Progress is Sweet!

It was a long week last week. Keely has been sick off and on (mostly on) for about a month now. One day last week she woke up crying in the middle of the night. After much screaming I finally laid down in the floor beside her and begged her to show me what was wrong. She has never told us what was hurting her before, so I was completely shocked when she immediately started tapping on her right ear. She then put my hand on her right ear. The next day we took her to the doctor and she had an ear infection. This was such progress for us. I really didn't want to put her on antibiotics. I was afraid it would kick up the yeast. She has not taken any antibiotics since we started biomedical treatments, but they said it was bad enough that she needed them. I have upped her probiotics in hopes of keeping the yeast problem tamed.

Keely has been gluten free and casein free for over a year. She has never had any infraction since we started. I was very proud of this and we worked really hard to make sure we were very strict. Well the streak ended. I went to get her from school the other day and her teacher told me the speech therapist had given her vanilla wafers. So by that afternoon the diarrhea had started and by that night her stimming was getting bad. The stimming continued through the next day. I guess this just confirms why we need to be so strict with the diet. She has just been feeling so much better so it was sad to see her not feeling well. It reminded me of some time back just not as bad, thankfully.

And for the really good news....Today Keely and I went shopping for a few things. We went to Target and had been in there for a little bit when we needed to take a bathroom break. I lifted her out of the basket and let her walk. As we were walking, I ran into a lady that I used to work with. We started talking and I picked Keely up and we talked for several minutes and Keely was as good as can be. We went on to the bathroom and then she got back into the basket and we went to shop some more. We then ran into my friend again and Keely let us talk for about 30 minutes. She sat so patiently and at one point we were by a shelf that had several men's hats on it. She started trying on hats. It was so stinkin cute. And this is a REALLY big deal because.....it has been so long since I even attempted to carry on a lengthy conversation while she was with me. I gave that up a long time ago. She would get impatient, start yelling and then it would all be over...within a matter of seconds. But not now! My friend had not seen her since she was a baby but had heard that she had been having problems. And she commented several times about how she couldn't even tell by watching her that anything was wrong. And yes...I cried all the way home. We are on our way! Yes we have a long way to go and she isn't talking like she should be....but she can say words and she is using some words everyday. And we still have problems with transitions but these are all things that have gotten so much better so I know she will just keep improving.

Autism B4 N After Project

A facebook friend of mine, and fellow warrior mom, started a project to document children with Autism who are recovering or are recovered. I sent Keely's pictures in so she could be part of the project. Please take the time to click on the link to the left for the Autism B4 N After Project blog and see the faces of Autism. Many of the kids pictures show the amazing progress you can make through biomedical treatments. Many of the kids have a before Autism (before they regressed), after the diagnosis, and then after doing biomedical treatments. And if you are a parent with a child recovering or recovered go to the blog for information about adding your child to the project.