General diet advice and is gluten/caesin free good for all ASD children?

[extremepie]

I've been considering putting DS2 (4) on a GF/CF diet to see if it would help him at all, as I've heard good things about it.

Only thing is a lot of the foods he will eat, and all his favourites have gluten or dairy in them - being ASD he has some food issues and I'm worried that restricting his diet even more would be a bad idea.

He has no bowel/digestive problems as far as I'm aware so I'm not sure how much this diet would benefit him?

Also, does anyone have any idea about how to get him to take an omega 3 suppliment? Or any recommendations for good ones?

Any syrups/liquids I've tried putting in juice he can tell the difference straight away and won't drink it. He also won't take 'capsules' and those chewy ones that look like sweets kind of worked but most of the time he won't eat those either!

Some of these suppliments are quite expensive and I can't afford to keep buying things he won't take!

Any ideas on how to get him to eat fruit? He won't eat anything wet or 'squishy' and so far I can't get him to eat any fruit (except in yogurt!)

the first book I read about gf/cf was Marilyn Le Breton's 'Diet, Intervention and Autism'

it is a little out of date now, but the first few chapters give a really good summing up of how to assess whehter your child might benefit from a gf/cf diet.

I then had dd1's urine analysed by the research team at Sunderland University (will look up link, I can never rememeber what they are called now!), adn the results indicated (along with the checklists from the book) that a trial woudl be beneficial.

it worked for dd1, in many ways.

I have not seen anythign to suggest that the diet woudl work for all children with ASD, but imo, it is worth looking into whether it would work for your ds.

No. It's pointless unless they're intolerant.

Mine both are, and were tested for it (the sunderland test) and have a gluten free diet on prescription as a result of that.

If he is intolerant then he will crave it! That's part of it. Don't know why.

I saw a dramatic improvement in both my children after they came off gluten, but I wouldn't advise trying it unless they've been tested and it's been determined there's an actual intolerance there. The test requires them to be eating gluten at the time, so you can't take them off it until it's been done anyway.

re fish oils, mine always had eskimo kids. I found those quite good. They tolerated the tutti fruity one.

re fruit, no idea. dried fruit? although that's very high in sugar and I'm not sure how nutritious it is.

How do I go about getting him tested for an intolerance?

Could I go to the GP? Would they do that if he didn't have any medical issues that needed to be addressed?

Have tried a bit of dried fruit but he won't eat that either! I will keep trying though, as you never know, one day he might suddenly start eating it!

I'm just getting a bit worried about him as he has recently recovered from a vomiting/runs sickness and he lost quite a bit of weight when he was a bit on the skinny side to start with. My brother has been underweight his whole life so it could be partly due to genetics but I'm just trying to get as many nutrients into his body as I can :)

this is where you can get him tested

it cost about £60 when I used their services (about 5 years ago now), but they did used to offer payment plans etc - call them up, they are really helpful.

in my dd's case, restricting her diet (by going gf/cf) has meant that she has actually widened what she eats - not overnight, but slowly, she has accepted new foods, and recently scoffed down salmon and new potatoes with a cherry tomato sauce (never thought I'd see the day)