Film about autism and MMR

[Jimjams]

On Dec 15 on channel 5 there is a film about autism and the MMR. it's called Hear the Silence. Apparently -even if you;re not enamoured with the MMR storyline- its a pretty accurate portrayal of life with autism in the family (oh heck!) I've seen the word "harrowing" used. Apparently you need lots of hankies. My friend's (from email) son is in it. 4 years ago they said he wouldn't ever talk and now he's been in a film- absolutely amazing. i can't wait to see it. MrsF - remind me please :-)

The woman from truly madly deeply is in it as well- she plays my friend's son's mum.

i agree jimjams
this whole measles vaccine in spinal fluid make me unsure about single measles vaccine however......

hmmmm- there are always some children who are going to have serious reactions to any vaccine though. Certainly some children have been damaged by single measles. One potential problem about putting MMR together is that mumps affects the blood brain barrier and measles is an immunosuppresant (whcih is one reason why it can be a nsaty disease- especially in the manourished). There is a website somewhere that oges into mealses cases vs MMR - I'll see if I can dig it out sometime. Think it SFAH website or something.

Anyway that webste said the numbers affcted by single measles were far lower than those affected by MMR. Did you read yesterdays Sunday Times?

thanks jimjams
i sometimes wish that someone would just decide for me!!!!
doctors keep sedning more mmr appts even though i told them to stop!!

its on now....channel 5

OMG sniffing books- ds1 used to do that- and ds2 at 12 months when he first started to get interested in books- but he was copying and it looked funny in him.

Glad dh isn't crap like that dh!

i used to like to lick books and the soles of trainers (?)

my friend's son did well!

Which was he?

doing ABA. I want....... His mum was told hec would never talk. He coped with a whole day of filming. He's MMR damaged...... (but doing incredibly well)

I wondered if that was your friend's son. Yes, he did really well.

What did you think of the film jimjams? I wished it had been a bit less black/white, simply because things presented in that way tend to make me less receptive to the info being presented. But I thought as a drama it was very well acted and produced. My dh thought the doctors were a bit more patronising than in real life, but they sounded very like the doctors my friend has been seeing recently trying to get a diagnosis for her child.

wish they were more patronising than in real life.... My GP is good, but it was a pretty accurate representation of the paeds I've seen this year (3 different ones).

I thought the portrayal of autism was very real. It showed in great detail why I have a pushchair that only needs one hand for ds2- and why I need a blubadge! I don't mind the bias as I know several people for whom that is their story. I think if it's seen as representing their story then fair enough. Not sure its the role of a fictional drama to provide balanv=ce (which to be fair it provided a debate afterwards to address the bias)

The debate afterwards was better than I thought it would be as well. Tamum was your neighbour the one with the beard?

Jeff Bradstreet is a great guy. He's always very balanced. Read some good stuff by him.

The autism meetings of mums was also very realistic- although they had more alcohol than us!!

Well I watched it and am afraid to say that I will definitely NOT be giving my son the triple jab. Just in case. I read recently that GPs who have stocks of single jabs in uk have been asked to dispose of them. Luckily for me, I can go to Sweden as I have a friend who lives there. I am not particularly well versed in any of this, but just say, I did it and it went pear shaped. My conscience wouldn't cope. I also hope that anyone who has been affected in this way seeks & recieves compensation for this. If this film was a true reflection on how an autistic child is, then God help us if this was caused by a jab.

I think I will do the same Wiltshire, though I am a bit worried that won't be enough single vacines for all the people who will be asking for them from tomorrow... DS (9m) has had reactions to any single vacine he has had, and unfortunately every time the reaction gets worse... it normally starts the day after the vacine, first it was a horrible fever, the second he started showing signs of eczema, the third one trigered a horrible eczema attack that ended up getting his skin so cracked that he started to bleed and finally with the Hib shot he got a horrible fever that lasted for almost two weeks (an average of 39 during the week and 41 in a couple of days, he stoped eatin anything but 4oz of milk in two full days while at the same time he was having diarrea nappies 5 times a day...) and what do the doctors say??? that it is just a coincidence... curiously he had never been ill out of the times he has had the vacines. My DH says that it is easier to get cought by a lightening that have a problem with the MMR but as I have a child that gets a lot of rain every time he has a shot I believe is better not to risk it...they may be totally unrelated but who knows... probably I have a child that is specially sensitive to them...

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missed it, was it any good? did watch AW on channel 4 news, boy was he attacked (ouch!)

I thought the programme was good and it was long too. A few critiscisms (sp?) though, it was rather anti men/husbands and in my experience they're not as unsupportive or uninvolved as portrayed. Sometimes they are but often they're not. I didn't like the all women wine drinking group as I thought that could put people off and was a bit SPAT (from About A Boy). It also made doing ABA look a lot easier than it is but, to be fair, the programme was not about that and at least it was included and improvement could not be only attributed to the biomedical interventions (although being able to think more clearly due to biomed interventions does make you more able to learn of course). The debate after was quite good and I thought the pro-MMR group was rude and ranty but I know I'm biased so I really can't tell how each side came across. Maybe some of you (thanks Chandra and Twiglet) who are unbiased can give us a view, I would be interested

Davros - I have two NT children but I too thought that the pro-MMR lobby did themselves nothing but harm last night. They met reasoned and scientifically grounded debate from AW side with too much ranting and raving and no where near enough scientific analysis to make them believable.

TBH I found the attacking of AW rather odd. He is just doing research he is not trying to scaremonger etc etc. Are the establishment really saying that they would rather not know than have the risk that AW and his US collegues might finally make a definative link. It really is toooooooo scary!

At what point will the establishment just stop being so dismissive and listen to the possibility that it might not be the right way to vaccinate.

I thought there was far too little discussion of single vaccines. All the proMMR crowd seem to be playing the all or nothing card. The woman with the rubella damaged child seemed to deliberately ignore the comment that single rubella vaccines would offer the same protection.

I thought the film was very moving - although the dad role was a bit too 'bad dad - good mum' stereotypical.

Do you do the diet thing with your child and has it made a difference do you think? Or does the diet just work on MMR connected MMR?

Should have said MMR connected autism!

Well, I think I'm a neutral. Didn't see all of the film but:

Why is anyone who is not anti-MMR protrayed as though they are heartless and unlistening rather than that they simply don't agree.

All officials are portrayed as stone-faced and as though they ALL have a hidden agenda.

Hate Juliet Stevenson with a passion- she seems so sanctimonious. Anyone invloved in that cringemaking hopping scene in Truly Madly Deeply can't be forgiven easily.

The obvious bias of the film and the 'F Off' comment at the end of it just got my back up.

jmg- i do the diet- davros doesn't. The diet works well on some children- but in some it makes no difference at all. The MMR damaged children with gut problems d seem to do well with the diet. But this is no surprise as a damaged gut will let through the opiate type compounds from gluten and casein.

My son does not have the gut problems portrayed in the film, but he did test positive at the Uni of Sunderland for a compound called IAG. This supposedly makes the gut leaky- and ceetainly for us removing gluten and glutamates (but not casein although we have trialled it twice) has made a huge difference. The other big thing (which sent him literally crazed- although I haven't come across it from anyone else) was peanuts. He upped his peanut butter (pure organic ground peanuts) consumtion from once a week to 3 times a day. He was headbanging everything hard in sight about 20 x a day (it was hideous - permanent bruises- headbaging the ground outside was a favourite). I reviewed his diet decided to trial removing the peanuts- within 2 days the headbanging had stopped and his head began to heal.

He did show the classic signs of a gluten problem before the diet. For starters he would eat only bread and cheerios (literally). His diet restriction (he used to eat everything) started at the same time as his loss of language. Followng the eczema herpeticum and lots of antibiotics.

I thought the pro-lot were a bit raving as well- but wondered whether it was becuase I'm biased. Agree that most husbands aren't that crap (although I have heard of a few that are I have to say).

Still can't get over the sniffing books- that got me going right at the beginning- bit too close to home. And the shop door plus buggy was me- although when ds1 runs like that I have to admit to abandonning ds2.

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One thing I always wonder- is this 63% of children unvacinated by the MMR in W London (is it kensington and chelsea). isn't that just becuase parents there can afford the singles so can afford to exercise parental choice. I would be interested to know how many children haven't been vaccinated at all- bet its not that many.

sorry I meant only 63% vaccinated..... 37% unvacinated