http://northwestindianaautism.com/overview-of-a...

Before my son was ever diagnosed with autism, he was having pretty horrible allergies. The first step, was obviously testing for allergies. He did two tests, first was food allergies. He was allergic to zero markers. The second was environmental, he was allergic to cats. We have a pet cat that he loves more than the world - we found the problem. We began giving her weekly baths using dander medication, stopped allowing her in the playroom and his bedroom and put him on allergy medication and since then he has never had any allergy signs.

That said, because of these tests we did conclude he had no food allergies, that included dairy and wheat and other gluten products.

We tried the GFCF diet. It was hellish to begin with because at the time my sons diet was so super limited that I thought if I didn't stop soon, he'd starve. I eventually got him to eat more fruits and found some vegetables he loved, that I never thought he would (broccoli and brussel sprouts!!) It helped me get him off of nasty chocolate milk... but his diet was still extremely limited and he had to have double the suggested vitamin supplements. His diet was, apples, bananas, cooked chicken breasts, broccoli, brussel sprouts, steamed carrots and 100% apple juice. For a little over 6 months, I was unable to get my child to eat anything else. I was also on the diet at the time, and I felt healthier because I removed all the fat and crappy processed foods from my diet, but neither of us improved in regards to autism symptoms.

We did not try other biomedical treatments, but did (and still do) take probiotics and fish oil, we both also take sleep aids, and he takes melatonin along side another medication or he doesn't sleep.

If you check out that site I linked, at the bottom is a study (pdf file) it shows you during various trials for various biomeds how people reacted to the treatment (symptoms got worse, showed no difference, showed improvement) most biomed treatments seem to show about the same... roughly 30-65% of participants showed improvements with the various treatments and under 5% showed signs of worsening.

Trying treatments are worth a shot, imo. That doesn't mean they will work for your child, nor does it mean they won't. And while the GFCF diet did not work for us, it taught us to be much healthier. If nothing else, it was a beautiful detox... our addiction to the nastier stuff out there was snuffed out of our system. We don't eat chips, soda, candy, cakes, doughnuts, sugary anything, fried foods, processed garbage anymore... except my son loves bacon and corndogs, still. But they are both very rarely eaten (1-2 times a month, if even that).

Bamb, do you have any group you can recommend?

Thank you your comments. I will try to give my son health food. He is a great eater. Not picky but he started to show preference on some food. He likes "new" food. Thank you for suggesting.

We use a combination of biomed and behavior therapy. Certain foods do help my trio- fish, eggs, and crunchy fruits & veggies

We have yet to meet a doctor pushing for the biomed approach. My daughter doesn't have digestive issues but she a picky eater so a restrictive diet wouldn't work for us.