It is that time of year, VACATIONS! Whether you hit the skies, the roads or do a stay-cation in your own town, there are some things I have learned through the years that may be helpful to others. I haven't been able to look at vacations the way most do. I look at it with trepidation, stress and maybe even a little fear. Vacations just aren't the same when Autism is involved. Here's a typical rundown of some of the stuff we have to do:
Pack comfort items, especially weighted blanket. The last thing you want is a meltdown because the one toy you forgot is the one your child absolutely has to have and is screaming for hours over. Rent trailer from U-Haul to carry all said "loveys".
Food - need I say more? Not only do you have to meal plan for the entire time you are gone but you also have to make and pack food for the WHOLE trip. You cannot count on local stores having GFCFSF, preservative, MSG, grass fed, free range, etc. foods. And just because the local town HAS a (Insert favorite store name here), there is no guarantee that they carry the said item that is your child's favorite, right texture, and chances are it is going to be more expensive in a vacation town. Again, you see how the U-haul can be invaluable!
Activities can be tricky. You don't want to do too much so that your child is overwhelmed and therefore melts down. What if the sounds are too loud? What if it is too crowded? What if someone poured on a bottle of perfume/cologne and is sitting next to you? What if they get away from you and dart off? I could go on and on.
Supplements, what if you forget something? They all need to be prepped and packed, can't leave anything out or lord knows WHAT will happen. Gaba and Theanine forgotten? Oh how the anxiety soars, add a new place and that is just a recipe for disaster. Get that checklist out, open all capsules (for the kiddos not swallowing pills) and of course don't forget the stuff in the fridge or like us, the LDN which is kept upstairs for night time application. Also throw in some epsom salt cream or salts for detox baths after playing in chlorinated pools. Don't forget the enzymes, especially if you are planning on eating out, maybe extra chewable Trienza's in your purse "just in case". I keep Trienza, A & I and vitamin C with me at all times.
Where to stay? Hotels suck, let's just get that out there. Inevitably we are next to the twenty-something partiers who stay up til dawn singing the latest Lady Gaga songs at the top of their lungs, or we end up below the group who decides to have an all night dance party and it sounds as if the roof is going to cave in. Where is the white noise? Where is the consideration? Not to mention you are all sleeping in the same room, hotels with more than one room are hard to find these days (or expensive). I had written a biz plan years ago to pitch to hotels for Autism friendly rooms (except for the fact that I am raising children, one whom has Autism and never got around to pitching it!). Wish I did back then, seems that idea is starting to catch on now. Staying in hotels just sucks for us. Period. We are lucky enough to be from San Diego so we have relatives to stay with and that is where we "vacation" (yeah, I know, we vacation back "home", ironic but it works). But staying with relatives can be tricky too. Will there be a meltdown at 6:00 am because the "right" cartoon is not on the local stations at the same time. Maybe breakfast is a tad different, maybe they are not sitting in their regular seat, you get the picture. You walk on eggs shells not to disturb the whole house when many time, Autism is loud and can be very stressful. Often you are sharing rooms which can be tricky for our phantom sleepers with Autism. We tip toe around our child with Autism, sleep can be precious and sharing a room, not so conducive.
You can see how many aspects of travel can be very stressful. Heck, I still have not braved a flight with my children. Now I must say, this has gotten SO much easier. Car rides alone were torture for a while. As we have done more biomed, as my son has "healed", as his symptoms fade, we can loosen up. Those old worries still crop up. I had to run errands this week with my son. We made 7 stops in one day, in and out of the car, unfamiliar places, therapy appts., etc. He was a trooper! Not one meltdown, rolled with the punches! It is times like that were I have to note how far he has come. 1 outing would have been too much, sensory system overwhelmed and screaming for hours on end and a fitful night sleep would be had for all. Not anymore. Progress....
There is still plenty of prep work involved, special diets prepared to have on hand but even that gets easier. Since retiring, my mother in law has been out more frequently. As a stellar cook, mom and wife, she appreciates what I do daily. She watches, asks lots of questions, not from the place of "Why in the world would you do that?" but from the place of "Wow! I see the changes in M and I want to see WHAT you are doing so I can do that too for him". We get texts (YES she is texted now!!) of "I picked up rice noodles and buffalo meat for spaghetti". There have been so many years that just to be sure, I brought EVERYTHING with me and cooked from scratch in someone else's kitchen (not ideal, let me tell you). I am so thankful that things are changing and that we have family that cares so much about what we are doing and are rallying around us to make our trip enjoyable. I feel like this is the first trip where I can maybe, just maybe take a little breathe and enjoy, not just plan and stress.
So why did we go each year if it was so stressful you may ask? Well for one, we see Dr. Kurt Woeller once a year in person so we always time our trips to coincide. It is a must to get out there. And, it is too tempting to hole up, not go anywhere. My kids deserve to see their grandparents, cousins, our life long friends and their children! And to watch them run and play heals my heart just a little. To see my kids hug their grandparents, and lately ask for them over and over with "I miss them" frequently said, I know it is important. We have to push (gently) past our comfort zone, theirs and ours, sometimes. I am all for attachment parenting, DIR therapy etc. but we cannot do nothing because it is hard. We just have to be smart about it.
So prepare, plan, organize and then breathe. Our kids also deserve for their parents to just enjoy them, watch them run in the waves, touch a starfish for the first time and maybe to get time just to sit on the beach and dig their toes in the sand. Life is what it is, stressful, frustrating, and yet also beautiful, wonderous, and joyous if we make the time to see that. It is something I (clearly) have not done enough of. But, my commitment THIS vacation is to stress less, enjoy more, be prepared and then RELAX. It took us years to get to this point. It was simply NOT an option prior. But you know what, I have worked my BUTT off to get here, and so has HE. So, back to prepping foods, packing and preparing, but my mind is thinking of that beach and maybe, just maybe taking a deep breath of that salty sea air I miss so much. My wish for all of you? Happy, safe vacations, memories made, meltdowns avoided. Most of all? ENJOY the ride!
Friday, June 18, 2010
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
An open letter from Jon Gilbert
All I can do is cry as I read this, nod my head and remember when.....remember when this was US. This was my son to a "T", right down to the light switches which was a fascination of his. We got to the point where I avoided going places for this very reason. This was us.....but it is NOT anymore. Autism can be treated. Read this, relate to it then read my part again that says it USED to be us. Get empowered, every small step you take can help your child. I thank God for biomed everyday. And I do say, it will not give EVERY child the same results but if there is even a chance, isn't it worth a shot? There are tons of parents out there to help mentor, myself included. NEVER GIVE UP HOPE ON WHAT YOU OR YOUR CHILD CAN ACCOMPLISH, no matter what path you choose! There is hope out there, my son is proof.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
An Open Letter
By Jon Gilbert
The other day that mom with the little boy who was making so much commotion in the fast food restaurant noticed you staring at her. He was a handful, wasn't he? His screaming was incessant
and the way he was challenging his mother: unacceptable. It's understandable that you would never allow your own child to holler at you like that, or bounce between the booths. You found yourself wondering what would possess her to bring an unruly child like that out into public in the first place. As your respectful children stood beside you in silence, you wondered when he would just be quiet. And you wondered what kind of mother she must be.
If you only knew what that mom wonders.
She wonders what she can do to get him to stop screaming. Sometimes it lasts all day, and lately, it's been almost every day. Then, while you put your kids back in the car, she wonders if he'll keep his seat belt on for the entire ride. You will get them home and they'll head right upstairs to play together nicely. She wonders if he'll decide it's time to begin switching the lights on and off repeatedly, or throw to everything that's on the desk onto to the floor.
When your kids fall down, you can ask them where it hurts and they can tell you. It hurts the other mom that all she can do is hold her little boy and wonder when he'll stop crying. Later, while you wonder what story you will read to your child tonight, the mom you know nothing about will once again cry herself to sleep in her husband's arms.
You wonder later why God would give any child to "that kind" of parent, yet she's thankful that God chose her. You judge the stranger based on that one incident, while she wonders why you didn't just ask if you could help. She probably wouldn't have taken it, but she would have appreciated the gesture.
Your four-year-old has mastered the art of conversation. She find's it triumphant that her son mumbles, "go school" and "want eat." You already wonder what your child's high school prom will be like. Meanwhile the other mom wonders when her four-year-old will potty train.
You wonder who your little one will marry some day, while the mom with the rambunctious son worries that he may not graduate from high school. You plan to send your child to the best university, and the lady that you
never met wonders if she'll have to care for hers as an adult.
While she's not jealous that your kids obey, talk and dream, she does wonder what it would be like to be able to call her son "normal." He is who he is. There's no altering that, and his mother wouldn't change him for the world. But feeling your eyes burn through her melts her soul. She does the best he can, and wonders why you judge them both.
She doesn't ask for your sympathy, just your understanding. Her family puts a lot of time and effort into helping him become the best somebody he can be. You don't see it, but that's all right, because his mom sees it every day. She sees the victories as well as the defeats.
You cast your judgment based on the one day you saw the unruly child in public. No one faults you for that, because the other mom used to do the same thing, back before her son's diagnosis. All the mom asks of you today is compassion and consideration.
Tonight, when you tuck your kids into bed, be thankful for the children you have and for who they are. Understand that, while you are getting butterfly kisses from your little angel, there are parents wondering when theirs will be able to say the words, "I love you."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
An Open Letter
By Jon Gilbert
The other day that mom with the little boy who was making so much commotion in the fast food restaurant noticed you staring at her. He was a handful, wasn't he? His screaming was incessant
and the way he was challenging his mother: unacceptable. It's understandable that you would never allow your own child to holler at you like that, or bounce between the booths. You found yourself wondering what would possess her to bring an unruly child like that out into public in the first place. As your respectful children stood beside you in silence, you wondered when he would just be quiet. And you wondered what kind of mother she must be.
If you only knew what that mom wonders.
She wonders what she can do to get him to stop screaming. Sometimes it lasts all day, and lately, it's been almost every day. Then, while you put your kids back in the car, she wonders if he'll keep his seat belt on for the entire ride. You will get them home and they'll head right upstairs to play together nicely. She wonders if he'll decide it's time to begin switching the lights on and off repeatedly, or throw to everything that's on the desk onto to the floor.
When your kids fall down, you can ask them where it hurts and they can tell you. It hurts the other mom that all she can do is hold her little boy and wonder when he'll stop crying. Later, while you wonder what story you will read to your child tonight, the mom you know nothing about will once again cry herself to sleep in her husband's arms.
You wonder later why God would give any child to "that kind" of parent, yet she's thankful that God chose her. You judge the stranger based on that one incident, while she wonders why you didn't just ask if you could help. She probably wouldn't have taken it, but she would have appreciated the gesture.
Your four-year-old has mastered the art of conversation. She find's it triumphant that her son mumbles, "go school" and "want eat." You already wonder what your child's high school prom will be like. Meanwhile the other mom wonders when her four-year-old will potty train.
You wonder who your little one will marry some day, while the mom with the rambunctious son worries that he may not graduate from high school. You plan to send your child to the best university, and the lady that you
never met wonders if she'll have to care for hers as an adult.
While she's not jealous that your kids obey, talk and dream, she does wonder what it would be like to be able to call her son "normal." He is who he is. There's no altering that, and his mother wouldn't change him for the world. But feeling your eyes burn through her melts her soul. She does the best he can, and wonders why you judge them both.
She doesn't ask for your sympathy, just your understanding. Her family puts a lot of time and effort into helping him become the best somebody he can be. You don't see it, but that's all right, because his mom sees it every day. She sees the victories as well as the defeats.
You cast your judgment based on the one day you saw the unruly child in public. No one faults you for that, because the other mom used to do the same thing, back before her son's diagnosis. All the mom asks of you today is compassion and consideration.
Tonight, when you tuck your kids into bed, be thankful for the children you have and for who they are. Understand that, while you are getting butterfly kisses from your little angel, there are parents wondering when theirs will be able to say the words, "I love you."
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Tanning, Autism, and Respen-A
All Hail The Farmer's Tan!?!
I have questioned this for years, why doesn't my son with Autism tan? He stays white, like Casper the Ghost, seriously, even through 5 hot Arizona summers. He gets the same amount of sun exposure (which is pretty hefty since he is an outdoor kind of kid) as his sisters do and they end up looking like Coppertone babies, they tan even under sunscreen. We let the kids get some exposure to the sun without sunscreen, for proper vitamin D absorption. And if we are going to be doing something like swimming for hours in mid day for example, then everyone gets sunscreen plus swim shirts to cover their torso. We use sunscreen without all the toxic chemicals, I am more worried about the chemicals than sun exposure, especially given our high whole foods diet. So then why does our whole family tan with the exception of my son?
After doing (brief) research I found data on an enzyme process (which is not surprising, I swear ALL processes are enzyme based) that aids in melanin production. OK so we know a lot of my son's enzymatic processes are not working the right way. So, you can imagine my surprise when just a few weeks ago my son got a little pink on his shoulders. The neighborhood kids were all congregating at our house so I decided to pull out the slip and slide. It was placed in the shade of a tree but the kids were running all over, in an out of mid day sunlight. They played for 2 hours, a pittance of our normal sun exposure. We came inside and I noticed a slight pinkening of his skin on the tops of his shoulders, given the relatively light exposure, I didn't make him wear the swim shirt he usually wears for mid day swimming, that and the fact that he never tans! So why would he start tanning all of a sudden? We started Respen-A at the end of last year. Respen-A is supposed to aid in enzyme processes within the body. You can understand my excitement of potentially seeing visible results of this therapy. We've had tremendous success with Respen-A in terms of social/emotional/relationship areas so this was even more exciting to see some tangible results of cellular changes as well possibly.
Then just the other day, Facebook was crawling with people reposting THIS article from Age of Autism discussing this very issue with regards to tanning and Autism. I had never heard of the heavy metals connection before but it is also an interesting theory. Maybe this is also indicative of metal excretion? My son did not show high for mercury but he did for aluminum. Whatever the case, I see widespread healing as indicated by bowel changes, behavioral changes and yes now even tanning.
As I look deeper at my son's progress, I can see changes in his cognition, how he relates to us, how he relates to others. Just yesterday he did a joint OT session with another little boy, a little boy eerily similar to him at age 3 1/2. The child was engaging in echolalia, repeating my son in the same intonation and everything. My son, exasperated, said "Stop copying me, that is SO annoying, we are not the same". His therapist and another staff member found that pretty hilarious. Oh how far we've come. We see "typical" behaviors, "typical" phrases come out of his 6 year old mouth and I have to appreciate that 3 years ago he was virtually non-verbal. He is rounding the corner to 7 so definitely 4 years ago he was non-verbal. Now all we have to work on in speech is the "S" sound. And I link the 2, body and gut healing and progress through therapies. I do not think I could separate them. Without biomed, we would not have made this progress but many times, biomed is leaves you wanting a crystal ball 1) to see what NEEDS to be fixed and 2) seeing what is getting better. The reality is, not many of us can afford to rerun tests (or want to put our kiddos through tons of testing, especially more invasive tests) constantly and so we have to watch for clues that what we are doing is working until we do rerun a test. Some of them are subtle and some things are "wow" factors. So when I see a change like tanning, I am thoroughly excited! So here's to a summer of fun, relaxation, and hey maybe even a farmer's tan or two if we are lucky!
I have questioned this for years, why doesn't my son with Autism tan? He stays white, like Casper the Ghost, seriously, even through 5 hot Arizona summers. He gets the same amount of sun exposure (which is pretty hefty since he is an outdoor kind of kid) as his sisters do and they end up looking like Coppertone babies, they tan even under sunscreen. We let the kids get some exposure to the sun without sunscreen, for proper vitamin D absorption. And if we are going to be doing something like swimming for hours in mid day for example, then everyone gets sunscreen plus swim shirts to cover their torso. We use sunscreen without all the toxic chemicals, I am more worried about the chemicals than sun exposure, especially given our high whole foods diet. So then why does our whole family tan with the exception of my son?
After doing (brief) research I found data on an enzyme process (which is not surprising, I swear ALL processes are enzyme based) that aids in melanin production. OK so we know a lot of my son's enzymatic processes are not working the right way. So, you can imagine my surprise when just a few weeks ago my son got a little pink on his shoulders. The neighborhood kids were all congregating at our house so I decided to pull out the slip and slide. It was placed in the shade of a tree but the kids were running all over, in an out of mid day sunlight. They played for 2 hours, a pittance of our normal sun exposure. We came inside and I noticed a slight pinkening of his skin on the tops of his shoulders, given the relatively light exposure, I didn't make him wear the swim shirt he usually wears for mid day swimming, that and the fact that he never tans! So why would he start tanning all of a sudden? We started Respen-A at the end of last year. Respen-A is supposed to aid in enzyme processes within the body. You can understand my excitement of potentially seeing visible results of this therapy. We've had tremendous success with Respen-A in terms of social/emotional/relationship areas so this was even more exciting to see some tangible results of cellular changes as well possibly.
Then just the other day, Facebook was crawling with people reposting THIS article from Age of Autism discussing this very issue with regards to tanning and Autism. I had never heard of the heavy metals connection before but it is also an interesting theory. Maybe this is also indicative of metal excretion? My son did not show high for mercury but he did for aluminum. Whatever the case, I see widespread healing as indicated by bowel changes, behavioral changes and yes now even tanning.
As I look deeper at my son's progress, I can see changes in his cognition, how he relates to us, how he relates to others. Just yesterday he did a joint OT session with another little boy, a little boy eerily similar to him at age 3 1/2. The child was engaging in echolalia, repeating my son in the same intonation and everything. My son, exasperated, said "Stop copying me, that is SO annoying, we are not the same". His therapist and another staff member found that pretty hilarious. Oh how far we've come. We see "typical" behaviors, "typical" phrases come out of his 6 year old mouth and I have to appreciate that 3 years ago he was virtually non-verbal. He is rounding the corner to 7 so definitely 4 years ago he was non-verbal. Now all we have to work on in speech is the "S" sound. And I link the 2, body and gut healing and progress through therapies. I do not think I could separate them. Without biomed, we would not have made this progress but many times, biomed is leaves you wanting a crystal ball 1) to see what NEEDS to be fixed and 2) seeing what is getting better. The reality is, not many of us can afford to rerun tests (or want to put our kiddos through tons of testing, especially more invasive tests) constantly and so we have to watch for clues that what we are doing is working until we do rerun a test. Some of them are subtle and some things are "wow" factors. So when I see a change like tanning, I am thoroughly excited! So here's to a summer of fun, relaxation, and hey maybe even a farmer's tan or two if we are lucky!
Thursday, June 10, 2010
How safe is the sun, and your sunscreen?
As we are thrown into the throes of our summer heat here in AZ, the topic of the sun comes up a lot. I feel, personally, there is a lot of confusion out there. Is the sun, in extremes, harmful? Yes. But with the advent of sunscreen, are we now mostly people with a shortage of the critical vitamin D that our bodies are SUPPOSED to get from the sun? YES! Every one of us should be getting 20 minutes of sun exposure in mid day sun (more if you are darker skinned) WITHOUT SUNSCREEN! Hey, lets remember, we have always had the sun. And while I will admit migratory patterns of humans have probably not always been that smart and there are probably some people who should not be living in California, Florida and Arizona. But that aside, our bodies know what to do with sunlight. The chemicals that are slathered on to "protect us" from the sun is another story. Am I advocating laying in the hot Arizona sun for 5 hours straight with no sunscreen? No, that would be stupid and irresponsible. But what I am saying is that we all NEED some sun, and we also need good protection for longer sun exposure, without the even more harmful chemicals. Chemicals being lathered on the skin is no good. I stand behind MY opinion that cancer has a lot to do with environmental toxins and body PH and less to do with whether you sit in the sun a little each day. Eating a diet high in processed foods, meats, dairy, soda, etc. will create an acidic environment=cancer grows. When you keep your system more alkaline, cancer cannot grow. So, when we are eating primarily raw, unadulterated foods, sitting in the sun isn't such a bad proposition. But, hey remember not too much, find a good quality sunscreen if you are going to be out for example swimming for a few hours, use common sense and ENJOY THE SUMMER! Here is a great article on safer sunscreens. Click HERE to read it.
Avoiding gluten, corn, soy and dairy
This is an excellently written piece with wonderful history and explaination as to why we should ALL be avoiding the Big $ as he calls them, Wheat, Dairy, Corn and Soy. I blog about it all the time. Hear it from someone else too. (From www.dogtorj.com)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Brief History of “the Big 4″ I have been gluten-free for over ten years now. But it did not take long for me to realize that there were other foods that needed to be eliminated from our diets…and those of my veterinary patients. Within a few months of starting down this road, I had discovered that dairy was not “nature’s perfect food”, soy was not a “health food” and that corn was the fourth food that induced villous atrophy of the small intestine, just as gluten does. Turns out, my four-legged patients needed this info as badly as I did.
Yes, I began placing all of my dog and cat patients on the same diet that I had adopted for myself, starting with the elimination of wheat and later adding restrictions from soy, corn and all dairy products. Miracles started happening in my veterinary patients! And why wouldn’t they? Dogs and cats are carnivores and not only would they never elect to eat gluten grains, dairy, soy and corn, they would never even be exposed to them, as they are all man-cultivated items.
So, when did we mess things up so badly? Look back…way back.
Dogtor J
A Brief History of the “Big 4”
by Dogtor J
©2010 DogtorJ.com
People ask me all of the time how wheat and dairy could be so bad for us when we’ve been consuming these things for thousands of years. I understand their confusion. After all, doctors have supported the FDA food pyramid for generations, making specific recommendations of multiple servings of each in order to meet our minimum dairy requirements of nutrients. Our parent’s parents forced milk down the throats of their children so they did the same for their offspring. “Builds strong bones and teeth” was their mantra, adopted from the (very successful) rhetoric of the dairy industry. Who can argue with the FDA, doctors, parents and the rest of society?
Those of faith point out that our Old Testament ancestors ate wheat and drank milk, so “How bad can it be?” At first, I thought maybe that these age-old food choices might just be the things meant to limit man’s life here on earth but I soon learned that we are dying prematurely at our own hand.
“There are tares in the wheat!”
We made some very serious mistakes in our nutritional history, starting with the blending of wheat by our Germanic ancestors. In the 4th century AD, they took original wheat (Einkorn wheat – Triticum monococcum) and blended with it two other grasses in the Triticum family, thus creating “common wheat”, from which our present day wheat is derived. We know now that this act not only dramatically increased the gluten content but also introduced the harmful ingredient into gluten to which so many are now reacting. Preliminary studies now being done on Einkorn wheat are showing that known celiacs are likely to be able to handle the gluten in Einkorn wheat. How cool is that? So, the fact that some of today’s wheat is 55% gluten versus the 5-7% of Einkorn is not the only factor. It is what’s in that gluten that makes the biggest difference in whether we become intolerant of that grain. Our ancestors put tares (weeds) in our wheat!
Dairy is not “Nature’s Perfect Food”
The next big mistake occurred when our English ancestors jumped ship from goat’s milk (the universal foster milk) to cow’s milk as their source of dairy products. The difference in the casein fraction is subtle but immunologically immense. Plus, we know now that these Anglo-Saxons chose the wrong cows back in the 1500’s when they picked what are now termed “A1 cattle” (the western European varieties – the Jersey, Guernsey, and Holstein) vs the “A2″ variety (the Zebu or Brahma). A Google search tells you all that you need to know about the ramifications of their choice – BCM7 (beta casomorphin 7), the origin of type 1 diabetes and “the milk devil”.
Recently, researchers have isolated the protein that triggers type-1 diabetes. They have known for years that our children who get cow’s milk in the first five days of life have a 40-50 times higher rate of type-1 diabetes than the general population. But they also noted that Africa’s Masai, who drink the milk of the Brahma, never experience type-1 diabetes. So these scientists took a group of diabetes-prone, non-diabetic rats and divided them into two groups – those to receive A1 milk from the western European cattle and those to get A2 from the Zebu/Brahma. Nearly half of those receiving A1 milk developed diabetes and none of those getting A2 developed the condition. The researchers went on to isolate the single protein that was causing the problem and, in that protein, they found one alteration in the amino acid sequence that made the difference. That’s the razor’s edge on which we live, just like the exact nature of the earth’s orbit required to sustain life.
The Asian Mistake
The “third plague”, as I like to call it, is soy….the Asian mistake. This health-robbing legume was buried underground in one remote area of world and used for years as a non-edible plant used in crop rotation to add nitrogen back to the soil. It took the Asians years to decide to eat it but first they had to develop the means to make it safe for consumption. They learned that fermentation made soy more tolerable just like our ancestors discovered with dairy products (e.g. yogurt, kefir). Interestingly, rice and rice-based wines turned out to be antidotes for some of the harmful properties of their newest culinary creation, in the same way that Italians learned to consume wine, high fat meats, olive oil and vinegar to protect themselves against their passion for pasta. But we should know that any food that requires as much processing as soy – just to make it safe to eat – will cause problems in individuals even when properly prepared.
And yet, the soy industry tried to tell us that soy was a health food and that Asians were healthier because of the soy they consumed. Thankfully, we quickly found out the truth. The only reason that Asians (in Asia) are healthier than Americans in some aspects is because their traditional diet has NO gluten, NO dairy, and NO corn. Soy was their mistake and its gut and tissue-damaging lectins, its overwhelming levels of isoflavones, and its wide array of anti-nutrients tell the tale. No one talks about the fact that Asians actually only live one year longer than the Swiss (and I don’t see them pounding down the soy) and lead the pack in the incidence of stomach cancer.
Like dairy, soy has altered the outward appearance and the internal mechanics of our children. The most notable fact is that the first menstrual cycle of our little girls is occurring much earlier than normal. It was generally accepted in the past that the first menses occurred at 15 years of age. We know from studying this event in the Japanese children before and after WW2, that increased dairy consumption (Americanization has its toll) brought this age down to 12. But soy has dropped this age down into the single digits. It is now reported that nearly 20% of our little girls have their first menstrual cycle by age 8. Wow! If that is not bad enough, I was giving this “lecture” to a woman on the local school board the other day in my office and she told me that there were three nine year-olds in our school system that were pregnant . Unbelievable. Isoflavones are a very real threat to our children’s development, including our males. I’ll leave that part to your imagination and Google.
Corn – The Toxic Grain
That leaves corn – the “gift of the American Indian”, as many of us view it. “Corn must be healthy if the Indians ate it”, a number of people have said to me. Ahhh…but the history of corn is one of the most interesting. It took thousands of years for the Hispanic ancestors to create the ear we see now. It started out as a useless grain in a single valley down in meso-America. And everywhere corn was introduced, pellagra (niacin deficiency) broke out. Wikipedia incorrectly blames this on the fact that niacin is deeply locked in the kernel of the corn. That would be the answer IF corn was their only source of niacin, which it was not. No…corn caused the niacin deficiency because it induced villous atrophy in those sensitized individuals who consumed it, just as it does in countless people and animals today (with rising corn allergies being the outward sign). That’s why pellagra broke out. They could not absorb the niacin from any dietary source once the lining of the gut was damaged. Yes…corn is nasty stuff, supported by the fact that corn gluten meal kills other plants (a “natural herbicide”) and corn meal can be used to kill insects. That’s why it puts fat on anything that consumes it: Fat is the body’s recycle bin and we form new fat cells in order to shuttle bad things out of the general circulation and into the “trash file”.
Our Body Knows What It is Doing
The only other things that damage our villi in the way that these foods do are viruses and fluoride, both of which give us important insight into why gluten, et al do this to our intestinal lining. Why does a toxic does of fluoride cause extreme damage to those finger-like projections called villi? To keep us from absorbing it. The same thing holds true for gluten, dairy, soy and corn. This drastic change is meant to be a temporary means of protecting us. But what part of the cell makes the decision to shrink our villi? Our residential microorganisms do this. Yes, viruses and pleomorphic bacteria are responsible for this amazing adaptive process. I guess we should stop dissing them so badly, eh? Much of what we call “disease” is simply an outward sign of this adaptive process. These resident microbes are on our side!
Making the Turn in Our Health
So…how many of you are on GFCFSFCF* diets? (*That’s gluten, casein, soy, and corn-free)? Have you removed one or the other of the trouble foods but plateaued in your recovery? Are you having a hard time believing that nearly 80% of the standard American diet (SAD) diet – made up of the “big 4” foods - is bad for you? Or are you starting to understand why I lovingly call this quartet “the four horsemen of the apocalypse”?
The bad news is that the damaged food chain does not end here. Have you heard that we can be “secondarily glutenized” by eating the flesh of animals that are fed these food items? This is a very real issue and I am now getting testimonials from people who have seen major advances in choosing grass fed beef and free range, range-fed chicken and their eggs over the grain-fed varieties. This can be especially important in the treatment of immune-mediated diseases as well as neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric disorders.
Is this really “bad news”? Not if you are one of the many who are suffering under the care of the current medical administration that appears to be out of touch with these crucial food issues. If you are looking for real answers to your chronic medical problems, you will find more than you have ever imagined in the pages of this site and those authored by the wise souls who preceded me. Even Hippocrates knew the truth about food and medicine. When did we lose touch with our past?
Dogtor J
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Brief History of “the Big 4″ I have been gluten-free for over ten years now. But it did not take long for me to realize that there were other foods that needed to be eliminated from our diets…and those of my veterinary patients. Within a few months of starting down this road, I had discovered that dairy was not “nature’s perfect food”, soy was not a “health food” and that corn was the fourth food that induced villous atrophy of the small intestine, just as gluten does. Turns out, my four-legged patients needed this info as badly as I did.
Yes, I began placing all of my dog and cat patients on the same diet that I had adopted for myself, starting with the elimination of wheat and later adding restrictions from soy, corn and all dairy products. Miracles started happening in my veterinary patients! And why wouldn’t they? Dogs and cats are carnivores and not only would they never elect to eat gluten grains, dairy, soy and corn, they would never even be exposed to them, as they are all man-cultivated items.
So, when did we mess things up so badly? Look back…way back.
Dogtor J
A Brief History of the “Big 4”
by Dogtor J
©2010 DogtorJ.com
People ask me all of the time how wheat and dairy could be so bad for us when we’ve been consuming these things for thousands of years. I understand their confusion. After all, doctors have supported the FDA food pyramid for generations, making specific recommendations of multiple servings of each in order to meet our minimum dairy requirements of nutrients. Our parent’s parents forced milk down the throats of their children so they did the same for their offspring. “Builds strong bones and teeth” was their mantra, adopted from the (very successful) rhetoric of the dairy industry. Who can argue with the FDA, doctors, parents and the rest of society?
Those of faith point out that our Old Testament ancestors ate wheat and drank milk, so “How bad can it be?” At first, I thought maybe that these age-old food choices might just be the things meant to limit man’s life here on earth but I soon learned that we are dying prematurely at our own hand.
“There are tares in the wheat!”
We made some very serious mistakes in our nutritional history, starting with the blending of wheat by our Germanic ancestors. In the 4th century AD, they took original wheat (Einkorn wheat – Triticum monococcum) and blended with it two other grasses in the Triticum family, thus creating “common wheat”, from which our present day wheat is derived. We know now that this act not only dramatically increased the gluten content but also introduced the harmful ingredient into gluten to which so many are now reacting. Preliminary studies now being done on Einkorn wheat are showing that known celiacs are likely to be able to handle the gluten in Einkorn wheat. How cool is that? So, the fact that some of today’s wheat is 55% gluten versus the 5-7% of Einkorn is not the only factor. It is what’s in that gluten that makes the biggest difference in whether we become intolerant of that grain. Our ancestors put tares (weeds) in our wheat!
Dairy is not “Nature’s Perfect Food”
The next big mistake occurred when our English ancestors jumped ship from goat’s milk (the universal foster milk) to cow’s milk as their source of dairy products. The difference in the casein fraction is subtle but immunologically immense. Plus, we know now that these Anglo-Saxons chose the wrong cows back in the 1500’s when they picked what are now termed “A1 cattle” (the western European varieties – the Jersey, Guernsey, and Holstein) vs the “A2″ variety (the Zebu or Brahma). A Google search tells you all that you need to know about the ramifications of their choice – BCM7 (beta casomorphin 7), the origin of type 1 diabetes and “the milk devil”.
Recently, researchers have isolated the protein that triggers type-1 diabetes. They have known for years that our children who get cow’s milk in the first five days of life have a 40-50 times higher rate of type-1 diabetes than the general population. But they also noted that Africa’s Masai, who drink the milk of the Brahma, never experience type-1 diabetes. So these scientists took a group of diabetes-prone, non-diabetic rats and divided them into two groups – those to receive A1 milk from the western European cattle and those to get A2 from the Zebu/Brahma. Nearly half of those receiving A1 milk developed diabetes and none of those getting A2 developed the condition. The researchers went on to isolate the single protein that was causing the problem and, in that protein, they found one alteration in the amino acid sequence that made the difference. That’s the razor’s edge on which we live, just like the exact nature of the earth’s orbit required to sustain life.
The Asian Mistake
The “third plague”, as I like to call it, is soy….the Asian mistake. This health-robbing legume was buried underground in one remote area of world and used for years as a non-edible plant used in crop rotation to add nitrogen back to the soil. It took the Asians years to decide to eat it but first they had to develop the means to make it safe for consumption. They learned that fermentation made soy more tolerable just like our ancestors discovered with dairy products (e.g. yogurt, kefir). Interestingly, rice and rice-based wines turned out to be antidotes for some of the harmful properties of their newest culinary creation, in the same way that Italians learned to consume wine, high fat meats, olive oil and vinegar to protect themselves against their passion for pasta. But we should know that any food that requires as much processing as soy – just to make it safe to eat – will cause problems in individuals even when properly prepared.
And yet, the soy industry tried to tell us that soy was a health food and that Asians were healthier because of the soy they consumed. Thankfully, we quickly found out the truth. The only reason that Asians (in Asia) are healthier than Americans in some aspects is because their traditional diet has NO gluten, NO dairy, and NO corn. Soy was their mistake and its gut and tissue-damaging lectins, its overwhelming levels of isoflavones, and its wide array of anti-nutrients tell the tale. No one talks about the fact that Asians actually only live one year longer than the Swiss (and I don’t see them pounding down the soy) and lead the pack in the incidence of stomach cancer.
Like dairy, soy has altered the outward appearance and the internal mechanics of our children. The most notable fact is that the first menstrual cycle of our little girls is occurring much earlier than normal. It was generally accepted in the past that the first menses occurred at 15 years of age. We know from studying this event in the Japanese children before and after WW2, that increased dairy consumption (Americanization has its toll) brought this age down to 12. But soy has dropped this age down into the single digits. It is now reported that nearly 20% of our little girls have their first menstrual cycle by age 8. Wow! If that is not bad enough, I was giving this “lecture” to a woman on the local school board the other day in my office and she told me that there were three nine year-olds in our school system that were pregnant . Unbelievable. Isoflavones are a very real threat to our children’s development, including our males. I’ll leave that part to your imagination and Google.
Corn – The Toxic Grain
That leaves corn – the “gift of the American Indian”, as many of us view it. “Corn must be healthy if the Indians ate it”, a number of people have said to me. Ahhh…but the history of corn is one of the most interesting. It took thousands of years for the Hispanic ancestors to create the ear we see now. It started out as a useless grain in a single valley down in meso-America. And everywhere corn was introduced, pellagra (niacin deficiency) broke out. Wikipedia incorrectly blames this on the fact that niacin is deeply locked in the kernel of the corn. That would be the answer IF corn was their only source of niacin, which it was not. No…corn caused the niacin deficiency because it induced villous atrophy in those sensitized individuals who consumed it, just as it does in countless people and animals today (with rising corn allergies being the outward sign). That’s why pellagra broke out. They could not absorb the niacin from any dietary source once the lining of the gut was damaged. Yes…corn is nasty stuff, supported by the fact that corn gluten meal kills other plants (a “natural herbicide”) and corn meal can be used to kill insects. That’s why it puts fat on anything that consumes it: Fat is the body’s recycle bin and we form new fat cells in order to shuttle bad things out of the general circulation and into the “trash file”.
Our Body Knows What It is Doing
The only other things that damage our villi in the way that these foods do are viruses and fluoride, both of which give us important insight into why gluten, et al do this to our intestinal lining. Why does a toxic does of fluoride cause extreme damage to those finger-like projections called villi? To keep us from absorbing it. The same thing holds true for gluten, dairy, soy and corn. This drastic change is meant to be a temporary means of protecting us. But what part of the cell makes the decision to shrink our villi? Our residential microorganisms do this. Yes, viruses and pleomorphic bacteria are responsible for this amazing adaptive process. I guess we should stop dissing them so badly, eh? Much of what we call “disease” is simply an outward sign of this adaptive process. These resident microbes are on our side!
Making the Turn in Our Health
So…how many of you are on GFCFSFCF* diets? (*That’s gluten, casein, soy, and corn-free)? Have you removed one or the other of the trouble foods but plateaued in your recovery? Are you having a hard time believing that nearly 80% of the standard American diet (SAD) diet – made up of the “big 4” foods - is bad for you? Or are you starting to understand why I lovingly call this quartet “the four horsemen of the apocalypse”?
The bad news is that the damaged food chain does not end here. Have you heard that we can be “secondarily glutenized” by eating the flesh of animals that are fed these food items? This is a very real issue and I am now getting testimonials from people who have seen major advances in choosing grass fed beef and free range, range-fed chicken and their eggs over the grain-fed varieties. This can be especially important in the treatment of immune-mediated diseases as well as neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric disorders.
Is this really “bad news”? Not if you are one of the many who are suffering under the care of the current medical administration that appears to be out of touch with these crucial food issues. If you are looking for real answers to your chronic medical problems, you will find more than you have ever imagined in the pages of this site and those authored by the wise souls who preceded me. Even Hippocrates knew the truth about food and medicine. When did we lose touch with our past?
Dogtor J
Liver support and detox
Our liver is very important for our overall health and functioning. Our liver can become quite bogged down with toxins and needs support to help function optimally. There are a couple of herbs that can be very helpful for that. Here is Dr. Kurt Woeller discussing Milk Thistle and Artichoke Extract as liver support and detox.
Milk Thistle from Autism Supplements Center on Vimeo.
More data on the harmful effects of BPA
As I have blogged time and time again, the toxins in our environment, especially our food supply can be reduced to the betterment of our health. BPA is a topic I have discussed before, and even promoted Eden Foods who do NOT use BPA lined cans. Here is an article on MSN talking about what BPA does to our DNA. When we also look at the rise in autoimmune disorders, inflammation, etc., we have to wonder what chronic exposure to these chemicals do to add to these. And when we talk about BPA making us more sensitive to estrogen and we see the rise in soy use (and especially GMO soy which just adds to inflammation) we have to wonder whether we are escalating the diseases and disorders. How do these all fit together? Maybe we will never know. All I know now is that I wish I had understood this while pregnant with my son and daughter. What could our lives be like? No one will know that and really there is no point in asking why other than to caution others out there about these chemicals. Not only should we stop putting them into our bodies, our childrens' bodies and especially into our developing fetuses! We know that our body will not protect these precious babies from these chemicals. Our babies are being born polluted. We need to wake up, learn this stuff and STOP BUYING THEM!! Support Eden Foods and other like minded companies, committed to healthy food choices. We vote with every dollar we spend. Lets stop the rising tide of Autism and other auto-immune disorders. And one way to do that is to reduce the toxic load going in each day through our foods. So read this article, educate yourself and make informed decisions.
Click HERE for the article.
Click HERE for the article.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)