[Things are hidden temporarily only as a means to revelation.] For there is nothing hidden except to be revealed, nor is anything [temporarily] kept secret except in order that it may be made known.
AMP
Once again, it's taken forever since I last posted. I am dying to be able to post here on a daily basis, but haven't been letting myself because I want to finish telling what's lead us up to this point in our lives. So, let's get on with it.
To make an extremely long story somewhat shorter, we began taking Joshua to a pediatrician who now specializes primarily as a DAN! doctor somewhere around June of 2010. In the first round of testing we found out that he has hypothyroidism (like me), and has a wheat allergy (along with a few others) and a casein (milk protein) intolerance. This explained a lot, right off. Joshua has major food issues, and at that time would only eat chicken nuggets, fish sticks, yogurt, and a few assorted snacks. Basically, EVERYTHING he would eat, he was allergic to. They told me this is very common because it's like a drug addict, the effect of the allergy makes them crave what they are allergic to.
On top of the diet change, we also started adding supplements as the tests were indicating he needed them. We have been going for over a year now, and Joshua's day consists of upwards of 20 different supplements.
Actually, as I am writing this we are starting an even stricter diet (SCD), and cutting out some of the supplements because they contain ingredients that are "illegal" on this diet. The poor guy's gut is in such bad shape, we are having to take more drastic measures to get it healed.
In the middle of all of these blood, urine, and stool tests, I came across some books by Jenny McCarthy. The first one, "Louder than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism" and a second one, "Mother Warriors". Up until that point, I had refused to look up anything to do with autism on the internet because I didn't want to scare myself. I was still pretty sure that's not what it was, although I was beginning to realize that we were dealing with something beyond a speech delay. I hadn't even finished the first book when the realization hit me like a 2x4...Joshua is somewhere on the Autism Spectrum. I wasn't sure of the extent, but I knew in my heart if we had him evaluated, that's what the diagnosis would be.
This is the part of the story where I probably would have laid in bed sobbing like a baby for a couple weeks, if it hadn't been for the extra information I was getting in this book. And the more research, I did, the more I found confirmation from parents all over the country... The horrible toxins in our environment, air, water, food, household cleaners...and vaccines especially, are arguably the main cause of the rise in autism numbers in the past decades. I was outraged when I learned that now 1 in 110 children in the U.S. are diagnosed with some form of ASD. A number that climbed right along with the insane amount of vaccines we now give our children. I'm not going to get into the vaccine issue much in this post, but I will say that before the vaccine schedule was initially increased in the 1980's the autism rate was at 1 in 10,000! Many will argue that we are just better at diagnosing it now than we used to be, but there are other mental disorders whose rates have remained the same and we are seeing a significant increase in other childhood diseases and disorders as well, including ADHD, learning disabilities, diabetes, and rheumatoid arthrititis. Anyway, my point here is that instead of just being overcome with sadness (though I absolutely was), I was enraged. I think I walked around ranting and raving in my brain for weeks as the more research and reading I did, the more I realized that what we were walking through with Joshua could more than likely have been prevented if our government and society wasn't so money-hungry and listened to parents.
So here we are, Joshua was diagnosed this past April and we have been in the process of trying to find ABA therapy for him since then. We moved over an hour away from any of our family, but our options for different therapies was very limited living as far out in the country as we did before. This stage of our life has been, by far, the hardest and it has been a constant up-hill, one-step-forward-two-steps-back ordeal. BUT, I remain convinced that what the Lord has began in Joshua, He will finish. Another thing I learned from these books is that a large majority of parents are seeing their children actually LOSE their diagnosis all together once their guts and minds begin to heal from the toxic burden they have been carrying. I don't need more than that. I have the Word of God that promises my son an abundant life and the testimony of others that this is more than possible, even within the confines of natural means. I have to believe and expect a total and complete healing for him. My Momma Heart didn't come with an "Accept Defeat" reaction.
Actually, as I am writing this we are starting an even stricter diet (SCD), and cutting out some of the supplements because they contain ingredients that are "illegal" on this diet. The poor guy's gut is in such bad shape, we are having to take more drastic measures to get it healed.
In the middle of all of these blood, urine, and stool tests, I came across some books by Jenny McCarthy. The first one, "Louder than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism" and a second one, "Mother Warriors". Up until that point, I had refused to look up anything to do with autism on the internet because I didn't want to scare myself. I was still pretty sure that's not what it was, although I was beginning to realize that we were dealing with something beyond a speech delay. I hadn't even finished the first book when the realization hit me like a 2x4...Joshua is somewhere on the Autism Spectrum. I wasn't sure of the extent, but I knew in my heart if we had him evaluated, that's what the diagnosis would be.
This is the part of the story where I probably would have laid in bed sobbing like a baby for a couple weeks, if it hadn't been for the extra information I was getting in this book. And the more research, I did, the more I found confirmation from parents all over the country... The horrible toxins in our environment, air, water, food, household cleaners...and vaccines especially, are arguably the main cause of the rise in autism numbers in the past decades. I was outraged when I learned that now 1 in 110 children in the U.S. are diagnosed with some form of ASD. A number that climbed right along with the insane amount of vaccines we now give our children. I'm not going to get into the vaccine issue much in this post, but I will say that before the vaccine schedule was initially increased in the 1980's the autism rate was at 1 in 10,000! Many will argue that we are just better at diagnosing it now than we used to be, but there are other mental disorders whose rates have remained the same and we are seeing a significant increase in other childhood diseases and disorders as well, including ADHD, learning disabilities, diabetes, and rheumatoid arthrititis. Anyway, my point here is that instead of just being overcome with sadness (though I absolutely was), I was enraged. I think I walked around ranting and raving in my brain for weeks as the more research and reading I did, the more I realized that what we were walking through with Joshua could more than likely have been prevented if our government and society wasn't so money-hungry and listened to parents.
So here we are, Joshua was diagnosed this past April and we have been in the process of trying to find ABA therapy for him since then. We moved over an hour away from any of our family, but our options for different therapies was very limited living as far out in the country as we did before. This stage of our life has been, by far, the hardest and it has been a constant up-hill, one-step-forward-two-steps-back ordeal. BUT, I remain convinced that what the Lord has began in Joshua, He will finish. Another thing I learned from these books is that a large majority of parents are seeing their children actually LOSE their diagnosis all together once their guts and minds begin to heal from the toxic burden they have been carrying. I don't need more than that. I have the Word of God that promises my son an abundant life and the testimony of others that this is more than possible, even within the confines of natural means. I have to believe and expect a total and complete healing for him. My Momma Heart didn't come with an "Accept Defeat" reaction.
I love your blog. I love reading your story and I love how intertwined your faith is into it. It's very encouraging to me!! "What the Lord began in Joshua, He will finish" made me bawl. It something I claim over Judah too and something I know is true. Keep writing!! :)
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