ASD and special diet?

[letsgooutstiiiiiiide]

Does anyone have any advice on whether special diets are worth it in kids with ASD?

DS is 2.5 and under referral for ASD. He's pretty clearly "aspie" and has enough signs that I think we will have a diagnosis at his psych appointment in early August.

He is doing SALT sessions once a week, and will start an autism-specific toddler music group and OT at some point, but otherwise I'm just desperately reading a Hanen book (TalkAbility - he is highly verbal) and trying to implement it.

He has really strong "on" and "off" modes. When he's on he's hyper-verbal, notices everything, really musical, happy to do eye contact and play with trusted adults, etc. When he's off he is perseverative, stimmy, distracted, incredibly hard to engage socially, won't do eye contact, cries all the time, wants to breastfeed all the time, hates anything new or unusual, etc. THere's no intermediate mode, he's either on or off. There's no obvious pattern with tiredness or illness.

It's so marked that it seems like there's some biological basis that is fluctuating and causing the "off" mode directly.

Has anyone seen any improvement of this kind of thing with diet changes like GFCF, fish oil, vitamins, folate etc?

Btw his diet is ok but not great. All home made and dairy and soy free. Not into fresh fruit or raw veg or texture but will eat blended rice & stir fries, veg soups, sausage roll, toast and egg, hummus or peanut butter sandwiches. I make fruit "ice cream" blended with coconut milk and oats. So fairly restricted but not as pathological as it could be.

Is the dairy/soy free for any particular reason? Fish oil or veg alternative might be a good idea.

He's got a delayed allergy to dairy and soy. Can eat very small quantities now in baked stuff but e.g. cheese cooked into scones still causes the reaction.

He gets blended veggie soup for lunch, and typically some form of stir-fried rice with leafy greens, peas, mushrooms, meat for dinner. Mostly he can't do the texture of rice etc so i blend it to about halfway between rice and mush.

Hi,

Hope you’re well. I just wanted to give you an insight into what we did for our son. He has no formal diagnosis as it stands. We pretty much knew he was on the ASD pathway when he was around 17 months however didn’t actually see any professionals till he was 2 years old. At this point I had toyed with the idea of changing his diet but with another baby I just didn’t have the courage do take on something so big. So I did as much research as I could in the hope that maybe one day we will look into this avenue.

At 2 years old he had no words, was stimmy, walked on his toes, made barely any eye contact, chewed on everything, had sensory issues and various other things. We initially went to SALT which seemed to have helped to some extent however he’s hyperactivity really affected his ability to learn much.

At 2.3 months after an awful appointment where he just spent the entire time screaming his lungs out, out of sheer frustration I revisited the diets. I was desperate to help my son and to understands his needs.

I looked into the GAPS protocol which is a very restrictive diet that attempts to heal the gut. Fast forward 3 months later I now have a 2 and half year old that talks, counts, sleeps, points, makes eye contact, no longer has any sensory issues (he used to refuse to wear anything clothing on his top half without a screaming fit) which is a massive thing to overcome as it was really affecting daily life for us. He made more developmental leaps in 3 months than he did in 2 years!

It’s been challenging, hard and I’ve defiantly shed a few tears however it’s been worth it. He still stims but that’s fine with me because I wasn’t looking to take his autism away I just wanted to try and take away the frustration of not communicating with us.

When I went into this whole diet thing I was very aware that it may not work or do anything for him. But as a family we decided that we were willing to give a good try. There are a few posters here from the past that talk about their journeys on here do a search and see what you think is the right alternative route for your child. There are many diets for ASD to look into it’s very overwhelming.

Also look into a site called Thinking Autism great resources and other families stories. They have a conference on this weekend in London which I sadly could not attend.

Wish you all the best with whatever you decide to do. X

Does he take vitamins daily?