Glimmer of hope for autistic children
As a doctor, I have access to most medications and have tried them on my daughter. Ritalin helped a great deal with her attention problem. For example, without Ritalin, she could count items up to only four before she got distracted or lost synchronization between counting and pointing. With Ritalin, she could count up to 15 and above, but Ritalin has its side effects: she became aggressive, picking at her skin, and digging out scabs from her arms and legs.
After a dose of Ritalin, her heart would race and she would break out in cold sweat and feel clammy. I tried many times to tail down the dose and stop the Ritalin but the attention problems soon resurfaced and the teachers had problems making her learn as she wouldn’t sit still. The other medications I had tried on her were numerous but none worked.
One day, three years back, a parent posted something she had found on the Internet: Sara’s diet – a diet free from green, yellow, orange and red pigmentations containing lutein. When I read it, it was like a piece of puzzle falling into place.
It made sense why my daughter was reacting to some of the foods in a very haphazard way. She reacts badly to long beans but not to french beans (initially we thought it was because of the pesticides but organic long beans were not any better). She reacts to lettuce and leek on some occasions only. It explained too her cravings for chicken skin and chicken fat.
She loved strawberries and would grab them from the shelves whenever we went shopping but after having some, I would not be able to teach her anything for three days. Lutein was the missing piece. I contacted Sandra Desorgher, the mother who pioneered Sara’s Diet, who sent me dietary advice which I have followed till today.
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