Getting started with antivirals

[Guest guest]

Hi ,

I was a bit afraid that this might happen. Sorry about that. I'm in the middle

of writing a

document that outlines a couple of paths that one can take to get started with

antivirals.

Right now we're in the middle of what I would call some " green light thinking "

on the

underlying mechanisms of antiviral therapy based on some of the natural products

that we

are beginning to see good things from.

A Brief Overview

We started the group in November of 2005 and it is the third fastest growing

autism group

started on in 2005. The top two are Kirby's Evidence of Harm, and

Dr.

McCandless' Autism_LDN group. I was asked by parents to start this group after

the LA

DAN! Conference when I presented antiviral therapies at the DAN!, and presented

videos at

the Physician's Training and the Nurses Training. I also presented our group

data on both

antiviral therapy and Nasal MB12 at the recent DAN! Think Tank in Washington.

I am not a doctor. I am a parent of a child who recovered on Valtrex and I am

an adult

with ADHD and IBS that I learned to manage with methylcobalamin nasal spray. I

am also

the producer www.recoveryvideos.com which includes 26 public videos showing

recoveries

of children and adults from autism and chronic illness. I own two private

schools that

include special needs children in the typical classroom and use simple health

oriented

diets and natural methods to recover children from chronic illness and to help

typical

children grow up healthy, alert, and productive. Lastly, I am the Co-Chairman

of Hand in

Hand Child and Family Development Center in Encino, CA, a Regional Center

Provider of

Speech, OT, PT, and behavioral therapies. Prior to my son being ill, my

background was in

software and technology.

In all of my positions I DO NOT TAKE ANY MONEY FROM ANYONE regarding my work in

autism and chronic health issues. My school collects tuition from government

funded

families and a low fee for school tuition for paying clients, but no family with

autism is

charged any more than a typical family (and families with autism have free

access to GF/CF

and SCD diets at the school and many other services) and no family outside of my

school

is charged anything for my work. I do not do private consulting for a fee. I

also do not

receive any revenue from any company or individual for referrals. I have made a

conscious

decision not to take money from anyone affected by autism or chronic illness so

there is

not any perceived conflict of interest in my work and the greatest number of

people can

learn from what we do.

About The Group - Fast Forwarding to Today

Since we know a little about how the natural products work, we are able to start

speculating about some of the underpinnings of our kids particular

impairments.... but

this is really a preliminary discussion, and at this point we probably know just

enough to

talk out loud with half of what we say being inaccurate.... it's just

brainstorming, but I

think it's a very important discussion. It's how many of us learn. It's how

discoveries are

made IMO. These types of open discussions don't always take place in the

medical

community, IMO, because of the fear of a doctor or researcher looking silly or

stupid. We,

on the other hand are silly and stupid more often, but in the midst of that we

seem to

make discoveries before some others.

That said, there are really four major elements to this group and when you read

a post

you'll likely see one or more of these elements in it:

1. Brainstorming and Research - Folks who " talk out loud " about ideas, research,

and

publications.

2. Antiviral trials and experiences - Parents who try an antiviral approach and

share their

experience.

3. Methylcobalamin trials and experiences - Parents who try MB12 Nasal Spray (or

shots or

other alternatives) and talk about their experience.

4. Other related research, trials, and experiences.

We have sort of lumped the 4 together in one group because they are what helped

recover

both my son and I (and now many others) from autism and ADHD, so they have

become

my passions. That said, I also believe they are connected together and are two

of the least

publicized and effective therapies for autism and chronic illness.

The group seems to work in waves. Sometimes members are sharing nothing but

their

trial experience like, " I just started _____ and here is what happened.. " or

" My child is

doing amazing and I've been doing this____ "

In the last few weeks, we've seen more brainstorming than anything, so for

someone

coming in for the first time looking for a place to start, the group doesn't

appear that

accessible, but it is. You just need to do what you did, which is say, " Nice

conversation

folks, but where do I begin? "

The recent brainstorming and research about why some natural antivirals are

working and

what other natural products may work. Most of us have the public or private

desire not to

use medicine if we don't have to for one of possibly many reasons... money,

possible side

effects, possibly just not wanting to invest in the drug companies, the

challenge to get a

script from a doctor (which has its pros and cons, and I'm not " anti-doctor " by

any

means... and " anti-unevolved doctor " ), or some people just live in areas where

some

medicines are just not readily available.

My view about this has changed a bit. I look at naturals and medicines and

choose what is

the most effective without bias either way (as long as they are safe). I am

actually a bit

biased towards natural, although you may not notice that since I often advocate

for a

medicine in antiviral therapy if I feel it is the best option. I personally

don't focus my first

priority on costs. I care more about what works best regardless of where it

comes from.

Some more recent members may be more biased towards naturals, while other folks

that

have been here longer have been focusing on Valtrex. Some of the Valtrex users

have

already have recovered children and no longer consistently post. (Some of those

folks you

can read about in the FILES section of our group under Valtrex posts.)

These mixes of people on the list make the discussion more rich and interesting,

and

ultimately challenges all of us to continue to learn.

Most of us here respect both types of therapies. In time we'll learn more. The

question of

what to start with and what to introduce next is still mostly theoretical at

this point. One

of my goals is to coordinate a clinical study comparing Valtrex along with the

natural

therapies to see what works best, in what order, and with whom.

I may get a little snappy here and there to try to challenge our thinking, or to

question the

safety of a new idea or therapy, or to just help keep us from going too far off

from the

focus of the group at times. Looking closely, some newer folks are also still

getting

comfortable with me after I came back from a four week leave. To some I may

appear new

to the group, but I really enjoy the discussion and I'm learning everyday and

I'm enjoying

myself.

I think the recent discussions are really important. The group is developing

new life with

new individuals that are IMO, parental leaders in new ideas and creative

thinking, and it is

changing the dynamics of the group in a good way.

That said, let me see if I can summarize where I would begin without taking up

too much

of your time...

Where To Begin

Just about everything we are talking about regarding antivirals has the same

basic,

successful formula

Taking care of the gut (diet and an antifungal strategy) + Antivirals (medicine

or naturals)

= benefits for many children

Mostly what we banter about is different strategies that might work differently

and

possibly (hopefully) better. In the end, IMO, this will likely turn out to be

like cancer

treatment (which unfortunately I learned a lot about this month), where there

are different

flavors of treatment that will work on different children. Everyone here

respects the

different approaches we are talking about, so we are just discussing different

agents

(medicine or natural) and how they may be working for our kids. Ultimately,

most of these

approaches are very safe and relatively proven to be non-invasive. I strongly

believe that

antiviral therapy is safer than chelation... and chelation, for the most part,

has a pretty

safe track record, although I had my experience of feeling like I wanted to die

when I did it

as a test to see how it would feel before I decided not to do it to my son, but

we'll talk

about that another time.

How to get started

A simple strategy is to first decision about your antifungal strategy.

Personally I believe

the safest, simplest and most effective agents for this is using oral Diflucan,

or Nizoral

(and I sometimes mention amphotericin . They are very effective and they have

a proven

track record of safety to not be relatively non-toxic. Others opt to try

naturals and some

have success with products like Candex, or Caprilic Acid, Biotin, Grape Seed

Extract (GSE)

and a growing list of things that I will put in my introduction letter I will

hopefully finish

this weekend.

Personally, if I was just getting started today, based on my personal philosophy

of going

what is most effective and not caring what the administration was, meaning I

don't mind

using a medicine as long as it's one that is science based, safe, proven,

non-toxic, and

effective, then I would start with either Diflucan or Nizoral (or my third

choice

Amphotericin . Additionally, there is recent research that shows that these

medicines

are helping a large set of our kids who have testosterone issues, and I won't

get into the

details in this post, but normalizing testosterone seems to be a major factor in

lowering

bacteria levels, raising glutathione levels and this activity may be a very

important element

of a good portion of our children's recovery. So bascially, IMO, you are safely

covering two

bases with one therapy.

If you are one of those folks who wants to go all natural, and don't mind the

risk that

some of the naturals may not work as well for your child, then exploring the

list of

naturals may make sense to you. I feel we will come up with a list of naturals

to use and

figure out what works best for what child, but right now it's a bit of a trial

and error

scenario, but an important one because if we can figure it out it will save a

lot of people

money and headaches in dealing with doctors... Rx's etc.

But, again... today if I was just getting started I would go with Diflucan or

Nizoral.

Next is the antiviral agent.

After a lot of thinking... today I believe the place to start if you can afford

it or have

insurance is Valtrex. While we have seen gains with natural agents, we do not

have more

than handful of possible recoveries from them yet. Yes, we have a growing list

of

improvements, but comparatively I have 50 pages of children who have greatly

improved

or recovered from the use of Valtex. My son being one of them. He continually

improved

on Valtrex and was off the spectrum in a matter of months. He was on Valtrex

for a total

of 9 months and has been free of any biomedical therapies for more than year

now. And

this was a metals toxic child with physical and behavioral impairments, so he

not only

recovered virally but he also detoxed and cleared his gut issues in a more

natural way,

through antiviral therapy. In the last few months we've confirmed that there is

a metals

dumping effect with Valtrex for at least some people, my son was one, we have

test results

of before and after on others.

We also know that Valtrex modulated adenosine. Many of our kids have high or

low

adenosine levels and prior to Dr. Sid Baker publishing his study results about

acyclovir and

adenosine, we didn't have another therapy for this. Valtrex quickly converts

into acyclovir,

but the added values of Valtrex is that it is less toxic, more bioavailable and

it crosses the

blood brain barrier, which is where our kids often have inflammation, (according

to the

's Hopkins study that came out last year and also mentioned recently in Time

Magazine).

Both Valtrex and the Naturals often result in what we call a healing-regression,

which is a

period of time when the child is healing but looks like they are regressing. It

is similar to

a die off effect, but at the same time we believe there is metals detox going on

as well as

immune system and metabolic restoration from the methylation changes and the

lessening

of the viral load. There also seems to be an increase in fungus during

antiviral therapy

and initially there is probably a kill off of this new fungus. The process is

often greatly

lessened by having the antifungal in place prior to starting the antiviral.

This healing-

regression typically lasts 20 to 40 days. Some folks also report never see a

regression and

only see gains...

A SMALLER MINORITY of folks experience the regression for more than 40 days and

folks

in that situation often go to a lower dosage, take a break and return later, or

possibly the

best option move to another agent like Famvir or Acyclovir which seem to work

more

slowly and then try Valtrex again after a period of time. We've seen some nice

posts from

parents who worked through really difficult cases with this strategy and I

applaud them.

What you don't want to IMO, is try an agent like Famvir or Acyclovir first,

because you may

trigger the virus to mutate or build a bit of resistance (this is just my

observation). Lastly,

some of these folks who have had a healing regression longer than 40 days might

move

off of Valtrex at that point, switch to an Natural like OLE or Virastop for

while and then

move back to Valtrex (or try both) if their child doesn't have a full recovery

with the

Natural (which I have not seen a report of a recovery from a natural yet...

although we've

seen nice improvements).

After the healing-regression and the typical gains we see thereafter, if you see

consistent

gains that look like you are recovery bound, like in the case of my son, I would

not change

anything. If you see gains and then a plateau, I would consider ADDING a

natural like OLE.

Then if you continue to see gains I would not change anything or I might try

adding

Virastop and seeing what happens.

One you have this part of your viral strategy under control, the next step would

be to

consider therapies that flush out Measles virus, which include a two day High

Dose Vitamin

A trial, and then Lauricidin.

The group (and hopefully your good DAN! doc) will help you with the nuances of

each

strategy, but I think this is a good framework to start with. I'm not a doctor.

I'm not a

PhD., but I do have the unique perspective of having the position of reading the

thousands

of posts and hundreds of trials from this group, and also of having a recovered

child.

Thank you for your question. It helped me clear up some of my thinking and I'll

use some

of this post in my framework for a " How to get started " document.

Welcome, good luck, and keep us posted on your progress and questions.

All the best,

- Stan

> > >

> > > Stan,

> > >

> > > I'm not suggesting all antivirals at once. But I am suggesting

> (as

> > > Andy Cutler has suggested, and I respect his opinion enormously)

> > > that antivirals work by different mechanisms, and that fact can

> be

> > > used to our benefit. Also, most of our kids would seem to have

> more

> > > than one virus at work in them, perhaps even viruses we haven't

> > > identified as problematic (our bodies are absolutely filled with

> > > viruses--the vast majority cause no problems whatsoever). While

> > > researching this, I spoke to a number of parents who had tried

> > > either Valtrex or the other one I can never remember how to

> spell,

> > > but with little result.

> > >

> > > All these things lead me to believe that for a good number of our

> > > kids, a multiple approach is best. And not one after another, or

> in

> > > rotation--which could lead to resistance--but all at once.

> Starting

> > > one at a time, of course, just adding them in. I chose the ones

> I

> > > chose based on what they are supposed to do. VS to attack all

> > > viruses through digesting them. Lauricidin because it can work

> on

> > > measles, which I believe to be a problem. And OLE, because it

> uses

> > > a different mechanism again, and had been used successfully by

> > > people like Dana for a very long time. Sambucol because it seems

> to

> > > do well with flu viruses, which change all the time.

> > >

> > > Anita

>