The different gut bacteria in autistic individuals may be...

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Thank you for being a voice of reason, Adamantium. I agree.

Again, you have misunderstood the points I am making, arguing with a straw man. Ironically these straw men are exactly the same ones I just pointed out. You have not engaged me in any of the points I raise. How do you expect people to engage you in intelligent conversation when you do this? How do you expect people to take your opinions seriously when you repeatedly prove you are incapable of the simplest act of critical thinking?

For the third time, human biochemistry is very complex. Something that purports to act in one pathway will almost certainly affect others at least some of the time. To quote the MHRA: http://www.mhra.gov.uk/Safetyinformatio ... fmedicines
(my emphasis)

I did not say "either you are in intensive care or you are not sick", I said "either you are in intensive care with some very specific symptoms or you are not suffering from invasive candidiasis". If you and your brother do indeed have lifelong invasive candidiasis then at some point in your life a doctor would have requested a blood sample and identified it. As it is, you maintain you had a condition requiring intensive treatment that affects 8 in 100,000 people, mostly the severely immunocompromised, without a shred of evidence. Sorry, but no informed reasonable person would believe that.

I don't care whether you think your implausible treatment has helped you. I care that a scientifically illiterate person is advocating treatments that are probably just overcomplicating living a healthy lifestyle, potentially dangerous, possibly no better than placebo, and certainly pseudoscientific, to desperate and vulnerable people, many of whom are also scientifically illiterate. Whilst I don't think your suggested treatments are likely to be as dangerous as vaccine denialism, it's the same issue. Go through your post and imagine it is written by someone who thought their kid's autism symptoms got worse after vaccination, as a result of vaccination.

whatamess is likely referencing trying the basic diet protocol I ate. I'd also recommend using epsom salt lotion on your skin, too. (which I did first while avoid salicylate acids.)

Of course the gut microbiome is complicated. And it's being studied. There are fewer types of bacteria in autistics & specific ones have been identified. Here's an article: http://www.autismspeaks.org/science/sci ... t-bacteria I remember reading another article that said there were 3 specific strains identified as missing from the guts of autistics - but I can't seem to find it right now.

Re detoxing the digestive tract via "exotic" enemas - afaik I didn't do anything that has never been done before. There's a lot of info online about doing high volume enemas, colonics, herbal enemas, coffee enemas, and yes - I even read up on doing ACV and garlic infused enemas. Others may not have used the exact same blend of herbal teas I've used, but I'm certainly not the first person on the planet to do any/all of these things. The only way someone could do themselves harm is to use unsanitary equipment or water, too hot of temperature, not enough salts to maintain electrolyte balance, or too high of concentration of ACV or garlic as I did once each & described in my post. Here, a google search for coffee enema yields 505,000 results: https://www.google.ca/#q=coffee+enema & there are some great articles and youtube interview videos about it. Herbal stuff you'll find online, too. I have posted links to sites with info about herbal enemas before. Google it, I didn't make this stuff up - I simply read & learned about it and tried it for myself and then shared the results here. Same with probiotic enemas. It wasn't something I dreamt up. As for judging what is/isn't safe when exploring this.. I read info from others online. Also, common sense says not to use boiling hot or ice cold water, anything dirty or contaminated, and nothing too harsh - i.e. I can't imagine using jalapeños lol, but hey, diluted enough if they were found to be effective I would consider it.. but for pretty obvious reasons it's not on my list of things to try.

I can see how doctors would want to have huge amounts of information before prescribing specific bacteria to treat specific ailments, just like they want study results before prescribing marijuana for anything because they're worried about potential liability issues of prescribing things they don't have enough info on to make sure they can't get sued. In reality, countless marijuana smokers already know what the effects of the drug are, that it's safe, and what various strains do for them when consumed in a variety of ways. Yet doctors are still reluctant to prescribe it because they fear being held accountable for some unforeseen negative consequence that they don't have info on to mitigate that risk. Same goes for probiotics, I suppose.. and I comprehend that, however, like marijuana smokers people have been safely altering their gut bacteria for thousands of years via diet - consuming yoghurt, kefir, sauerkraut, probiotic supplement capsules, kombucha, kimchi, and various other fermented vegetables etc with mostly positive results. I say mostly positive because I have noticed that if I overdo the probiotics I can become a bit nervous/anxious and have slightly jittery hands as if I drank a few cups of coffee - but that affect wears off over a period of several hours. Very minor side effects considering the benefits. I'm still a work in progress and will continue to experiment on myself with various strains, quantities, delivery methods etc until I find just the right balance to maintain that works for me. It's a relatively risk free treatment since any side effects are very very minor and short lived.

PS I do like that you have intelligent questions & concerns about all of this stuff and have voiced them here in a proper discussion.

Fear of being bored to death from reading the same old crap about "natural" therapies, week in, week out.

I put some crankpot on ignore on a Crohn's forum yesterday, because I couldn't take his drivel about Wild Oregano Oil any longer. There's a much longer backstory to it than that, but basically this guy has distorted his own experiences to make his remission seem far more impressive than it really is.

He's not alone, sadly, but he is one of the more obnoxious examples. I'd certainly take goldfish21 over him, but, truth is, I'm absolutely bored to tears of it all after seeing it for the past five years on the Crohn's and UC forums I browse on.

I'm perfectly capable of critical thinking, as portrayed by my posts. Your insult is unfounded & quite rude. I think it is you that needs to review your post in light of what I said about your rigid thinking & rethink how you come across to others telling them that something can either be one way or the other with no room for anything else in between. That sort of black and white or all or nothing thinking is quite common by those on the spectrum, so I do understand why you're thinking the way you are. I'm merely pointing out that you're thinking that way and your thinking is flawed. There's a lot more grey area to things than you realize, or are willing to admit.

Of course human biochemistry is complex. I never said it was not.

See my post above. I listed some minor side effects of using too high of concentrations of some herbal/natural medicines as well as probiotics. The side effects are short lived minor annoyances (vomiting as a worst case scenario, as I posted about originally, and nervousness/jittery hands.) vs. life threatening.

If you were to meet myself and my twin brother, you'd note that his skin is quite yellow in comparison to mine - IMO jaundiced from said bacterial/fungal infection affecting his liver function. (he does not drink or smoke, ever in his life.) You'd also notice differences in behavioural symptoms. I used to be way way worse than him, now while he's still able to function in life, he's definitely worse than I am by a long shot - not because he's gotten much worse himself, but because I've gotten so much better.

At no point in my life has my GP, or any other doctor, noticed this ailment & requested a blood sample to test anything for it. Doctors are not infallible. They do not know everything. They don't notice everything.

I don't know where you get this figure that the level of infection I had qualifies me as one of 8/100K people. From what I've read, 70% of Americans have intestinal imbalances to some degree or another. That's a whole lot more than 0.00008%. Again, I believe this is your very rigid all or nothing thinking coming through here in stating that either I was deathly ill or was not sick at all. Neither. I was quite ill, but did not require hospitalization.

I've shared what my symptoms were, what I've learned, what I've done about it & what the results have been. You're free to not believe me, or to believe me, to try it or not - they're your decisions to make. But to slam me for sharing what I have and trying to help others alleviate the same symptoms is.. not very nice. You're not obligated to support what I've shared, but to suggest that I should keep it to myself and not want to share it with others it can help is something I'm going to continue to ignore. Put yourself in my shoes for a moment.. if you'd achieved what I have, wouldn't you want to share it with others so that they may benefit from it if they're willing and wanting to try it for themselves? It's not as if I'm advocating doing anything dangerous or lethal. Epsom salt lotion and a healthy diet w/ no junk food and plenty of herbs/spices & chicken soup aren't exactly harmful things for people to do. You may not believe me, you may think what I do is "gross" and are thus opposed, but you're not saving anyone from anything that could realistically be considered harmful by voicing your opposition.

Sigh... I am very wary of making you feel like you are personally being attacked, because it will only make your views more entrenched and you less open to criticism of your ideas, but if you keep attacking me then I'm going to push back...

This very paragraph shows you are incapable of critical thinking. I am not exhibiting black and white thinking.

Persistently, whenever someone points out that you've said something stupid, you say "you just don't understand because you're still autistic! You have no empathy/think in black and white/a special interest in proving me wrong!"

Nope, you don't understand other people's points because you seemingly cannot think critically (or if you can, then you don't do it very often). You certainly don't seem to be stupid as you are capable of sticking to a rigorous, unenjoyable and demanding diet, which also shows you are disciplined and self-aware. However, you have had ideas such as the placebo effect, regression to the mean, the burden of proof, medical diagnosis of candidiasis, anecdote v data, RCTs, the post hoc fallacy, confirmation bias, the Dunning-Kruger effect, and other simple concepts explained to you, sometimes multiple times, and you show little sign that you understand more than a couple of them, generally just handwaving them away. You frequently misunderstand the points that other people make, you speak in non-sequiturs, you don't engage with criticism - you've never said something along the lines of "I understand that the placebo effect can do powerful and dramatic things, however I don't think this is a placebo because the work of Faulks et al. shows that dietary changes do not usually have a placebo effect". You should little appreciation for nuance, rarely if ever qualifying your statements (you'll notice I am nearly always careful to qualify my statement, which makes your accusation that I think in black and white particularly bizarre). You dismiss rigorous scientific papers if they don't support your conclusions, but will happily taken an unsourced blog post as fact if a few sentences support you.

This is not an unjustified, rude attack. This is factual, substantiated criticism. It is quite common in humans, and I am certainly guilty of some of these things from time to time, but you have extremely entrenched, unsupported views on this

I didn't say you did say it. I explained to you because you seemed baffled by the idea that side effects were somehow necessary.


If you had invasive candidiasis since birth then at some point you would have stumbled into A&E with organ failure and been prescribed IV antifungal agents, which you would probably have needed to take in intensive care. Organ failure isn't something you miss, just as you don't miss when your patient is having a cardiac arrest.

From the CDC.


That's very different from what you claimed to have (invasive candidiasis). To go back to the lung cancer analogy, you say you had lung cancer but cured it using the power of positive thinking. I ask if you were ever diagnosed, you say "no, but my friend said lots of people get it, and anyway 98% of Americans will have a respiratory disease at some point in their life!"

Unbalanced diets can be dangerous. Enemas can be dangerous. And of course you've also been advocating against vaccines and GM foods, both good things (even if you do actually support them, you certain have not come out and said "yeah vaccines are good, my bad" after posting anti-vax articles).

See, there you go again. You can't understand that people may genuinely think you haven't got enough evidence to make the claims you are making in every third post you make. You think everyone who disagrees with you must be acting in bad faith, they simply don't believe you or they think you're disgusting.

Hopefully some of the users on here who haven't developed their critical thinking skills yet will learn from seeing users point out the mistakes you make. Heck, hopefully next time you read an unscientific smear piece, you'll think "hold on, there's no control group!" or some other appropriate thought.

It is of course very good of you to try and help other people, but if you really cared about helping people then you'd try and engage with people who make helpful remarks rather than just dismissing us or attacking us. I understand that you have a very keen interest in your diet, you've invested a lot of time and energy into it and it is disheartening to see people suggest that you might not have really cured autism, but you need to try to take criticism on board.

If I developed a special interest in how the colour purple cured my autism, then you said "but actually this has been studied and purple doesn't provide an additional benefit to people at all", I'd quickly become a laughing stock if I clung to my beliefs regardless, and went around recommending to everyone that they paint their living quarters purple.

Really? Either organ failure & intensive care or someone doesn't have a systemic fungal infection? Really? That's not black & white or all or nothing thinking? ..interesting interpretation. We'll have to agree to disagree on this.



I haven't said anything stupid & don't appreciate your insults.



I comprehend what scientific and medical studies are just fine. I also comprehend what the placebo effect is. I've transparently told you that my experience is not a placebo effect. I've observed physical masses passed out of my digestive tract & experienced the neurological - mental & physical - benefits of the treatment protocol I've followed. I haven't merely read about someone else' experience on their blog and taken it to be factual. I've lived this myself and have reported my own experiences. I'm not sure how you still don't seem to comprehend that.



You can justify it all you want to yourself, but saying I've said stupid things among other things is rude whether you realize it or not. Again, I accept that your rudeness may simply be symptomatic of your Autism & forgive you for it - but I do think you should take that feedback as critical & constructive and perhaps tailor the way you speak/type to others in a way that doesn't insult or offend them whenever possible.



I listed minor side effects. There don't seem to be any serious ones unless someone were to truly do something stupid as I described above - i.e. using boiling water or far too high of concentrations or something of the sort.



I've never used the phrase "invasive candidiasis," you have. If that's the scientific name given to extreme dysbiosis to the point of organ failure and intensive care hospitalization, then I didn't get that bad. Candida, to me, seems to be an invasive species and the name may be more broadly applicable. Again, you're being very all-or-nothing in your thinking in stating that I either had an extreme case w/ organ failure or didn't have it at all.



You're the one who said "invasive candidiasis," not me. I said candidiasis/systemic fungal infection that affected multiple organs, but I never ever said that I had organ failure or required hospitalization. Quit putting words in my mouth.



ANY extremely unbalanced diet of any sort could be dangerous. Eating veggies, herbs, and chicken soup is not. MOST people's diets are unbalanced and unhealthy. Take a look at your average American for proof. The diet I've followed is much healthier than the typical obese American's, that's for damned sure.

Further, I qualified my stance against GMO's due to their sky high salicylate acid content & the fact that the majority of those on the spectrum are sensitive to SA's. I haven't posted anti-vaccine stuff save for what was also mentioned in articles I posted about the gut-brain/dysbiosis/probiotic link to autism.



Once again: Just because you don't believe me doesn't make me a liar. Further to that, stating that you don't believe me doesn't disprove anything I've shared. All it shows is that you don't believe what I'm telling you that I've done and experienced. Nothing you've posted has disproved or "debunked," as you like to say, one single thing I've said. All you've stated over and over is that you don't believe me.. and that's fine - like I said right from the get-go, don't take my word for it - try what I've done for yourself and you'll know within a matter of days or a few short weeks if it's going to be very beneficial for you (you, as in others reading this, not specifically you only.) as it has for me. There really is no other way for anyone else to KNOW for certain whether something will or won't work for them, IMO. You're free to try it, or not, it doesn't affect my life one iota. I just find it slightly annoying that you persistently tell me that what has worked for me can't possibly have worked for me - because it has; and I'm living a second life for it.

I take this as further evidence for my theory of autism that it's the combination of "root autism" with aggravating symptoms and psychodynamics (not in the Freudian sense, mind you). The gut problems isn't the autism, but it causes some symptoms to be more severe. Reducing the gut problems does not cure the autism, but makes symptoms less severe, where-ever the aloofness came from, it's still there. I think this is good course to further study.

I'd love to see an aloof mouse.

Yes, this is exactly what I've been saying for about a year.. it's either caused, or exacerbated by, the digestive issues - and likely the latter. I still definitely have ASD traits & symptoms, but they are nowhere near as strong as they were and I'm back to life and work like never before. My best guess is genetic predisposition + intestinal dysbiosis = ASD symptoms. I also think that there may be some sort of fault in the enteric nervous system in addition to differences in the brain itself. In time I bet these things are researched and we eventually have the sorts of scientific results that please the uber analytical folks like The Walrus vs. anecdotal evidence from people like me.

In October I took a strong course of antibiotics, then symptoms returned.. I noticed some of them and in the moment wondered why I was thinking & feeling as I was, but quickly forgot about it. Then a list of behaviours and incidents were pointed out to me and it was an ah-ha! moment of realizing that the antibiotics had undone the good I was doing for myself and caused ASD symptoms to return/be amplified again. I'm working my way back to the balance I was at before the round of drugs and am probably about 80% or so of the way there. In time I'll be back on top of my game and performing even better again.

As I've said before, I've pretty much dropped the negative symptoms and maintained the positive ones for a win-win. I'm a lot less idiot & a little more savant. Instead of feeling like I have great ideas and potential "if only.." I can actually DO things & work towards my bigger goals in life, business, sports, and relationships. I truly am living a second life for having done this & am grateful beyond words for the impact my Herbalist friend and his Naturopathic Doctor father have had on my life.

PS I'd just like to add that I have absolutely zero ulterior motive to lie about any of this. There's nothing in it for me. I'm not selling anything. I'm not selling information or advice or herbs or lotions or supplements etc. I'm very simply just sharing what has had such a miraculous result for me & I'm willing to chat on the forums, pm, email etc with anyone who cares to learn or try any of this stuff. I'm persistent in sharing it because I truly believe this can help more than just me in very big ways, and of course, I hope that it does & others can begin working on their own success stories with whatever their goals are in life that ASD symptoms may be constraining them from achieving. That's it that's all.

I'm happy for you, reading about how your life is so much better than before. There is nothing wrong with sharing that with us here. However you're taking this a step further by portraying yourself as some kind of miracle worker who can teach others to do the same.

You seem to know what's best for you. How do you know what's best for me, or any other stranger you meet online? Are you a qualified expert? Different people have different dietary needs and medical conditions. If I send you a PM asking for advice, are you going to tailor a specific diet that best fits my needs? Will I need to fill out a form with my medical history, allergies, etc.?

Why are you trying to coerce people to PM you for specific dietary advice? You say you've helped yourself, but how do you know for sure you can help other people this way? Do you have an established history of helping anyone else by giving specific dietary advice over the internet?

I've never once called myself a miracle worker. I referred to my own symptom relief results as miraculous - because the changes have been that significant for me. I can certainly teach anyone to cook, make, or prepare any of the recipes I've been making for myself if they'd like to try them - from the lotion I use, to soup I make, or the waffles I just made today out of mostly organic sunflower seeds & some brown rice to keep them very low carb w/ a decent amount of protein.

I'm not so sure I know what's best for me, because there's always room for improvement. I certainly know what's been much MUCH better for me, though. I've never stated that this is best for you, or anyone else. I've stated how good it has been for me & suggested that others try it for themselves to see if it alleviates the same symptoms for them as it has me. It really is that simple. I've shared my experience, I've never claimed to have any sort of qualification to assess anyone else.

If you sent me a pm I would send you the info of exactly what I've done for myself and what it's done for me, along with some recipes I've used for foods, teas, lotion etc. It's up to you to know not to eat peanuts if you're lethally allergic to peanuts. etc. Again, as I've said for nearly a year now, I've only shared what has worked for me. You're free to try it for yourself if you like, or don't, it doesn't change my life any either way.

I'm not trying to coerce people to pm me for specific/custom tailored dietary advice. I'm making an open offer to share what's worked for me. Also, some people have pm'd me to discuss what I think they might be able to do with $x food budget & what things are the best "bang for your buck." Perhaps they don't want to discuss those things on the open forum. Others have pm'd regarding recipes, or alternatives they might try replacing things in their diet with. Some may message me because they don't want to skim through the 22 pages I wrote to try to find one specific piece of info they can't recall at the moment. Also, there's the gross science of high volume enemas/colonics & herbal/salt preparations etc that I'm guessing most people aren't comfortable discussing on the open forum so if they have a question about what I've done or are looking for a link I referenced to info on the subject then they might pm me for that. Maybe others pm just for a little support in their diet/health/fitness goals - I don't pretend to know all of the reasons people pm me for various things about all of this, I'm just making some common sense guesses. I state that people can feel free to pm me about it for a couple reasons.. one, so they know that I'm an open book about it and they can pm me, and two so that we don't end up with conversations like this one derailing threads.

I have helped myself. Obviously I can't be certain this will help you. But I do know that you can find out for yourself by trying it for a matter of a few weeks and seeing if you notice differences in your symptoms, mood, executive functions, and overall ASD level of functioning. Only YOU can possibly ever know if this protocol improves YOUR symptoms, well, save for others observations of you in real life.

Why are you so against me sharing what's improved the very same symptoms in myself as afflict nearly everyone on these forums? Bizarre to me, really. Especially since I'm not selling anything, I'm not asking for anything, and I'm not telling anyone they must do this or anything of the sort. Really, really, bizarre.

Take it or leave it, really. Either you'd try it for yourself and prove/disprove that it works for you as I've shared that it has me, or don't try it and just completely ignore any discussion about it because you don't believe me and/or have no interest in it. And once more: Just because you don't believe me doesn't make me a liar.

Thanks for the clarification. I have no problem with you sharing recipes for chicken soup and I never called you a liar. Have a good night.

You're welcome. Fair enough.
Feel free to pm me for my chicken soup recipe.

Lol, as if I could be grossed out by enemas or colonics. The only thing which offends me about colonic detoxification is what utter scientific BS it is.

Then there’s colonic irrigation. Its proponents will tell you that mischievous plaques of impacted poo can lurk in your colon for months or years and pump disease-causing toxins back into your system. Pay them a small fee, though, and they’ll insert a hose up your bottom and wash them all away. Unfortunately for them – and possibly fortunately for you – no doctor has ever seen one of these mythical plaques, and many warn against having the procedure done, saying that it can perforate your bowel.

Source: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/dec/05/detox-myth-health-diet-science-ignorance?

Try googling YouTube videos of colonoscopies. In a healthy colon, there is nothing there apart from pink, vascularised tissue - no lumps of years-old rotting meat festering away or anything.

I suffer with asd, It's a developmental disorder. It is what it is.