I had originally put Aidan on this diet after realizing that he had an issue with yeast, and since I couldn’t get a doctor who would prescribe an antifungal at the time, I wanted to keep it under control as best I could by natural means.
I was still VERY new to this whole world of alternative diets, Autism, and biomed. I had not really read much on the effects of phenols in certain foods. So, I read Breaking the Vicious Cycle and a week later put Aidan on the diet. I followed the introduction part of the diet to the letter. The online Yahoo Group that I joined kept stressing how important it was that you not stray from the diet. Well, when you have a kid who was formerly constipated, and you feed him nothing but carrots, chicken, turkey, applesauce, bananas or eggs, things get worse. Since the intro diet is only to last a few days, and stage 1 should be followed for at least a month. I asked other people on the board, “should I skip ahead to some foods that will help my son have a BM? And remember, this is before I knew about Magnesium!! Every response I got said that I needed to stay the course and that this was a good sign. Hmmmm…this just doesn’t seem right to me, but I figured since they had been through it and seen such amazing results with their own children they knew what they were talking about., right? No, I was wrong big time. This was the first time we saw Aidan walk on his toes. He hadn’t gone to the bathroom in 2 days after eating a lot of food. Ahhhh! So THIS is why so many kids with Autism walk on their toes! Their little tummy hurts so bad that even just the pressure of walking hurts!
I gave Aidan an enema, and I pushed forward to another stage of the diet, where he might get more foods that would help him “go”. I added fruits, veggies, and some almond meal muffins here and there. His bowel movements did not seem to improve, as a matter of fact they were BETTER when we were doing GFCF. However, his language started to increase again. This time he was saying words while we were out with other people (normally he would just talk to me at home. I don’t think anyone thought he could talk). While he was adding words and songs to his vocabulary, he started acting really spacey. He would shake his head around, look up at the lights, he would get really hyper and was having trouble going to sleep at night again. I didn’t know what was going on.
It wasn’t until a month later that I figured out that everything he was eating was high in phenols and Aidan has a phenol sensitivity. It would be almost impossible to keep him on this diet without phenolic foods. I had never seen this addressed on the chat board for this diet, or on the website. I was a little mad at myself for not figuring this one out sooner. I went with the crowd, and hurt my son. Why didn’t I follow my gut when I knew something didn’t seem right?
From that moment I realized that our family would be given many different avenues to explore during Aidan’s recovery, but it would be up to me to always follow my gut. My feelings about what was good or bad for Aidan have always turned out to be right. I would not follow anyone else blindly even if they did “recover” their child. Every one of these children are so different, and it is up to us as parents to figure out the safest path for our child. I promised myself I would never let Aidan down like that again.
So, when we put Aidan on the diet the second time around, I gave him mostly pureed carrot “pancakes” with egg, and very very little meat (at the suggestion of our nutritionist). When we moved to the next phase of the diet, I did not give him bananas or applesauce (because they are both constipating foods). Just these small changes made a HUGE difference. Aidan was doing wonderful on the diet. He was having 1-2 perfect BM’s a day. He just seemed a little more connected too. I really wished I had followed my gut and removed these foods the first time around.
If you are interested in learning more about the benefits of the Specific Carbohydrate Diet, you can read Breaking the Vicious Cycle: Intestinal Health Through Diet by Elaine Gottschall and check out:
