Infojunkie

A head's up for everyone in Lancashire: Lancashire Parent Partnership is being absorbed into the LEA and will no longer be even partially independent as of 1st April this year. Parents of children with SEN in Lancashire now have no local access to independent advice and support. It may be worth drawing attention to this as Lancashire shouldn't be doing this! Lobby any contacts you have.

I would recommend 'Dietary Intervention and Autism' by Marilyn Breton. A little dated but has good, straight forward lists which are very useful for a beginner. The recipes are straighforward as well.

I would definately suggest getting medical advice on this. Best to rule out a physical illness first as there is a rare condition (can't remember right now what it is called) which could potentially cause these symptoms. Infojunkie

The website at www.autscape.org is now up and running again. Autscape is likely to be of interest to autistic adults plus those of you with autistic children who are interested in positive approaches to living with (as opposed to curing) ASD. Infojunkie

Hi Bid, Definite costs are not yet available, however we expect the cost to be somewhere between ?150 and ?300 per person. Sorry not to be more definite but it depends on the amount of funding we can attract. Infojunkie.

I am on the organising committee for Autscape and have been asked to post the following 'call for proposals'. If anyone has questions about Autscape I will happily answer if you post them here - but I will be away until Tuesday evening and won't be able to respond immediately. Infojunkie. PLEASE NOTE: The Autscape website is currently down but will be fixed within a week. Autscape 2006, Call for Proposals http://www.autscape.org/proposals/ Event date: Tues to Fri, 1-4 August , 2006 Location: Radstock, Somerset (near Bath) Submission deadline: April 7, 2006 Autscape is a combined retreat and conference organised for and run by autistic people. The second annual event will be held this summer in a peaceful rural retreat centre surrounded by extensive and picturesque grounds. We are now accepting proposals for seminars & workshops to be presented at Autscape 2006. This event is primarily for, not about, autistic people. Workshops geared towards parents and professionals may be accepted, but must be positive in their support for autistic people and their right to be different. In general we would like ideas for positive ways of living with autism and navigating an alien world. To get some idea of what we are looking for, please refer to last year's programme: http://www.autscape.org/programme/ We are also likely to enjoy similar workshops to those that have been presented at Autreat in the USA in the past. http://ani.autistics.org/past-workshops.htm We aim to both stimulate your interest and challenge your skills. We hope to change lives by empowering autistic people to live their own lives more effectively. If this interests you, please see our website for more information, detailed submission guidelines, or to submit your proposal online. http://www.autscape.org/

Hi David, I am autistic myself and also have an autistic son. Welcome to the forum. It is a friendly, diverse and accepting place.

My AS son is Jamie too

I recently got my son's school to delay his statement review after failing to give us enough notice by quoting paragraph 9.17 of the SEN Code of Practice 2001 which specifies that copies of the advices must be circulated at least two weeks before the meeting. I don't know if that will help now the meeting has already happened, but it's a place to start if you want to make a complaint

Hi all, I've posted this before but can't find the thread. I have found http://www.dietaryneedsdirect.co.uk/ extremely useful in obtaining some of the harder to find GFCF items. I don't have anything to do with this company I am just a satisfied customer.

Hi Hollymg, I only have my own experience of this as a child with (at that time) undiagnosed AS. I learnt piano by the suzuki method. Music seems to appeal to many with ASDs, especially classical music - maybe because of its regularities. The only problems I had were - poor co-ordination (I still struggle with this in terms of producing perfect performances, but playing the piano helps improve my co-ordination), frustration at the rigid 'grades' system - I was much happier once I was allowed to play what I liked. Your son may well be very different but it sounds like a great idea to encourage him to try. You might just need to shop around a little for a well matched teacher. I look forward to his future recitals

Hi Elanor, This is definately rubbish. We asked for and received a referral to an excellent NHS dietician who knew all about GFCF for my ASD son. Only catch was I had come accross the dietician in question at an ASD support group meeting and knew exactly who to ask for a referral to! I would recommend asking other parents in your area for recommendations of a good dietician and then asking your GP to refer to circumvent the paediatrician. Or just go ahead with the diet anyway! For info on my experiences on the diet see my post on the Autism and co-morbids thread. Good luck.

If it's any help to those of you considering the GFCF diet I have documented my experience and views here. I was a complete sceptic on the subject of the diet 18 months ago. For those who don't know me, I am an adult with ASD and as anti-cure as they come. I'm still anti-cure, but I have had severe bowel problems and immune system problems my whole life so tried the diet out of desperation. (btw from my history my ASD is probably genetic and my son is on the spectrum too). I went GFCF almost overnight about 15 months ago. To my complete amazement I got really, really ill within a few days of starting the diet! Unbelievable diarrohea, mood swings, rashes, cravings for gluten and milk etc. I stuck with it though. I took me about 6 months to really start getting the diet right as I had to go a long way beyond GFCF (this may be because I am older - before I panic all you parents ). I am now GFCF, Aspartame free, MSG free, DGA free, egg free, corn free, low sals (i.e. no fruit except pears and careful with spices and a few veg such as peppers), rapeseed oil free and tomato free (unless I have forgotten anything). I do an awful lot of cooking, it is quite expensive and it is very hard work. BUT I have a normally functioning stomach for the first time in my life AND I hardly catch any bugs. When I do I shake them off easily without the ear infections, chest infections and every other kind of infections I had before. Much as I hate to admit it, I am also better organised and understand some social stuff a LITTLE bit better than before. It may not be right for everyone, but I would recommend trying it. Ignore the (many many) people, websites and groups who will try to get you to buy in to all kinds of fanciful philosophies and dodgy quasi-scientific theories. The Sunderland Protocol is a reputable place to start, after that "Hear all, trust nothing" (Rule 190 of the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition - Star trek). I would suggest trusting your instincts and your child as to what is working. I would also suggest concentrating on improving bowel functioning and immune system health since these are much easier to assess objectively (and then any behavioural improvements are an added bonus). But don't expect overnight miracles and it certainly isn't a cure. I am about to try my son who is 6 (with his consent and co-operation) on the straightforward GFCF version. We'll see how it goes.

I would suggest 'Pretending to be normal: living with Asperger's Syndrome' by Liane Holliday Willey. You might also check out http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~alistair/survival/ - a web guide to living with AS. Both of these are by adults with AS.

To all who may have watched this program and be considering son-rise: Please be aware that the son-rise approach involves forcibly imprisoning children in their playrooms by locking the door and refusing to allow them out during the 4-hour period everyday, no matter how distressed they become. I do not believe this aspect of the program was fairly or accurately portrayed in the documentary - there was a single shot in which you could just about see the door being bolted, but otherwise this was not mentioned. I would also argue that it is possible to teach an autistic to act NT and that this is what the program does - regardless of how stressful and unpleasant that may be for the autistic individual in question! There are undoubtably elements of the program which are great and totally fine, such as the idea of joining in with a child's autistic behaviours and interests. But son-rise is a profit making organisation who are now using this tv program as the excellent free advertising that it is by featuring it prominently on the home page of their website. These are my personal views and I would not try to stop anyone doing what they believe is best for their child but I wanted to ensure parents considering this have access to ALL the information.