I do believe we have a plan...

So this is the plan, and it started in earnest last night:

Just over a week ago, we drove to Rehovot and met with a nutritionist, Roni Enten. She specialises in ASD diets, and she is well versed in the DAN! protocol. We were facing a huge series of problems, but one was definitely the fact that your poop is loose. You were also selecting primarily gluten rich and dairy rich foods, and giving up other things one-by-one. You essentially became a vegetarian, wheat and milk obsessed kid with constant liquid poop. So I figured a nutritionist was as good a place to go as a doctor. I'd read the DAN! protocol, it is not rocket science, people can understand it quite easily if they read up a bit. Roni had lots of positive comments made about her on the various forums and I figured if anyone would know how to sort out the poop, and the diet, well, it would be her. She asked all sorts of questions, about current diet, vaccinations etc and got a picture of what brought us there. Then she recommended a series of things, and we started last night with the Epsom Salts in the bath - half a cup increasing to a cup every night. Rub the skin, soak up to the chest, don't rinse of. Epsom Salts are Magnesium Sulphate (or Magnesium Sulfate for the hard of English). I found a couple of things on the net saying why this was important. This article sums it up well. Namely that there is usually a shortage of a particular enzyme called PST in autistic children. It apparently coats the gut, and it helps guide toxins out of the body by covering them in water. So, I guess if you have a shortage, your have an uncoated gut full of toxins. Or that is the theory. I'm obviously no expert. The easiest way of getting this balance back is magnesium sulphate. Soaks through the skin. So we started. And remember, I am a cynical old sod, but you went to sleep very quickly, wouldn't wake up even with me shaking you gently at 7.15am and today have been, well, pretty good indeed. Certainly the best day for eye contact we've had. And you are bloody exhausted as I sit here at 3.30pm. But we have had - and I've just realised this - no - none at all - arm flapping, stamping, screeching when you can't get your own way. None. Not one instance. Shit. This can't be right. You've had two tantrums because you wanted to sleep and I wouldn't let you because Mummy is ill and she won't last past 8pm herself. But shit, no flapping, no brushing behind your right ear, no banging. Blimey. And you've just fallen asleep. You were tired. Action stations....

Second step as recommended by Roni we send some samples of your pee and poop to labs in America to see what you are intolerant to, what you have in abundance and so on. We need to see if you have candida for example. So the poop was collected, and you peed on the floor a dozen times, usually just as the phone rang or I had run to get a clean cloth to clear up the last one. But the pee is frozen and sealed, and the poop is in formaldehyde. Don't say I don't do anything for you.

Roni also gave us a list of minerals and supplements which we will need to gradually introduce, one at a time, five day gaps between each new supplement to see that you have no adverse reaction and to let body get used to it a bit.

Also, I need to track down some Larix, to improve your immune system and avoid tonsilitis and therefore the need for antibiotics. I read somewhere it works a treat and is great for pepople with O blood groups like you.

They supplements are mainly by Kirkman Laboratories , they seem to specialise in supplements for kids with ASD. We are going to give you ½ teaspoon per day to begin with, working up to 1 teaspoon of Cod Liver Oil by Kirkman Labs. Yep, I know. It's fish. And it tastes disgusting.

Seemingly the most important to start with is something formulated by Kirkman called Super Nu Thera, a multivitamin (ours is without Vitamins A & D, they are going to be obtained from other sources). We're going to begin with half a capsule in the morning and increase to hald a capsule twice per day, giving you the second dosage in the afternoon as there is a chance it may cause hyperactivity if given in evening.

We need to give you 1000 mg per day of calcium powder or capsules as soon as possible (Roni said citrate is best) since we are eliminating dairy from your diet now. Rice milk is not a source, they announce this quite loudly on their packaging.

She recommended you take some enzymes which can be sprinkled onto food and will help with all your digestive problems.

We also need to get some extra Vitamin A,
Zinc (apparently it tastes horrible so liquid might be better, and Vitamin C. I have to say, I don't exactly know why at this stage but I'll find out when they arrive and before I give them to you. Saba is sending them over from the US, he paid, and he was very happy to help.

Her main recommendation though is that you start a gluten free, casein free AND soy free diet. We knew it was coming, and obviously it was the reason we went to see Roni. She is no doubt the best person around to ask how to cope with this and so far she has been very helpful. Of course the diet is a bloody nightmare. But we cooked like crazy from the Hamlyn All Colour Vegetarian Cookbook yesterday, Lentil & Peanut Layer, Almond Patties...a few more to make but you won't eat any of them anyway!!! No, I'm being negative, because it's not a compromise game here. Ifat said we shouldn't do the diet, she didn't want you to get stressed or sad about food. I, on the other hand, am your father. So, my job is to make you safe and give you what you need, not what you want. If you were diabetes, or had coeliac...well nobody would have anything to say. So you are going on this diet till we are sure it is not working or required. We went to the shop of www.glutenfree.co.il and got quite disheartened, it seems so difficult. It's a gluten free website/shop, but lots of things are dairy free too. Still, we're in Israel, and every Israeli product will say whether it is Kosher Parve or Kosher Dairy so we won't make a mistake there. The gluten is marked too, so soy is the one to watch out for. A minefield, but it did look like it was going to be harder to fill your cupboard that it was. We went to Tiv Taam yesterday, principally because it was the only shop open on Saturday, and we found lots of stuff - snacks, cereals, all sorts. I was enormously relieved, especially as it is not the best place to look. We bought pasta to go with your mum's pasta sauce.

And the diet has started. We decided to go cold turkey, Roni said it was best. Because we collected and Fedexed some urine and three days' worth of stool samples to the USA to check for the things that regular doctors don't we couldn't start straight away - otherwise we'd be misrepresenting the typical contents of your pee and poop. You sort of have to cook a lot with this diet, manufacturers tend to take shortcuts and use the cheapest ingredients (soy!) in everything. But I think it is like Kosher, or being a vegetarian, you get used to it being a pain in the neck. We also decided that we would try and get things close to what you are used to, cornflakes with rice milk for breakfast, rice pasta and tomato sauce...but for the first week or so, we will let you eat what you like - if that means 200 bananas, I don't think you'll die of malnutrition.

So far you've eaten:

Morning drink: Banana and Date Smoothie (a banana, some dates, some water, a blender - better than milk any day, I was very jealous)

Breakfast: Small bowl of Adama Cornflakes with Natura Rice Milk, freshly squeezed orange juice

Snack: Apple and Prigat Diet Grape Juice

Lunch: Well, you refused the Rice & Quinoa Fusilli with homemade tomato sauce. You put it in your mouth, spat it out, and repeated the feat 4 times before asking for pitta with cheese. Oh dear. It was going so well. So you had an apple.

Snack: Banana

Dinner: Lentil & Peanut Layer, which you completely ignored. You got a Perach rice cracker with peanut butter as a reward for leaving it. Which you ate. And you think that I would be disheartened, well, you ate a rice cracker - the first one ever. That is on top of the rice milk this morning. Then by all accounts you had another half with Halva & Honey Spread. And you had half a dozen strawberries.

So after speaking to your mum last night, she was a little stunned too. No miracles or anything, but just more eye contact and patience than we are used to, more co-operation and more response and interaction. Instead of stamping your feet or whining, you asked for what you wanted. And she said that you were very very clingy. Not in a bad way, but in a 'won't let me even make a coffee way'. When I tried to make you lunch you just wanted me to cuddle you. You came up maybe 20 times for a hug.

I also think that when I went out and you cried, I shouldn't have said "See you later", because you took it literally. And you waited up for me, you wouldn't sleep and you asked for me. So when I got in from the basketball you went to sleep in 10 minutes after you mummy tried for an hour.

Your 3rd favourite person in the world, your Occupational Therapist Dania, said your eye contact had improved today, and you were very responsive. You gave kisses and cuddles when she was being playfully obstructive during Floortime, you gave her five when she wouldn't give you something, you asked for things, you didn't stamp. And for prolonged moments you actually played with her as well as us. I also suspect you know you're in therapy. You know it is the doctors, I call it the doctors and though Dania said to me she wasn't a 'Doctor', for you she is. And you know doctors make people better. And today, you did something that made me think you knew Dania's job was to see how you progress. It was like you wheeled out all your new tricks that I have been working hard on. During the 45 minutes OT you gave her five, you said 'yes' in Hebrew (I'd only heard it in English), you developed this new phrasing 'Ball not' or 'Daddy not', which means 'there is no X here'. The thing that made me think most about it is that you did the nod of the head (from the waist up!) like you were showing off. You're a very very smart kid. She also said she was impressed that you can imitate. I said you see something once and you have it sussed, but apparently kids with communication problems don't usually know how to copy. And though I was a little confused at Dr Pozner's pre-report summary when it said you had 'typical intonation' - autistic children tend to be monotone and I never thought you were, Dania said at one point when you called for my help 'did you hear the intonation. And then when we were in the car, you waved and said 'bye bye Dania, lihitraot (See you later)'. Sweetheart!