Disappointing

My husband agreed to come with me today to the nutritionist in order to get the results and to ask some questions of his own. I was actually quite disappointed with her responses, with the report and with her attitude in general. So, I think that perhaps he was right to be skeptical this time.

My biggest problem with the report was that it told us virtually nothing specific to my son. There was maybe a paragraph listing the different sports that were considered 'active' but no other explanation of just what that meant. The other four pages of the report were an outline of the program we'd be expected to follow: three to six visits initially, then anywhere from twelve to thirty-six weeks following, depending on progress. There wasn't even any specific explanation of what the two supplements were that she was recommending; she just said that they were homeopathic - not even a name brand. This lack of information disturbed me.

I asked about the specific reasons for the dietary changes, and the reasoning behind removing dairy from Gus's diet was mostly for physical reasons - it produces more phlegm in the body. That has nothing to do with his Asperger's, though.

Then my husband got around to asking his questions. He asked about clinical trials, about where he could get more specific information on the technique. She got somewhat defensive and actually seemed annoyed that he wasn't all gung-ho over her methods. And, although she said that she was fine with our decision to wait until we get back Gus's blood work before putting him on any homeopathic remedy, she did become very cold and short. This bugged me as well.

I mean, really, if I was going to give my son medication from a doctor, I'd want to do some checking on it. It's perfectly reasonable for a parent to ask such questions, and now I'm glad that my husband stopped me from jumping in (although I expect that I would have hesitated once I saw the lack of info in the report anyway).

So at this point, my opinion of Nutrition Response Testing is not good; it may change if we find that she was right from the blood tests. But as for now, not something I'd recommend.

Well that didn't go as planned

My husband did some of his own research last night on Nutrition Response Testing and is dead set against it and most of the nutritionist's recommendations. He's okay with removing the sugar from Gus's diet. There's a small chance that he may decide to come and talk to her, but he's firmly convinced that it's a bogus practice and doesn't want Gus taking any supplements. He's also not quite convinced that we should take him off dairy.

So we compromised a little. We're going with the sugar removal for 2 weeks to see the effect, then we'll try out the dairy removal to also gauge any differences. As for the metals, we've agreed to wait until we get the blood work back from the geneticist to see if they show up and we'll proceed from there.

Last night's was one of the most heated discussions we've had since trying to decide where/when/if to move.

Whaddya Know

We went to see the nutritionist today at the Center for Natural Healing located in Kingston, NY. What a fascinating practice!

Marsha uses Nutrition Response testing, which upon further research seems to be (or at least closely related to) Applied Kinesiology. Now the latter has been criticized as 'quackery' ( see Quackwatch) and honestly, if I didn't have some level of experience with energy work, I'd probably agree. Yet, NRT seems to combine elements of acupuncture and homeopathy to perform muscle testing in order to pinpoint where the problem areas are and what nutritional supplements can counteract said problems.

More information on Nutrition Response Testing can be found here:

AcuNatural Family Healthcare

So what did we learn thus far? Well, I go back tomorrow for the full report, but
apparently, Gus does not have gluten problems. Big relief!! The recommendation is that we remove dairy from his diet as well as sugar. It will be a challenge, but nothing that will kill us. Quite frankly, I've always known that sugar is bad for him, in particular, but for people in general. (We were also given, as part of our packet, 124 Ways Sugar Ruins Your Health by Nancy Appleton, PhD.) In addition, it seems that Gus has mercury and lead in his system. So that will need to be addressed with a supplement called Metal Free. It's expensive, but if should last for several months and if it works, I can eat the buck-fifty. I'll just have to convince my husband.

But how could mercury and, especially, lead possibly be in his system? There could be contaminants present around us now, or there could have been some exposure as far back as when I was pregnant. I've got metal fillings, Gus had vaccinations, which probably had preservatives containing mercury. as for the lead, we've lived in 2 places that were built back in the thirties, so there could easily have been lead there, or who knows? there could even be some sort of lead contamination in our drinking water or in the canned food we eat. So if there's something that can get the metals out of his system, would I be remiss to not even try it and see if there's some improvement?

So far, I'm pretty optimistic about what I'm hearing, but time will tell. Despite the nay-saying, I've seen enough testimonials and heard enough first hand about this particular nutritionist, that I'm willing to give it a real try.