gluten free diet

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I have an 11yo son with high function autism which is pretty close to aspergers, the only difference he has is he talked late. Is it true that all aspies talk early? Anyway, my question is, have any of you tried a gluten free diet when you were younger and did it help anythng?

I didn't talk early and I still find it difficult to talk. I think I have one friend who talked early and one late aspie-wise. I've only just learned about gluten/casein free diets so I don't know. I know someone who went on the epilepsy diet ani t helped. Try online.

I have celiac disease so I have to eat a gluten free diet. I turn into a zombie when I eat gluten.

My son is "high-functioning" autistic and we didn't try any diet for him. He was eating almost all bread (wheat) products during the toddler years and I didn't see a possible way to convert him to wheat/dairy free. He's very stubborn and picky with food.
He's' progressed quite well and I'm glad I never altered his diet.

The onset of language acquisition is one distinction between HFA and AS. Late talkers are sometimes grouped as HFA. My son did not talk until he was 5 and he still has language delays.

I am self-diagnosed AS and something of a health fanatic when it comes to nutrition. I have gone long periods being both gluten and dairy free. I found it to have no difference on my behavior or thinking.

Cleaning up any diet will be bound to improve some things... you should try to stop anything with artificial coloring, flavoring, hydrogenated fats immediately, just for his health's sake. Then try to move on from there to removing refined sugars and caffeine. after that you might want to experiment with removing gluten and or dairy, but with the way kids eat today, that could be very hard. With my son I've been successful only with the first part- removing artifical stuff and most hydrogenated fats. He is a picky eater.

My son is HFA - slight language delay (therfore not Aspergers), but he talked before 3, has a good vocabulary but sounds a bit funny with immature pronounciation. We were told that both the degree of autism and intellectual capabilities vary independant of each other, so all combinations are possible. He is very clever and very autistic .
We tried gluten and lactose free diet for about 3 monthes some years ago - it was hard work, and we saw no change in behaviour. But I believe "autism" as a syndrome is caused by many different things, and what works for some kids, won't work for others.
BTW we think EYE-Q fish oil did help - no miracles, but he seems to function better.

I know what you mean... my son LOVES all things noodle-y He also loves yogurt, cheese, bread, etc. It would be really hard to cut out these foods unless we knew that they were causing a health issue. Apparently there are tests you can have done to determine if the foods are a problem.

One of the things to remember is that autistics are known to have allergies and those can make their "autistic" behaviors heightened (ie stress, itching, my son acts deaf still if he's having bad allergies).
There are autistics that have wheat and/or dairy allergies and those outbreaks appear to make them "autistic". My sons allergies are not food-based but grass/dust and something else that we can't figure out.

i had everyone in the family try it for a period of 2 weeks~hoping that it would reduce the anxiety levels in the house.....the only person it made a direct effect on was me ( one of the few NTs in the house)....i felt better. the kicker was that after the 2 weeks was up, and i tried to go back to drinking milk~i became sick.

The diagnosis for HFA is apparently supposed to take precedence to the AS diagnosis, although that seems to be at the center of controversy right now. Our 3 1/2 yr. daughter was dianosed with AS, and it seems that the talking early was one of the few things separating her from having a diagnosis of HFA. It appears to be a fine line between the two, at least as far as diagnosis is concerned. We have been trying the GFCF diet. Initially it was rough, but the almost overnight improvements (not cure or anything like that, just improvements say in, being more engaged - a conversation can actually last 2-3(!) exchanges now). My wife and I were skeptics, but no more. We're going to keep doing it, I use we because my wife and I are eating the diet as well, since it's easier to cook one meal instead of two.

The hardest thing is the realization that we came to, that many of the substitutions are just plain yuck, for example making pizza with a rice crust and soy cheese. So more or less we're kind of gravitating towards cuisines that are already more likely to be GFCF in the first place, like Mexican - if you use corn tortillas, hard or soft, instead of flour tortillas and use guacamole in place of sour cream and cheese, you're gluten free casien free, as long as the beans don't have 'em. Or making barbecue instead of cheeseburgers, although you got to be careful on the sauces, or make your own. Also switching over to Thai (rice noodles, and cheese is practically unused) instead of Italian (wheat based noodles and cheese on or in nearly everything). If your family has to have Italian spaghetti, the best overall noodle we've found is the Quinoa-Corn blend, which just about get the texture/taste/look thing right. Use a marinara or meat sauce and skip the parmasean cheese, or there is that soy stuff if you can put up with it.

Keep in mind that "Vegan" or "Soy-Based" does not necessarily guarantee that there isn't casein or gluten in it, so buyer beware, and read the labels. Also, "Dairy-Free" or "Lactose Free" doesn't have any bearing on casein's presence at all. Dairy free creamer has casein for instance. The rule of thumb on menu items is we don't want to substitute more than one thing, otherwise you have 100% mostly fake food, like the aforementioned pizza like concoction.

You'll find that casein and gluten show up in some crazy unexpected places like some chewing gums, hot dogs and sausage (although if Kosher it's actually okay), sushi, beer and most liquor (not that your kid will have to worry about that for a while - although if you're going to whole heartedly as well, wine is fine, so is tequila and potato vodka, although most vodkas are actually grain now, so good luck finding it), and then doesn't appear in some places you would expect like butter (although that's open for debate - strictly trace amounts, but if you want to be strict about it perhaps you may want to use margerine), eggs, about 70% and above dark chocolate, and my longtime favorite cookie, coconut macaroons.

A couple tips - Lucy wasn't very big on the soy milk (as you can tell, neither was I - plain flavor is mostly for cooking, vanilla or chocolate is for drinking), so we tried Almond Milk instead and she seems to like that much better, although I find all of it way too watery and kind of funky for my tastes. Also get the orange juice with the calcium & vitamin D added, so that nutrient need doesn't go unanswered, and a vitamin becomes less necessary.

Getting groceries becomes a little like reading "War And Peace" what with all the labels, and even less interesting at that. And good luck finding ANYTHING ready to eat that is GFCF in the freezer section, save maybe french fries, and a few of the "Amy's" brand freezer foods, and even at that you gotta check the labels. Even with the pain in the butt it is to find, and the small dietary sacrifices (all the BBQ I want?!?), it very well appears to be worth it with our daughter.

I have AS and I had a speech delay until I was four. However, I said my first word (blanket) when I was about ten months old and I read the words, "thank you", off of a trashcan when I was three. But I would only say one or two words per year until I went to speech school when I was four. Since then, I haven't shut up! lol

This may be a completely stupid question, but what exactly is gluten and how exactly would it help to remove it from a diet?

Gluten is a binding protein (think of it like a glue - it holds the bread together) in wheat, oats, barley, and rye that in some people's brains seems to get in there and "gum up the works", at least that's the theory in play, which doctors won't outright dismiss, but generally won't get full force endorsement, kind of like vitamins. To put it more succinctly avoiding it in diets of children and adults with PPD's has kind of met the level where it no longer considered pure quackery or snake oil, but still isn't so mainstream that you can find decent substitute products at your local grocery store, as my previous post pointed out. Avoiding gluten, and it's cousin, casein (in dairy products like milk and cheese which is specifically made of casein, but not eggs, and only trace amounts in butter) removes what can only be described as sort of a dopamine effect, like being a little doped up. It's no cure or cause for any of the PPD's, but helps in some cases, as it seems to have with our daughter.

My daughter and I are gluten and casein free. My daughter is 13, undiagnosed but pretty sure she has aspergers. She was having a lot of stomach aches and gas and just did not look well...pale and her hair looked dull and she often had a rash on her face. I read about the diet and thought I would try it. Definitely helped the stomach troubles immediately and she looks more healthy and no rash. It also helped a bit with irritability and sensory things. We tried reintroducing gluten because our dr. wanted to do a blood test for celiac and you have to be actively eating gluten to have the test be accurate. The very next day she was complaining of stomach pain and had a rash and was very irritable. So...we have been strict with it since then.

Sandy

I am just starting on a gluten free diet.

I also heard about antioxidants we've added more chocolate and tea to our diet!>less symptoms!!yay

No, but that's what the doctors will tell you. I'm quite high-functioning, but I talked late; I didn't speak in anything more than one- or two-word phrases until I was six years old. Late onset of verbal communication is the defining difference between high-functioning autism and Asperger's Syndrome, but many people think that distinction is arbitrary and meaningless.