes! Cholesterol, which is a must have ingredient for your body. No, it doesn't clog your arteries, that would be vegetable oil, YES! VEGETABLE OIL!! that silent killer, artery clogger and belly fat maker. One of the first things I did in my intervention was hit the veg oil on the head. We use butter from Guernsey cows, full fat non-homogenised Guernsey milk, fry now in coconut oil and use flax oil for dressings. As winter comes upon us, I will be making lard, YES! homemade lard, a great nutrient dense food - will cover that latter. Anyone who is thinking what! check it out on google, everything you heard about what a healthy food is, is probably wrong. It was a shock to me to. The last thing that I swapped immediately was salt. I have always used sea salt in cooking, but now I slosh it about, those who think this is a banned food, think again. Where else do you get those important trace minerals from, and salt is needed for water exchange at a cellular level, again, check it out, but check out sea salt or the wonderful pink Himalayan salt, as opposed to table salt, which you shouldn't have anyway coz that really is bad for you!

One of the things I wanted to do with this blog was share my discoveries, and I kinda shared rather a lot just there, but not all the reasons why I do it, so next week, I will go through them one by one. These are things that we all should be doing to be healthy, not just because it helps with autism. Autism is the canary singing in the mine. Our precious children are an alarm that things are very wrong in our food chain, I know it as Autism, your may know it as something else, like cancer, hormone trouble, problems with your teeth, chronic fatigue etc. You know, at the beginning of the week a webinar came up from the Institute of Autism in American. It was lead by some Lady Professor, and the title of the webinar was TILT (toxic induced loss of tolerance) Its on the web if anyone is interested, its pretty weighty stuff, but basically, we are all slowly poisoning ourselves with a mass of chemical that were unknown in the 1940's(the chemist might have known about them, but hadn't as yet put it in our shampoo etc), our new diet of manufactured foods are also poisoning us, leaving our bodies unable to do what they used to. Autism is just one of the dreadful consequences of industrial food. All the foods I am re-introducing are things we have eaten for centuries with no ill effect. Why are our children sensitive to gluten, well, the bread we eat now is not the bread we ate then, nor is the milk, the fruit and veg and even the meat and dairy is all, well, fucked up. Our bodies are amazing things, we have many complicated processes which happen without us knowing or doing anything. Proteins and enzymes breakdown to make other proteins and enzymes which make hormones that break down to do something else etc, etc, one wrong move in this chain, and the rest of the system doesn't work. You wont notice anything dramatic, you know your leg wont fall off, but at a cellular level things are not what they ought to be, and you may just at best feel a bit off. Ask yourself this question. Do you fit the description of health from the World Health Organisation, that good health is feeling vibrantly alive. And why, if once bread was the staff of life is it so not now. Why are so many children so allergic to things, why are so many children needing glasses, invasive dentistry, why are so many adults needing glasses now. You know this isn't how it used to be, and no its not because the NHS is picking more things up, its because there is more of it, ie, our bodies not working properly.

Till next week, (the children are on holiday now and the holiday clubs start then) knock yourself out and google even just one of the things I mentioned, and I know you will start doing just the same as me x

PS I know anyone can put anything on google, so I crossed reference everything to make sure I was reading fact not fiction, because at first, I couldn't believe we had got it so wrong, and thats why it took me nearly two years of constant enquiry to know what I do now.

Friday 19 July 2013

A moment of unity

The recent hot weather has seen no slow down in Ed, it didn't matter how hot it was, if he was going somewhere - he was running! Eventually, the weather took it toll on his tummy and I got the call to get him from school. He had had the 'runs' in the playground, all over the playground and himself. JOY!
As I picked him up, I joked with his teacher 'I'm only taking him if he is empty' - 'Oh he's empty' she said with meaning. I had dreaded the following 48 hours, but he calmed down, and was really very sweet, and on James 19th birthday, he joined James with his friends drinking beer on the patio, with his carton of Cranberry Juice.

The following day, the heat got sticky. The kind of hot sticky that only a thunder storm dissipates. Thankfully the rain waited till all were home and then we had a massive cloud burst, honestly the splats of the rain drops were easily 2'' across. We all stood at the back door watching. Ed went running out in it dressed in PJ bottoms and a vest. The front of the vest was held in his mouth, and he held both trouser legs up in each hand, and he ran round so joyfully that we were all held spell bound, laughing together like a normal family. In came Ed completely soaking, into the cupboard under the stairs and ran out with a ginormous umbrella and back out he went, still with his vest in his mouth, and trying to hold up both trouser legs and an umbrella, its was so funny. All 4 of us stood, laughing and enjoying each other, and enjoying Ed. All the previous hair pulling and biting forgiven, and I had a wee glimpse of what life could be like, maybe even what life might be like in the future, God I hope so x

Sunday 14 July 2013

Everything has 2 sides

Every cloud has a silver lining. Other than the fact I have a gorgeous wee fella who has spiced up my life, the other side to having Ed is the wonderful people I have met as a consequence of him.

I really have had the best weekend ever. On Friday I met up with some ladies I knew from a toddler group I used to go to. I had to leave early because I had a Treating Autism support coffee morning. As I left, I bumped into another lady I met from another toddler group I went to. It was so lovely to catch up, and as I sped of to Marlow (late) I reflected on all the wonderful people I have met. Roll on more wonderful ladies in Marlow. One of them was talking about her child hanging on the curtain pole. 'What?' I said, 'You have curtains?' The whole group burst into laughter, no, they all used to have curtains. How nice to be with such a positive and knowledgeable bunch, we laughed as we all burnt in the afternoon sun. What a great Friday, even managed to squeeze in a NAET treatment.

Saturday, all the wonderful people who work at children in action, a charity supported by  Bucks Council to help disabled children. As I drove away from dropping him off, I just caught sight of him charging off round the corner out of sight and the lady looking after him running in hot pursuit! How nice it was that it wasn't me! Well he ran all morning, and then we squeezed in another treatment.
In between 4.30 when we got back and 6pm when we had tea, he manged somehow to find some old paint at the top of the garden and get it all over him and pour his dads Radox all over the bathroom floor. I caught him washing his hands in the toilet. I don't know if any one has tried to mop up a bubble bath spill, but its quite difficult, especially on what was said to be the hottest day of the year.

Sunday, and he is off with Lauren at the moment. Its our weekend for respite, this doesn't happen every weekend except in my dreams. I am just wondering how many children he has licked, and whether he has managed to get in with any animals or let them out. Oh, its so good to be alive. This has been a good week. x

Wednesday 10 July 2013

In the begining ...'''

To tell our story in one swoop would bore you all to tears, so I will give a brief over view of how it all panned out for us. And then I will go back and put more flesh on the bones. So, how it all started...

My mum had told me that my brother Steve was a really sweet quite baby, and as he was her third and Ed was mine, just thought that was the way it was. I did find it odd that if I pointed out a plane or a squirrel that he took no notice, but with small children you don't get much thinking space and with two big ones needing ferrying around life has a zip to it.

As Ed got older my friends with babies the same age tried toddler sign language, all the other children were entranced, Ed was just trying to make a break for freedom. At all the groups I went to, other children were making progress and Ed was becoming more of a handful. Now all the other children and really talking and Ed is SILENT, except when he is screaming, I visit my heath visitor concerned. As my sister didn't talk till she was 3 I was told not to worry. His third birthday approaches, I bypass the heath visitor and head straight for my GP, he is a little worried to and tries to set up a speech and language appointment. A few weeks in, a pissed off GP calls and says I need to go to a drop in session, he found this info out with a lot of difficulty, but not as much as I had actually finding a session that wasn't cancelled. Months pass before I even get a look in, by this time we are all concerned. Ed is very difficult at pre-school, and at home.

Now we are under a paediatrician, who asks me what I think is wrong? Months pass. I have looked up autism and things to look out for, but it doest seem to fit him. Months pass. After a couple of visits, I ask her, ' do you think he is autistic?' Can you imagine my surprise when she basically said 'if it looks like it and smells like it then it probably is it' and bash boom, Mrs Oke here's your autistic child, join NAS, apply for disability and over in wycombe theres a random club which caters for disable children. The whole statement program got started and off went my precious child, who I had such hopes for, to special school.

Its genetic, theres nothing you can do about it. Ed turned into a head banging (he would smash his head on my tiled floor) shit smearing, screaming, angry, diarrhoea child, who jumped around at bed time like a mad man till he wore himself out sometimes at midnight. He would tear at his skin screaming, and destroyed everything. He would come in the room and just switch the light on off, on off, run off and leave taps running, he was a fucking nightmare! I couldn't take him out because of his behaviour, those months were so dark. I picked out a place to kill myself and him - I couldn't picture the rest of our lives like this. I managed to pick myself up and reached out to social services. They couldn't do anything for me, I was married, and apparently coping even though I told her I was suicidal and contemplating harming him. Those dark months were bad but they got worse. I vowed that if no one else could help me then I would. I didn't remember growing up hearing anything about autism, if its a growning problem then it isn't genetic. I hit google. God bless google. I don't care if they never pay a penny in tax what they have given out for free is priceless. And I read and read and read. Ed got so bad that I had to start taking him to school, it was too awful to see him in the taxi. So my days were taking him to school and when I got home, researching, going and getting him and just getting through the rest of the day. I read about supplements and children with starving brains, it all made sense. I spent 100's of pound on supplement and put them in place. Small signs of improvement. I had him on vitamins, minerals, GFSE, I tried the GFCF diet, but it made no sense to me (yes I know that's like blasphemy but hold your horses) then he started to stop eating all the foods I hid this stuff in. One by one he shut down, and became skinnier, his hair was like straw it was so brittle, his skin was torn to shreds. I switched to more out there therapies. I tried cease homoeopathy and for a time it helped a bit, but not alot, because he would spit it out. In the end he spat out the drops in his sleep and I was at the end of the gangplank and had no where to go.

I had started lying down with him at night, I could hold him down with my arm and reassure him as he fitfully fell asleep. Sometimes I fell asleep too! my poor family barley had any time with me at all. One night as I lay there and he had calmed down, I said to him 'I love you Edward" He turned over and punched me straight in the eye. I saw a blinding flash. The pain was intense. I couldn't get up or he would be up and bouncing again, so I rolled over from him and wept. My eyes are pricking now remembering it. Now in the background to all of this, my husbands business had failed, and we were 2 steps away from ruin. My help was my mum and sister and my faith. Yes, despite everything I have a strong faith. And in this wretched place, I called out to God. I am a strong believer in the power of love, and at this point love was not the emotion I had for Ed. So I thought I will love him because you are in him lord, but this didn't work because I could still see Ed and I hated him at this point. So the idea came to me, but I know what my guru looks like, so I put the face of my guru over Ed and sent him love and demanded help, lord if you have given me this child to care for, you must help me care for him, what do I do? And the random thought came 'what about that NAET?' I had come across this weird therapy several time and dismissed it as quackery, but when your at the end of the gangplank, you have to jump. And this was my leap of faith, and thank God for NAET because it saved me. This is where we are now. Will flesh it out latter. x

Tuesday 9 July 2013

something really weird

Well Guys, I had been planning on telling our story by recounting some of the stand out memories I have of Ed, then tracing it back to where we started, to how we got here. But yesterday I had the opportunity to make an extra visit to our NAET therapist. We hadn't been able to get a time that suited us both for a couple of week, and an opportunity arose where I thought 'What the hell, lets see if Ann is free!' I popped into Eds school yesterday to hand the Headmaster some literature from Treating Autism, you see I have decided to make myself busy, on a side note, I am so glad I did. His school has been put in special measures, which doesn't sound great, but brings in lots of expert help to get the school where it should be. Just before Ofstead came, the Head resigned out of the blue, and the Deputy Head who had only just started became the emergency head, and now he is the official Captain of the ship. What a lovely man, speaking to him, I am really glad that Ed is with them. Anyway, on with my story.

This gave me the opportunity to pick Ed up, which meant I could just slip in a treatment before the traffic gets to heavy. So off we went, now for about the past 2-3 weeks the itching has begun. I thought we were over it, but as soon as he went outside (when the rain finally stopped in June) it was back. Now in the generally scheme of things it wasn't a biggy, but it steady got worse, to him rubbing his face sore when summer finally happened overnight. So I knew the itching wasn't all heat related. This is apparently the worst year on record for pollen, so Ann tested him for grasses and he tested positive. Now she had a dilemma, because he was also due to be treated for nicotine. So, she tested them for order and nicotine won. There I was feeling guilty thinking it was my past smoking days, or his Dad who still smokes (albeit one of those pretend cigarettes now) but no, apparently tomatoes are really high in it as well. Guess who has started eating tomatoes (only cherry tomatoes) like they're going out of fashion? He will take them straight off the chopping board, your plate, your fork you name it he loves them. And he eats them by the bucket load.

The first few times we started with this therapy I had to bribe him with naughty foods to try and keep him still, Ann said don't worry, he'll soon settle down. I didn't believe her, but sure enough, after only a few weeks, he runs in, no sweeties required. Now he sits still in such a state of peace its eerie. Not this time, as soon as she started treating the nicotine, he was squirming, unhappy. He jumped on the table to finish off passing the treatment, and started to cry. Normally he lies there in a state of quite peace, not now. He keeps squirming, crying, at one point he sat up and gave me a sweet little kiss and lay back down crying. He never does that. Ann and I just keep trying to calm him till the buzzer went, thank God when it did. He ran out, still crying and upset. Was upset the entire journey home which is a good 30 minutes. About 10 minutes from the door, over a short period of 2-3 minutes, he quiets down and is transformed into a happy boy and is positively joyful. This side of my little bunny has been missing for the past 2-3 weeks. Just before bed, he has the worst diarrhoea. More cloth for the pooh bucket. But after that, in the bath happy, in bed happy, read a story, turned over and off to sleep he went, WOW!
This morning happy. It was so weird, I guess looking back the steady consumption of all those tomatoes raised his level of nicotine, which then set a reaction off with histamine, which makes you itchy and inflames all your insides. Passing it was obviously unpleasant, and difficult, but once passed, job done.

Now anyone who doesn't know about this therapy will be scratching their head, what am I on about! Well, I promise to start our story tomorrow, this therapy obviously comes at the end, so stay tuned. In the meantime, have a great day X

Monday 8 July 2013

finally summer is here!

Having thought that perhaps summer was last Wednesday and Sunday, this week just warmed up to give us a much needed burst of sunshine and heat. Great for us, but not for my poor Ed. I think the previous months of dampness have affected us all with micro spores of some nasty variety. I could hear all sorts of racking coughs from the neighbours, husband and the boys are sneezing as though they have  hay fever, which is a new one, and Ed as started scratching again. There are big scabby lines on his ankles where something on the grass is making him itch. Not just his ankles but his legs and arms and body. Last night I had to rub some savlone on his face as his cheeks and nose were Scarlett from all the rubbing and itching. The intense heat (which when just a few weeks ago to my disgust I put the heating on because I was so cold) has caught us off guard, we haven't had time to shed our winter fat and acclimatise. Here in England we can only cope with mediocer. To much rain we flood, too little rain we have a drought. Our houses are cold in winter and hot in summer, and perfect for the rest of the time. Our house stores up the heat and in the cool of the night it is scorchio. As Ed has pulled down most of the curtain poles, I cant even pull the curtains to try and keep out the hot sun. Despite the windows all being opened, its difficult to sleep, and the little fella was up till 1am last night before he finally settled in our bed. This morning he was very grumpy. I kinda thought does the Education Secretary not have children, because how is he expecting them to learn when the weather is so hot, isn't that part of the point of a summer holiday. So note to self, will write a letter to MP when I finish, (which is my new hobby to prove to my 14year old that democracy works)

Back to Ed. The heat hasn't just played havoc with his physical comfort and sleeping routines. We are back to loose pooh and a bucket of pooh pants in disinfectant. With my other two, you could reason with them and let them understand what was happening and how to cope. With a non-verbal autistic child, you do the same but don't get the same result. I have no idea how much he understands, its all guess work. Anyway, I hope the warm weather is here to stay for a while, so we can all get used to it. Better having a grumpy child in the garden than the house!

Friday 5 July 2013

why is that boy covered in chocolate?

We were all sat round the dinning room table (about 2 years ago) having a nice supper with James new girlfriend who we shall for convenience call " hot totty." Ed was giving me a moment peace and was off merrily playing, I could hear him in the hall. He had actually eaten something and life felt like it was almost normal. I had been able to finished a sentence and been around to hear the reply without having to get up and sort out Ed, so I was feeling pretty good. When the small boy comes in sight naked as the day he was born and covered in chocolate. As I saw him I can still remember the loud voice in my head saying, 'why is that boy covered in chocolate?' closely followed by ' where the hell did he get chocolate from?' because lets face it if there was chocolate, is was better off in me than on him.

The awful truth hit me as I got up to clean him, to find he had managed to get chocolate all over not only himself but much of the house. Door knobs. walls, skirting boards, most of the floor (praise Jesus that we had it tiled) over the hoover, the handle and flex and underneith where he had tried to clean up. Moving on to the toilet, all over the toilet, the taps, the door, the floor, the sink, the toilet paper, all over the cupboard doors in the utility room, the door knobs the walls. Now heres the good bit. It wasn't chocolate. Its amazing how far you can spread a relativly small amount of shit, and considering how much was on him, his face, his hair, his body, his legs and his feet and hands it was incredible that there was so much left to cover the house with.

This was not the first time we had come across this behaviour. In medical lingo it has the rather sanitized name of 'smearing.' At night time before I discovered the joy of a melationine spray (god bless google) he used to jump around in the dark in his room for hours, litteraly till 10-11pm at night. Sometimes the smell wafted downstairs through his closed door, through the living room door and you knew to move quick as he was 'smearing' in his bedroom. Other occasions, saying good night to one of the boys as they went to bed half way up the stairs you would hear 'mum come quick' and you would have to pick a sleepy child out of shit and wash them and the room (thank god for bissel carpet cleaners). Sometimes you were so tired you would miss a bit and it is only when you find a gritty handle or something like that you knew the job of cleaning wasnt over.

I love a bit of CSI. I am old fashioned, and love a bit of Willows and Grisom. Sometimes I day dream about the pair of them going through my house with their special light and my whole house is illluminated by the traces of human waste. Is this a pleasent day dream, well no. But its a damned sight better than mopping up shit. Thankfully, as he is older, and we are addressing his issues and treating him with NAET, toilet problems are now an unusal occurance. Thats not to say they have stopped, but its not a regular thing anymore. Pooh in the bath is much easier to deal with, and that too is getting to be less of a regular feature.

On a good day its easy to see the progress we are making. On a bad day, well, I see the mountain we have to climb. Today is a good day, and I am thankful for all I have, just wish spell check was working! lol

Thursday 4 July 2013

a sad little thought

Hi all, sorry for the long delay. It started with half term, then ended with Ed being poorly, and then we had a sunny period of the good life, not a lot of screaming or pooing, or biting or screaming or such like. We had smiles, and trying to play like a real boy (joking, taking the line from shrek) and eating, yes eating. My wee fella has a tiny wee tummy, and his tummy button instead of being an out-e is a flat-e (not quite enough tummy for an in-e). And then my ego kinda kicked in about how well I was managing him blah blah blah and then boom! Back to screaming, opening and slamming the front door and poohs in the bath. And we're back to our strange normal. He tried to get me up the other day at 5am in the morning, anyone who knows me knows that was never going to happen, but he woke me up enough to completely bugger up my sleep, then he falls fast asleep and is a grumpy bugger in the morning. It feels like 1 step forward, 1 step back.

Here's the sad thought, after pulling Toms hair for some unknown reason, Tom says that maybe we should get some of  Eds friends round, and then he wouldn't be so bored ( your see other than cleaning the floor there's nothing really that interests him) and I had to tell Tom and hear it myself that Ed doesn't have any friends. Not a single person. And the sadness and isolation that I felt for him felt like an open wound in my heart. It has roused me out of my complacent we are getting somewhere mode. I have to renew my efforts to make a difference in his life.

Promise I will post tomorrow, and to cheer myself up will list some of the stand out memories I have to prove that we have come a long way from the dark days that used to be the way we lived.