Hi Dr. Vincent,
My name is XYZ, and I am
writing you today in regards to my daughter, ABC. ABC was born on XX/2011,
and so she is a little more than 3 years old now. FYI, we have spoken on
the phone about 3 days ago, and I am the fellow calling from ABC. Thank
you so much for taking the time to speak with me and my wife. Just a brief history on ABC. She was
developing normally until I think about 14-16 months mark when we started to
see some regression in her behavior and learning. My wife just noticed
this and brought it up to my attention, but I dismissed it. At 18 months,
we brought her to our pediatrician, and he too dismissed the possibility that
there might be something wrong, especially autism. Just before 24 months,
she received (in one day) a battery of 4 shots in one visit (including MMR) and
I think she really went downhill after that. Her symptoms included
tip-toeing, like to be by herself, like to watch TV and playing on the Ipad for
hours at a time, difficulty to sleep at night, non-verbal, some
frustration-induced screaming, etc. At this point we were really
concerned and took her to a local autism doctor. He ordered a full
battery of tests (blood test, urine test, feces test, allergy test, etc).
Of course, it turned out that she was allergic to all food according to the
test, so he prescribed strong pro-biotics, liquid glutathione, strict diet, and
progressively B12 shots. Whether some or all of those methods worked
fully or partially, we have no ideas. We looked at various diets, from
the GAPS diet to GFCF diet to Feingold diet.... I think we tried them all to
some degrees, but we didn't have any strong belief in these diets so we didn't
really following any of them strictly or at length, and of course, that didn't
work out well either for us. From the time she was two, we brought her to
the state-sponsored "Early Step" program and they diagnosed her with
severe developmental, language delay, so for like 6 months, we also had speech
therapy and ABA therapy in our own homes. Of course, I don't think any of
that worked because when she turned 3 years old, they re-tested her and she
again was diagnosed with severe developmental language delay, and was placed in
optional pre-K "Exceptional Student Program" in the local elementary
school. She was in that program for approximately 1 month, I officially
took her out of that program last week because I didn't think she was learning
anything but bad behavior and habits from all the kids there.
Currently, she is tip-toeing, very high, but since we spoke
with you, we really watched this and tried to monitor and lessen this
behavior. She sleeps better at night now than before if she does not
sleep in the daytime and if she is sufficiently tired. Every night, it is
hard for her to get to sleep, and sometimes we had to use Melatonin. Her
feces is super stinky, and sometimes she is constipated for days. She is
still in diapers, and she has shown no interest at all in going to the bathroom
to urinate or defecate. However, she looks very normal (what our peers
said) and not people-shy. She is very loving, cuddling, has good eye
contact with everyone most of the times. I don't think her muscles tone
is either too soft or too hard. Her diet now is extremely limited:
steamed white rice, Popeyes fried chicken, McNuggets, Xiu Mai, fried eggs and
bread, bacon, ice cream, and pizza. She would refuse to eat anything
else. She hates teeth brushing, face washing, sometimes taking a bath can
be a challenge but usually ok. She is non-violent most of the times,
except when she is wanting something really bad and either we don't understand
her or refuse to give it to her.... then she would scream, yell, and dive at
us... but this is rare. She can put on her own shoes. Her manual
dexterity is somewhat clumsy, but not horrible. She can spoon-feed
herself food and drink from a cup (with a straw) relatively well, but she
usually tries to make us feed her first and only does it herself if we
refuse.
She repeats things very well. Her pronunciation can be
fantastic. But she is only repeating what people said, and not necessary
understanding anything. I think her language development is extremely
poor. She only knows a few words: Daddy, Mommy, eat, cup,
drink..... and almost nothing else. I think she understands some basic
commands like: "go upstairs", "take shower",
"turn off the lights", "put back shoes", "put on
shoes", "change clothes".... but that's it. She memorizes
quite a few things from many months of watching cartoons, educational videos,
and Ipad games ... so her left brain is a lot stronger than her right brain, so
to speak. We are now currently retiring her Ipad, restricting her TV
watching to a minimum, and faithfully monitoring/controlling her tip-toeing.
Since 16 months, she got seriously sick twice with high
fever and had to be admitted to the ER. Both times, it was something like
bronchitis or viem co hong and she was put on antibiotics for 10 days.
She is very allergic to insect bites. The bitten spots oftentimes looked
very bad and could easily lead to serious infection if not treated immediately
and correctly.
At this point, I want to engage
into a serious conversation with you about your 3 months residency
program. I really want to know all the details and logistics so I can
start planning from my end. There are so many questions and unknowns and
I don't know where to begin. I realize that you are a dedicated doctor
and your time is valuable and that's why I am writing this email instead of
calling you again. Right now, I am thinking about making a trip to San
Jose
I am enclosing a couple of ABC's
recent videos for you to view.
If you have time, of course I would like to converse with
you on the phone If not, you and I can also exchange emails too.
Thanks so much for doing your work. Please take care and I am looking
forward to hearing back from you soon.
Sincerely yours,
XYZ
XYZ
Answer: Here are my thoughts. Your daughter has
problems and you know them very well. My approach to autism treatment is
massive action. It means a lot of things to be done or to be tried in a
short period of time. Sometimes we find the solution and sometimes we
don't. For your daughter I only hope that she can walk flat after the
3-month trial. Other thing you can expect is that she will be able to eat
better and healthier diet. Her current diet is causing massive inflammation for
her brain and body tissues. If she stop eating them right now, it will
take about 6 months for the cells to heal. The body does not heal well
when having too much inflammation. If
you go to San Jose San Jose
