Choc or not? Allergies and 'preverbal' autism.

[ecomum]

Hello

My 3 yr old DS is autistic with very limited understanding of language. He also has several severe food allergies and needs an epipen.

My friend has discovered a dairy, soya free chocolate that he could have. BUT if I introduce him to chocolate he may start wanting to try 'normal' chocolate and I can't explain to him why he can't have it.

He is just statring to show an interest in sweets - he stole and ate a chew from the post office yesterday when I wasn't looking! Luckily he wasn't allergic to it!!

I'd love to be able to give him an easter egg this year, but my mum says it would be a really bad idea.

Any one been in a similar situation? Any advice much appreciated

Thanks

If the chocoalte he is allowed is the only choch he is bought he will know no different.

keep a bar on your handbag for times when you are in sshops and he asks for a normal bar and you can substitute it.

I give Ds Green and Blacks 80% chocolate but only as a treat now and again.

ds1 is 8 and non-verbal autistic. It's only really recently that he's started going out of his way to get food he can't have (he's gluten free).

I can see your concerns though. In reality I guess he's going to be closely supervised......

Ecomum - can you tell me the brand of chocolate? DS2 is also allergic to dairy and soya, so would like to know as most of the dairy free bars I see have soya in them.

I keep a stash of sweets DS2 can eat in the cupboard so that if DS1 has sweets I can get them out. He hasn't complained so far (he's 5) but then again he is very passive. I think by the time he gets to Yurt's Ds1's age he may be similar - we've had a few biscuit stealing incidents just recently!

Sphil- green and blacks 80% cocoa has no soy. But only the 80% one al the others do.

sphil, dietaryneedsdirect do a huge selection of dairy free soya free chocolates. I think the Peter Rabbit chocolate is too and I think you can still buy that in boots.

Unfortunately he's not too keen on classy chocolate so G and B is out - too strong I think. I've been on the Dietaryneeds website before but keep forgetting about it - will have a look. Easter is coming up and I think for the first time DS2 might be persuaded to join in with my mum's traditional easter egg hunt.