We are taking off the month of December with regard to the ETU Designer’s Journal to instead bring you a series of articles on Autism in support of the Midnight Charity Project. Even though this isn’t game related, we hope you’ll take a few moments to read it. 

Howdy. First I want to thank everyone who is supporting this drive to raise money for the Autism Research Institute. Your support during this holiday season is a tremendous gift and very much appreciated.

As some of you may know, I have two boys. The youngest, Kevin, is a high functioning autistic child. He has Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD- in educationalese). I consider my family to be very lucky as he can function in society, learn, and become a productive citizen, though he may always have “autistic” tendencies.

I knew the day he was born something was wrong, but no one could tell what. As a newborn he was very fidgety, could never get comfortable, and cried a lot! Of course we thought he was just a colicky baby, but I knew something was wrong. It was as if whenever I tried to hold him he would not be consoled. As if he hated being held or touched. He never played peek-a-boo or showed interest in what other people were doing. As he grew into a toddler, he did not develop speech as my other son had done, but remained with a type of baby gibberish. He did mature physically very quickly and was pulling up at 9 months and walked extremely early, never really crawling as most babies’ do.

I asked our pediatrician several times if something was wrong with him, each time she said she didn’t think so and that some children “just develop at different rates” from others. I was very impressed that he learned the alphabet, seemingly overnight, and spent hours playing with magnetic letters on the refrigerator. I could ask him for any letter and he would give it to me. My wife and I worried that the only true speech he had developed included “mom, dad, coke,” and the letters of the alphabet. I also realized that if I ever tried to make eye contact, he could not look me in the eyes and always immediately looked away.

It was stressful to ever go out in public as he seemed to never hear us, was uncontrollable, and generally raised hell wherever he was. We left restaurants early, rarely visited others, and were even afraid to leave him with the sitters at church. Our friends were afraid when we came to visit as nothing was safe. He would run through their home and though I don’t remember him breaking anything, it was a constant worry.

Realizing he needed help, we contacted our local school system and they recommended he attend speech therapy classes at the elementary school with a speech therapist. He was to receive 30 minutes instruction a week. He was 3 ½ years old at the time. The young therapist told us to leave him with her. The first session lasted a total of 10 minutes and the therapist told my wife that she couldn’t work with Kevin as he wouldn’t sit down or listen to her. There were also three other children in the session. My wife sat in on the second and all subsequent sessions to assist in “controlling” Kevin. After a particularly frustrating experience, the therapist told Tracey (my wife) that she simply couldn’t help him, but we could continue to bring him and let him play in the corner.

I got very angry. I have a Special Education Teaching Certification and I know the laws. That is not a right the therapist actually has. I called her and told her my opinion. My wife and I then decided against attending any more of the sessions.

I finally transferred Kevin to the school district in which I work, as I rightfully thought they would have better services for him. They tested him and decided that he was PDD. I took him to a specialist and she tested him as well. She recommended we take him to special speech therapy class. Each session would cost between 75 and 100 dollars and it , two to three times a week, and it was not covered by insurance. Well, it’s not something we could afford. There are actually many awesome programs to help autistic children, but they are all very expensive and middle class and lower economic folks simply can’t afford them.

Finally my wife and I got tired of feeling helpless. We began reading everything we could find on autism and particularly a book by Karen Seroussi about her struggles as a parent of an autistic child. In it she described the GF/CF diet (gluten free, casein free) and how it had a very positive impact on her child. Basically every item that contained wheat or dairy had to go. We decided to try the diet and threw out approximately $200.00 in groceries and started over from scratch. We ordered a book called Special Diets for Special Kids to gain recipes and to learn to cook the GF/CF way. We went to an organic store to purchase these special dietary items. It’s amazing really. I used to make fun of folks who went “organic” and perceived them as flower children or Wiccans, but I am now convinced of the effects of this diet.

Almost overnight Kevin began talking. Within six months he was speaking sentences. I have not seen him stemming (hand-flapping) since we started the diet. His abnormal behaviors decreased greatly and he no longer hid under tables at school and we constantly received positive reports from his care givers and teachers. The difference was drastic. He can now look into my eyes, and he actively plays with his brother and other kids. He still has a very sing-song voice and experiences difficulty expressing his thoughts, but he has come so far.

Many doctors do not believe that a diet can be used to treat autism. They state that there are no professional studies to prove it helps. True. Pharmaceutical companies are not in the business of treating any illness with dietary changes, so it makes no sense for them to fund such studies. However, thousands of parents can attest to the difference dietary changes made with their children. I am definitely one of them.

I don’t believe the diet works for every child, as I believe the causes of autism vary greatly and without recognizing causes it is difficult to treat. But if you are a parent of an autistic child, what would it hurt to try the diet and see for yourself?

The Autism Research Institute is made up of DAN doctors who have seen the dramatic results of dietary changes and are willing to seek other answers as well as using the more generally accepted methods of teaching and working with autistic children.

Finally, I am happy to report that Kevin is now in first grade, is reading in the top of his class, and is on level in math and other skills.