You remember my post about my multiple mom fails the first year of Pink P's life when we found ourselves in Japan? Well, it turns out that I didn't fail in one important way--I got her immunized on the Japanese schedule. Besides that big, bad BCG shot, the rest were uneventful. First of all, there were fewer of them. Second, they were spread out. She was never given more than one immunization at a time. This means that I had a hard time keeping up with all of them, especially since I wasn't terribly familiar with the Japanese names for all of the vaccines, but it was a sane, safe schedule. If I have learned anything from being a mom in two different countries, it's that much of what seems to be common sense is learned and largely subjective. Once you realize this, it's hard to accept most anything at face value.
Recently, I've been following the story of the regression of my friend's son (who has been diagnosed with PDD-NOS like Sky) following his flu shots and a round of antibiotics. So now I am learning a lot about how certain foods and chemicals can affect kids with autism. It's a vast and scary subject, but with one kid on the spectrum and another with allergies and asthma, it's time to take a closer look. Since we are a family that travels a lot internationally, going vaccine-free is probably not an option for Stow, but we will proceed with extreme caution.
Anyone with an ASD kid knows how hard it is to maintain the delicate balance that enables our kids to make it through the day (even for the "lucky" ones like us who have kids that function fairly well in the neurotypical world). During the past eleven months, I've discovered that every mom has a different story to tell about her ASD kid. And what works for one kid may not work for another. Moving forward can be hard. I'm still feeling overwhelmed on a pretty regular basis and try to keep reminding myself that it's okay to take baby steps as long as we keep moving forward.
So, now that we are making progress with speech, OT and social skills groups, it's time to tackle the question of diet and possible biomedical connections. Maybe there's nothing there, but it can't hurt to look.
Baby steps. Baby steps.
2 comments:
Diet was *huge* for us... My daughter with the allergies has actually been harder to heal than my little one who had ASD (*had* - she has lost her diagnosis, although she is still pretty "quirky" and if you know what you're looking for you can see the remnants that remain to be healed).
In case you want to read about our diet trials/tribulations... It is a whole new level of crazy but it is working. For a lot of us!
http://TribalMamas.blogspot.com
We're going to start fiddling with diet at the beginning of the new year. I can't imagine getting through the holidays (and the kids' birthdays which are also this time of year) while also attempting major dietary changes! We already eat fairly well, but will start trying eliminating certain potential problem foods. Any suggestions on a slow but steady way to get started are much appreciated!
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