Blogging Revisited / Seizures

I have taken a hiatus from the blog for various reasons. We have been working with a holistic neurologist/DAN doctor for the past few months, trying to get Liberty's seizures under control with natural products, but last week, the teacher called and she saw something new that scared her. Then I witnessed it, as well. Turns out we were seeing true absence seizures. The other behavior we THOUGHT were absence seizures were not. Go figure!

We were able to obtain an EEG fairly quickly. This time Liberty was not sedated but awake. He had to be put in a papoose from head to toe, but the technician was wonderful. He cried, but really he was just angry. Fortunately, there were clear-cut "textbook" absence seizures recorded on the EEG. He had three while we were there. So, my boy is now on medication. We tried to avoid it, but I do think that this is going to help him. I do not know how many lapses in consciousness he has had over the past who-knows-how-many years. I know that if he was having seizures, they only recently became visible around 6 years of age. The good news about absence seizures is that children usually outgrow them. They can sometimes go into complex seizures, so we chose Depakote to cover both.

I don't feel bad about the medication now, because honestly the seizures scared me worse than any fears I might have about the drug. Lib has been on the medication for four days. I might just be being hopeful, but already he looks more connected and rested. The doctor and I decided that this drug is only a "bridge" until at some point we can wean him off, if we can optimize him on other supplements like milk thistle and GABA. Liberty has had paradoxical reactions to the very things that are supposed to help absence seizures such as taurine and melatonin.

I have learned, as well, over the past few months that the yeast issue in the gut will never really be cleared up completely until the metals are chelated. I have tried the DAN way and I told my doctor this, who is a DAN, that I wanted to try the "other" way, namely the Andrew Cutler protocol. He's a chemist who wrote "Amalgam Illness." Anyway, the AC protocol is "low" dose and "slow" meaning it can take a matter of years. This protocol considers the chelating agent's half-life of only 4 hours, reasoning that after 4 hours, the metals are no longer being pulled from the tissues and are free to move about and become reabsorbed. You can only chelate for around 3 days like on the weekend with an 11 day rest in between and, of course, at that point some metals will get reabsorbed. But, I see many children who actually recover on this protocol with no regressions like I have seen and witnessed in my own son. My DAN doctor is cool enough that he listened to me and told me that whatever I wanted to do he was "on board" with and "let's try it." I am so thankful that I stuck with him! His office is now located an hour and a half away from my town but he does not charge the arm and leg and fingers and toes that many of these DAN docs charge.

I hate that the the autism community is divided like this on the proper protocol for getting our children well, but the truth is no one has discovered the one right way to help children on the spectrum.

I am going on my Guidance and it is not failing me. I have faith. And that is everything at the moment. And, I do think that whatever avenue you choose, you have to feel good about it and not anxious. Here's a great quote by Abraham that I saw the other day when I was deciding to put Liberty on medication:

"Is this pill really an effective pill? I this process really an effective process? Anything that causes you to allow what you desire is the process of coming into alignment. And so, we're not, in any way, validating or invalidating anything. Many offer their "dog and pony show" as being the one that works. And good for all of them. We applaud anything that assists someone in allowing the Well-being that they so much want and deserve, to flow. -- Abraham.

Will keep you posted on Liberty's progress...and mine.